Any feedback/criticism will be good. I wasn't sure can I include my extended essay, is it too "show off"? And for the second essay, do I need to give example for the lesson I had learned from the restaurant? The word limit is 1000 total, right now I have 835... Thank you in advance!
Prompt: Describe the world you come from - for example, your family, community or school - and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations
(Start) When I was three years old, my parents left me and my sister to our grandparents and came to the United States to seek a fortune. For the next ten years, I would never see them again. The only ways I knew them were by looking at their marriage photo that hang in the middle of my room and answering their phone every day. In those ten years, "family" is a word that I refused to talk about with other people. When I was thirteen years old, I finally got a chance to meet with my biological parents. I could not describe my feeling when I stepped out Kennedy airport and saw two strangers ran to me. At first, I did not recognize their faces but only the clothes the man was wearing - it was same cloth that I saw my father was wearing in the photo. In the woman's sallow face where her sunken eyes filled with tears, I could see a lifetime, both full and overwhelming. It made me feel shocked, pity, and sorrow all at once. How could such two young, loving, strong faces have aged and weakened this much! It was then I realized the importance of education; with only elementary education and some high school education, my parents had to leave their family and struggled to make a living and provide a better life for my sister and me. It was then I had a clear vision of my future: a life fulfills not only excitement in the job, but also my dreams of financial security and good relationship with others.
Since then, I started to digging deep down of my soul and tried to find out what my true passion is. However, with a smattering of English, I found myself in the middle of frustration and hopelessness. I devoted myself to every assignment and tried to translate every single word into Chinese to understand the material. During those time, I became in love with mathematics. It is a universal language and my ability to solve problems helped me gain confidence and strength as I learned English as a second language. Also, when I recalled back to my middle school in China, I found myself had become fascinated by math since then. I remember at the first lesson of geometry, I did a simple activity in which I drew many dots as closely as possible and they became a line and then several lines became a plane. I was amazed to discover that everything in the world started as a dot. I always feel that adventure of math fills me with joy and enthusiasm. I feel thirst about math, so I have completed every problem in the Math Higher Level textbook even though my teacher had not ask to. My extended essay of "The importance of Prime Numbers in RSA Cryptography" enhanced my interest in mathematics as I found out the amazing practical use of math in our daily life. I can always picture myself, in the future, struggling on but also intriguing by a single math problem and in the end come to a sudden realization with appreciation of beauty and elegance of solution. (End)
Nope. You did not properly answer the prompt. The first half of the essay actually portrayed the world that you came from but did not continue into the second part of the prompt. Your response deviated from the provided question at that point and did not really explain how the world that you came from shaped the person you have become today. How did this separation from your family help shape your dreams and aspirations? What lessons did you learn about family, survival, or traits that you developed because of the way you were separated from your parents and only had your grandparents to relate to during your formative years. At this point the essay should not deal with how you came to find the major that wish to apply to at the moment. Rather, it should relate only with the way that your world was transformed by the disappearance of your parents so early in your life.
It needs a better focus. You tend to go a little off topic at times, i would suggest that you mention your dream in the first paragraph as well and then begin describing what shaped it.
Grammar needs to be checked again. I will correct the first paragraph as much i can for you.
Correction:
(Start) When I was three years old, my parents left my sister and I with our grandparents and came to the United States to seek a fortune. For the next ten years, I did not see them again. Their wedding photo, that hung in the middle of the room and their voice on the phone were the only things i remembered them by. In those ten years, "family" was a word that I refused to talk about. I finally got a chance to meet my parents when I was thirteen years old. I cannot describe the feeling when I stepped out into Kennedy airport and saw two strangers running towards me. At first, I did not recognize their faces but only the clothes the man was wearing - They were the same clothes my father was wearing in the photo. In the woman's sallow face, her sunken eyes filled with tears, I could see a lifetime that was both full and overwhelming. It shocked me and i felt pity and sorrow for them. I did not understand how such a young couple, with loving and strong faces age and weaken this much! It was then I realized the importance of education; with only elementary and some high school education, my parents had to leave their family and struggle to make a living and provide a better life for my sister and I. It was then that I had a clear vision for my future: a life fulfilled with not only excitement for the job, but also my dreams of financial security and good relationship with others.
