Teaching, Research, Service -- Lehigh and me

Lehigh mission, my mission

@Holt

"Lehigh strives to earn international prominence as a university of special distinction through its integration of teaching, research, and service to society. The integrating element of teaching, research and service is learning, which is the principal mission of all members of the Lehigh community. Our mission of advancing learning has three aspects: teaching, research, service." from Lehigh's website.

Hi Holt,

I will be applying to Lehigh and before I write my supplement I just want to know confirm with you what I will write in my supplement. So Lehigh's mission statement says that they have three aspects to advancing learning(as it says above; it is directly from Lehigh's website). So in high school I did all three of those--

1) Teaching: I was a mentor for the little kids in math.

2) Research: I joined Science Olympiads and did research. I also earned two awards from Cornell and NJIT Science Olympiad.

3) Service: I also helped many international students in my school(they did not know english and I helped them in the classroom and in school).

Lehigh's question is "What do you and Lehigh have in common?" Do you think I can say "Lehigh and I have a common goal of teaching others, being involved in research, and serving people. In high school I have done............(I will say) and so I believe this is what Lehigh and I have in common."

Mualla, the first 2 parts of your outline fall within the prompt requirements. For the service part though, you should think more along the lines of community service and volunteer activities that you did with non profit groups or clubs. Just tutoring students won't be enough to qualify as a commonality because the Lehigh students who practice service activities do so through properly sanctioned organizations and clubs. If you do not have a formal club or organization that you belong to, it will be hard for you to justify that as a commonality that you can continue to undertake as a student at Lehigh. Don't you have any socio-civic activities that could fall under service requirement in this instance? Almost all the other applicants will say the same thing. They tutored other students as a form of service. That will not make your application stand out. That will just make it another common information filled essay for the reviewer to consider. That is the only part of the essay that you should try to develop further with better information.

@Holt

Hi Holt I finished my Lehigh supplement. When you have time could you please take a look at it? Thank you.

PS--Sorry about all the supplements. I am trying to wrap up all the schools I am applying to by January 1st & i if it werent for you i dont know how I would ever finish them.

Ever since I knew it, I have always enjoyed exercising to keep in shape. So, when the Lehigh representative talked about the hills at Lehigh, I imagined myself going up and down those stairs. Two for one: I would go from class to class and build leg muscles at the same time. How cool is that?

As I began to explore Lehigh I discovered a common goal between us--teaching others, taking part in research, and being committed to research.
In high school, I served as a Big Sister mentor for elementary students. It was a struggle to take the attention of the students at first but after going through many articles on kid's behaviors, I decided to engage students with fun educational math games. Through such activities students were excited to learn and improve upon their weaknesses. Lehigh and I both have a common goal of teaching others in a creative manner, that is through involvement.

Next, I was involved in the Science Olympiad team. In tenth grade I took part in many Science Events, one being Anatomy and Physiology where I won 5th place at NJIT University. Similarly, I was assigned the event It's About Time last year, a physics and build project. Participating in such events with my friends allowed me to expand my research skills and work in unity. Like Lehigh, I am dedicated to research and advancing learning through inquiry.

Lastly, I was always involved in interfaith dialogues in my community. As a Turkish American who is the product of the synthesis of the Eastern and Western values, I value different cultures and the promotion of deep mutual understanding. Lehigh goes beyond tolerance to explore all cultures and deeply embraces diversity. We both have a common goal of learning through service to others and appreciating different cultures. I believe I would be able contribute to the well-being of the Lehigh community through "incLUsion" by building bridges with other cultures.

I want to spend my next four years in a community where teaching, research, and service are all part of learning. Lehigh is that place.

This is a very well thought out an developed essay Muallah. My apologies for the delay in responding to you. I had a power outage that kept me from getting online till now. I promise to get to all of your essays for review as soon as I can. Don't worry about all the supplements, I am always here and eager to help you out. January 1? Here we come!

