The Personal Statement is our best means of getting to know you and your best means of creating a context for your academic performance. When you write your personal statement, tell us about those aspects of your life that are not apparent from your academic record:
a character-defining momentthe cultural awareness you've developeda challenge faceda personal hardship or barrier overcome
Directions
Choose either Topic 1 or 2. (Maximum length 600 words)
Discuss how your family's experience or cultural history enriched you or presented you with opportunities or challenges in pursuing your educational goals.
- OR -
Tell us a story from your life, describing an experience that either demonstrates your character or helped to shape it.
The limit is 600 words.
A little less than two years ago, I moved to China. Even before I came here, I made up my mind not to create new relationships here because I knew they would come to an end when I left this place. It would leave me with more scars than I had from having to leave the people and environment I grew up in. I came to China with only a year and a half left of high school. I thought all my hard work participating in my church leadership praise team and school dance/drill team had gone to waste because of just one decision made by my parents. What I didn't know was that I would be learning so much more than what senior year at Redmond High School would ever teach me. I was given a chance and an opportunity that only a few people would ever be privileged enough to have.
Being a Korean American with many Chinese friends, I thought I had more than enough knowledge about the Chinese culture to be able to "fit in." I soon realized that I was wrong. For the first time in my life, I felt like a foreigner, completely alienated from this new society I was immersed in. I learned the importance and power of language when trying to learn a culture. Only through an experience like mine was I able to truly get to know and understand so many new cultures. Each day I spend here, each new person I meet, and every new word I learn, I find out that the "knowledge" I had of different cultures was based on factless rumors and stereotypes. I learned that generalizations and stereotypes could not and should not be made for such a large group of people. Each person has a "culture" of their own.
Being the socially outgoing person I am, after spending 3 months in solitude, I broke my promise of not making new friends and meeting new people. At the time, I was in a city called Suzhou attending a college in the Oversees Department learning Chinese. This gave me the opportunity to meet people from all over the world. At first, I had a hard time approaching them because there was nobody my age. Everyone was older than me and had already graduated high school. Luckily enough, my classmates approached me first and made it easier for me to open up to them. Because of these people, I was able to overcome my depression and learn about cultures from all over the world.
The reason why I came to China was because my parents didn't want me to live on my own. However, I have been living in a dormitory in Beijing approximately 641 miles away from my parents for nine months. Here, I must act as my own teacher because I attend a school that follows a homeschooling curriculum. At first, I had a very difficult time adjusting to this program because I was so used to public education, but now I have learned to become independent in my studies and go the extra mile to find the information that I need. More often than not, I regret coming to China because I ended up living apart from my parents, took a year off from high school to learn Chinese, and have to teach myself things that typical high-schoolers would have taught to them, so I constantly have to remind myself that I am blessed to have this chance to experience the world.
What seemed like a curse at first, I know realize was truly a blessing in disguise. Because I had to start all over from the very bottom to learn the way of life in China, not only was I able to learn more about the world, I also learned more about myself.
a character-defining momentthe cultural awareness you've developeda challenge faceda personal hardship or barrier overcome
Directions
Choose either Topic 1 or 2. (Maximum length 600 words)
Discuss how your family's experience or cultural history enriched you or presented you with opportunities or challenges in pursuing your educational goals.
- OR -
Tell us a story from your life, describing an experience that either demonstrates your character or helped to shape it.
The limit is 600 words.
A little less than two years ago, I moved to China. Even before I came here, I made up my mind not to create new relationships here because I knew they would come to an end when I left this place. It would leave me with more scars than I had from having to leave the people and environment I grew up in. I came to China with only a year and a half left of high school. I thought all my hard work participating in my church leadership praise team and school dance/drill team had gone to waste because of just one decision made by my parents. What I didn't know was that I would be learning so much more than what senior year at Redmond High School would ever teach me. I was given a chance and an opportunity that only a few people would ever be privileged enough to have.
Being a Korean American with many Chinese friends, I thought I had more than enough knowledge about the Chinese culture to be able to "fit in." I soon realized that I was wrong. For the first time in my life, I felt like a foreigner, completely alienated from this new society I was immersed in. I learned the importance and power of language when trying to learn a culture. Only through an experience like mine was I able to truly get to know and understand so many new cultures. Each day I spend here, each new person I meet, and every new word I learn, I find out that the "knowledge" I had of different cultures was based on factless rumors and stereotypes. I learned that generalizations and stereotypes could not and should not be made for such a large group of people. Each person has a "culture" of their own.
Being the socially outgoing person I am, after spending 3 months in solitude, I broke my promise of not making new friends and meeting new people. At the time, I was in a city called Suzhou attending a college in the Oversees Department learning Chinese. This gave me the opportunity to meet people from all over the world. At first, I had a hard time approaching them because there was nobody my age. Everyone was older than me and had already graduated high school. Luckily enough, my classmates approached me first and made it easier for me to open up to them. Because of these people, I was able to overcome my depression and learn about cultures from all over the world.
The reason why I came to China was because my parents didn't want me to live on my own. However, I have been living in a dormitory in Beijing approximately 641 miles away from my parents for nine months. Here, I must act as my own teacher because I attend a school that follows a homeschooling curriculum. At first, I had a very difficult time adjusting to this program because I was so used to public education, but now I have learned to become independent in my studies and go the extra mile to find the information that I need. More often than not, I regret coming to China because I ended up living apart from my parents, took a year off from high school to learn Chinese, and have to teach myself things that typical high-schoolers would have taught to them, so I constantly have to remind myself that I am blessed to have this chance to experience the world.
What seemed like a curse at first, I know realize was truly a blessing in disguise. Because I had to start all over from the very bottom to learn the way of life in China, not only was I able to learn more about the world, I also learned more about myself.