Common App Essay: Growing up, my life was defined by rigid lines that divided my world into black and white, right and wrong. At home, I was imbued with an inflexible set of religious ideals. At school, I focused solely on grades, and along with my friends, I was blissfully brainwashed by consumer culture. Religion, school and pop culture defined my ideas. As a result, I lived in a fortress guarded by my fear of difference. It became second nature...

Harvard Extra-Curricular Essay My first two years in debate were largely trial and error. Traveling independently to national tournaments, I faced debaters from long-established programs. Sometimes, judges wouldn't pay attention when I spoke, seeming to grant my opponents wins because of their name. With minimal opportunities, and a lack of experienced LD captains, I spent countless hours researching, self-teaching, and watching videos of successful debaters. Through collaboration, other "lone-wolf" debaters nationwide became teammates. Success solidified my reputation nationally. Importantly, I...

Penn Essay My first "paycheck" was $80, for selling virtual gold to a Chinese game company. In junior high, I avidly played Massive-Multiplayer- Online-Roleplaying-Games, but unlike my friends, who sought to complete the cyclical quests, I was drawn to an entirely different notion of "playing the game." In these virtual worlds, I saw economic microcosms with unique currencies and markets. To succeed in this environment, I analyzed fluctuations in prices of goods in relation to the events of the game. It...

Stanford Important Issue Modern liberalism has created a ruse that we've "solved" issues of discrimination. People have become complacent with Voter I.D. Laws, Gerrymandering, racial violence dubbed "self-defense", a Criminal Justice System disproportionately incarcerating minorities. It pushes the issues underground, making them subtle and harder to identify but all the more insidious.

Stanford Int Vitality Essay Outside the temple, my aunt offers me prasadam. Since it usually contains chickpea flour, to which I'm allergic, I decline, but she insists it's safe, that refusal would disrespect God. I had just prayed for my pending SAT score, so I recant and swallow a clump. Immediately, my breathing becomes shallow. Hinduism was my way of life, my crutch when facing ambiguity. If I didn't know a test answer, I would use prayer like eenie-meenie-minie-moe to...

Stanford Roommate Essay Rear Doommate, What matters to you, and why? My name is Neel. My friends call me Neebu because I am a kid at heart, but I like to call my occasional inability to take things seriously "optimism". I will make incoherent spoonerisms quite often- show you the untapped potential for humor within everyday words. At first, you'll find that I will respond with, "Really?" to many things you say. I promise that I'm not mocking you; I...

What Matters to you: Stanford If there is one person I would never want to fail, it is my Namma. Ever since my sister and I were born, she was with us, staying a world apart from my grandfather to help raise us. I used to take this for granted. When my friends would rejoice about their grandparents visiting for the holidays, I proudly exclaimed that my grandma lived with us- only to find that my grandma was the only...

Everyone is just extremely...

There is no cutthroat competition. Stanford might literally also be, as...

Spend more time looking over and...

I hired a private essay editor which helped me immensely and...

I interviewed with most of my schools, and really the number one tip is to just be yourself. Don't treat it like an interview at all. be very friendly with your interviewer and...

I didn't have a lot of different stuff I was good at. I also didn't have...

Don't waste your time with like college courses or camps at these schools. Honestly...

I knew I'd get into UT b/c of the texas 7% law. Find a mid-tier school you are pretty much guaranteed to...

Tips for Stanford: 1. Have a diverse intellectual pallette indicative by your activities and answers to questions. 2. Sound like a genuine and fun-loving person...

Ignore the stuff about good reccomenders being 11th and 12th grade teachers. Find teachers who absolutely love you (obviously who taught you in...