In the paragraph where you discuss your commitment to research, I think that you can add some information about how you plan to spend your time doing research on Lehigh either on a continuing project that you have or simply as a voracious student of research who would research anything from how dust settles on the ground to the application of power bank use on non-usb devices. I know, it sounds crazy, I don't know what i am talking about here, but it's just me talking about how you can better reflect your thirst for continued research using Lehigh's facilities. The increased commonality being that the school encourages research and you are one person who appreciates being pushed to follow up on things of interest to you.

In the last paragraph, I am not sure if you really meant to write the world inclusion with the capital LU. Maybe it was a typo? Anyway, I am pointing it out for possible editing and correction. Just in case you missed it.

@Holt

Holt you make my stress go away!!

Thanks for everything. I really appreciate it.

So, for the Lehigh's supplement I changed up a couple things, including the format, and I tried to include what you told to me but the word count kind of limited me. Right now my supplement is exactly 350 words.

What do you and Lehigh have in common? Please reply with 250-350 words.

Growing up, I always enjoyed exercising to stay in shape. So, when the Lehigh representative talked about the hills at Lehigh, I imagined myself going up and down those stairs. Two for one: I could go to classes and build leg muscles at the same time. How cool is that? As I began to explore Lehigh, I discovered a common goal between us--advancing learning through teaching, research and service to others.

Teaching - In high school, I served as a Big Sister mentor for elementary students. It was a struggle to take the attention of the kids at first, but after going through many articles on kid's behaviors, I decided to engage students with fun, educational math games. Through such activities, students were excited to learn math. I realized engagement in teaching is crucial, as is promoted by Lehigh.

Research - I took part in research in the Science Olympiad team. I joined many Science Events, like Anatomy and Physiology where I learned three human body systems and It's About Time, a physics and building project. Participating in such events with my classmates allowed me to expand my research skills and work in unity. At Lehigh I would be pushed to follow up on things that are of interest to me, from researching how dust settles on the ground to the application of power bank use on non-usb devices. Lehigh and I have a common goal of improving learning through research and collaboration.

Service to others- As a Youth member of the Peace Islands Institute, I have been involved in interfaith dialogues where I was able to meet new people. Being a product of the synthesis of the Eastern and Western values, I value mutual understanding. Lehigh goes beyond tolerance to explore all cultures and deeply embraces diversity. I would be able to contribute to Lehigh through "incLUsion" by building bridges with other cultures. Like Lehigh, I believe in learning through serving others and appreciating different cultures.

I want to spend my next four years in a community where teaching, research, and service are all part of learning. Lehigh is that place.

Hi Mualla, I think that the whole presentation of the essay is very good and offers some solid examples of how these commonalities would benefit you as a student at Lehigh. By the way, I noticed that you used the example I gave you. I did not think it was worth adding to your essay because it sounded so silly. Now that I read it as included with the other text, it did add some humor to the serious essay. So that made the essay lighter to read. I'm glad you thought of it.

The concluding paragraph doesn't feel right to me. It doesn't circle back to the commonalities prompt discussion. Is there some way that you can do that? I could try to do it by saying something like:

College life is hard enough with all of the academic demands placed upon a student. Going to college at a university where life will be made a bit easier for me through our common goals and pursuits would remove some of that stress and increase the enjoyment factor of learning for me. I believe that I found that in Lehigh.

@Holt

Thanks Holt. I believe your suggestion for my last sentences is seriously amazing. I copy pasted that into my supplement. The only problem with that was that the word count went up to approximately 370. My last sentence is definitely weak but I just did not have room. Since the word limit is 350 I had to keep it short. I am trying to work on trying to cut out some parts so that I can put your suggestion for my last paragraph.

Mualla, if i may make a suggestion. You can actually cut the current word count if you will sacrifice your opening statement that discusses the hills that you heard about in relation to exercising on the stairs of Lehigh. It is a throw away paragraph that doesn't really have the same impact upon the reviewer as the successive commonalities description that you have below that. If you delete that, you will have an essay with 281 words in it. Then, if you add my comment as the new opening paragraph, the word count becomes 341. That is with the same closing sentence that you have at the moment. If you develop the essay in that manner, your closing sentence makes more sense because it comes full circle in meeting the discussion of your opening paragraph. Please consider it. I think it will work very well for the essay.