“Learning to change the world.” Texas Christian University’s vision of educating their students to change the world is appealing to me. I want to change the world. Coming from a small town seventeen year old, this sounds like a fantasy; however, when I visited the TCU campus, I knew I belonged there. A TCU education will provide the foundation to transform my dreams into reality. All the people I met, both current students and alumni, were kind and willing...

At TCU, the Christian environment allows students that attend to foster their values and worldviews in a Christian mindset. During my time as a Horned Frog, I want to foster the Christian values I have been raised with further so I am able to face the world with faith in mind. Also during my time at TCU, I believe that the small class sizes will allow me to foster my academics further and I will become a more intelligent person...

My future career is in public policy. I feel as though God is calling me to public service. Upon graduation from Notre Dame, I will take with me an education from one of the most revered institutions and my Christian values to guide in my public service career. In government, there are controversial policy decisions made that do not always reflect the Judeo-Christian heritage of the United States of America. I believe the University of Notre Dame offers me the...

The unconquerable course. The impassable test. AP US History is not an easy class for any junior to take. Many of my classmates, including myself feared the word APUSH. The subject of history is so vast some find it daunting. I find it fascinating. Learning about the past has always been a part of my character and family culture. When my sisters opted for an amusement park, I preferred the local museum I had already explored so many times. When...

Tradition, honor, and integrity are values I hold dear to my heart. I believe that the University of Notre Dame embodies these values. From the first time I watched Rudy with my family, to visiting the campus as a prospective student this past summer; I have always known that there was something special about the University of Notre Dame. When I set foot on campus, I felt at home. The people at the bookstore, the staff at the office of...

Reading is one of my favorite pastimes. Reading allows me to escape to another world and enlightens me. At Our Lady of the Hills High School, our reading list is intense. Our AP English classes are most challenging. One novel that really surprised me while reading it during high school was 1984 by George Orwell. I remember in eighth grade when we got our reading lists and 1984 was on it, but marked with an “M” for “Mature Content.” I choose not...

Paraphrasing Shakespeare’s Hamlet the question society needs to ask is, “To tweet, or not to tweet: that is the question.” Social media has become a crucial component of our daily lives worldwide. Businesses utilize these outlets to advertise their product and teenage girls post diary diatribes on their Facebook walls. One important thing people do not think about is how social media is so accessible. Twitter, for example, has become exceedingly popular in means of reach over the past...

In elementary school, students have to answer a difficult question even for some 18 year olds to answer. The question: What do you want to be when you grow up? The surprise on my teachers’ faces from my answer was priceless. I still have that sheet of paper to this day with my answer. My messy second-grader handwriting and drawing aside, my dream of becoming the first female president largely impacted my decision of major. In the fourth grade, I met...

Since I was three, the stage has been my home. For the past 14 years, dance has been a major part of my life. I learned classical ballet training and took tap lessons leading to my decision to join the competitive dance team at my studio when I was 9 to further my dance education. At my old dance studio in Michigan, we traveled to many competitions and conventions and I got to work with amazing choreographers like at Dance Makers Inc....

Important Activity: "Long hours, long weeks, and one long season, cheerleading has been the sport I have been most involved with since the beginning of high school. Cheerleading begins before school even starts. We start around the end of June to learn new cheers, perfect old cheers, learn dances, and get the new girls and freshmen up to speed with the caliber we were at last year. I began cheerleading at a local parks and recreation facility when I was...

After I was waitlisted at the University of Virginia, one of my teachers suggested that we send in a collaborative letter of rec to the...

At Georgetown, all prospective first-year students are required to go through an interview process (unless there is a circumstance where one can't be held). I met with a nice woman who was from Austin...

When I was choosing schools to apply to, I took a lot of things into consideration. One of my major items was the graduate school acceptance rate for my major. My main goal is to become a politician but for that to happen, I decided that I would pursue a career as a lawyer. So, in addition to researching good schools for my major,...

One thing I would definitely change about my admissions process would be to have started my essays earlier. I highly recommend starting as soon as they're released. I procrastinated until the week that Early Action applications were due! So...

I ended up choosing UIUC primarily because I felt more at home there. I didn't want to stay in Texas (where I lived at the time) because my family was going to move out of state as soon as I graduated from high school. At UIUC, I was going to be...

Summer activities are really important to colleges. They want to know that you don't waste your time and keep actively doing things over the summer. Do things that interest you...

I had my English/APUSH teacher write one of my letters and then my other English teacher from junior year write another. My counselor also wrote me a letter. Make sure to choose teachers that you have a good rapport with and actually like you! They need to know you pretty well to give you the holistic recommendation that schools want to see in their process...