On the eve of my first day of fourth grade, I was sitting beneath the window of my living room, absentmindedly catching shards of sunlight on my spoon, when I brought up a memory of four years earlier. My five-year-old heart had been shattered when the odd dirt that engulfed every inch of my father's hometown in rural China had caked over my light-up sneakers, and I was making an off-handed inquiry as to what it was. My dad just...

"Tell us about an engineering idea you have, or about your interest in engineering. Describe how your ideas and interests may be realized by "and linked to" specific resources within the College of Engineering. Finally, explain what a Cornell Engineering education will enable you to accomplish." I must have wanted to be an engineer long before I knew what the word meant. On almost every fork we own, the middle two prongs are pulled half an inch back, a homage...

"Briefly elaborate on one of your extracurricular activities or work experiences." In a masochistic attempt to cure my shyness, I forced myself to join the speech team, deciding it would be a competition between my love for winning and my fear of public speaking. But when the latter won out freshman year, I was determined to improve. I forced myself to watch recordings of my performance and rehearsed constantly until last year, where I was only a point from section...

"Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, C.S.C., President Emeritus of the University of Notre Dame, served as a trusted adviser to U.S. presidents and popes. A champion for human rights, Fr. Hesburgh was one of the architects of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. Reflect on the current state of civil rights, the progress that has been made, or the problems still being faced today." In the essay ...

"Blessed Basil Moreau, the founder of the Congregation of Holy Cross, described education as “the art of helping young people to completeness.” How are you incomplete?" Had I been born a few years earlier, I may have grown up in a single-room basement of someone else's home. Had my father been a bit lazier, I may have never escaped the impoverished village of his childhood. Thus, I have been nurtured by my parents' perseverance, sacrifice, and godsend, but I'm still...

(For USC) "Your browser history says a lot about you. Take a moment to think about the time you spend online. Whether it’s browsing an Instagram account, listening to your favorite podcast, subscribing to the best web series on YouTube, or even addressing questions on tech-help forums, we want to know where you spend the most time online, and why. Please share your favorite online destination (via a web address, specific app, social network, etc.) - and describe why...

If I could go back, I would have probably applied to more upper-tier schools. Regardless of what my chances would have been, a mixture of self-doubt and in full honesty, laziness, prevented me from applying to other extreme reach schools I would have felt happy...

You should choose your recommenders based on who genuinely knows you as a person just as much as a student. I had a number of teachers who LIKED me,...

I only interviewed with two schools, Johns Hopkins and Stanford. The stark contrast between JHU and Stanford was that the former was more interested in my accomplishments and...