7:20 on a Monday morning. I sat on my stool behind an untouched lump of clay, dumbfounded. A wave of anxiety washed over me as my eyes darted around the room. Everywhere I looked, fingers danced through clay forming intricate doors, roofs, and windows; but not mine. My fingers were stuck tracing the sentence over and over again. “Create a sculpture that represents your home.” I repeated it under my breath. “Home”— a word that I had called out thousands of...

I stand at only five foot six— which is probably why I’m obsessed with tall buildings. Having a body that doesn’t quite size up to my personality and aspirations, I’ve gone through life with my head tilted back; looking up for my spot among city skylines. Up there, I plan to leave my mark— a mark at a greater scale than just five feet and six inches. A mark that people can’t ignore. That’s the...

I hate how ethnicity silences people. I hate how awkward of a topic it is, and how nervous everyone is to address it. I hate the looks and whispers it creates. I hate the invisible walls it puts up, and I don’t understand why. Why do we try to act like we are blind to color and race when they are the first traits we see? I am tan. Nestled in my thick eyebrows and dark hair are recipes...

Not only is USC one of the top 10 architecture schools in the nation, but it is one of the only...

It's smart to get close to teachers that are good at writing. I only had one teacher write my recommendation, but since she was my AP English Language and Composition teacher, I knew she would write a killer essay. I had her for two years, and she was my student government advisor as well. That way, she knew I...

I am very proud with how I handled the application process. I started in August, and filled out all the tedious common app information. As soon as the senior school year started, I asked teachers for my recs. Then, I wrote my personal statement for the common app. This essay took me a whole month because although I had the general idea of what I was writing, I had to...

Make sure you do one big college-application-worthy thing every summer. Yes, everyone wants to enjoy their time off, travel, and relax, but you have almost 3 whole months! Many of these activities are only a week, and they can greatly improve your chances of getting in because they show that you used your time off wisely. One activity that I recommend is...

The very first thing I did was look at several ranking lists for undergraduate programs in my major. The architecture program was what was most important to me, so I really looked at schools in the top 10 or 20 in the nation. After that, I made a list of...