The names of the long-deceased and long-forgotten scroll down my computer screen. Some might brush them off as unimportant, these ancient unknowns, but I’ve found myself more and more entranced by the simplicity of entering names, the power of family across generations-- the patterns from mother to daughter, father to son. Most of them could never have guessed that a 10-year-old girl, four hundred years in the future and an ocean away, would spend her afternoons copying their names...

Virtually all of Stanford's undergraduates live on campus. Write a note to your future roommate that reveals something about you or that will help your roommate -- and us -- know you better. (100 to 250 words) ​ Dear Roommate, Have you ever tried archery? There’s this feeling of complete silence in the mind and body, of harmony between finger and eye and feet, of unity and peace and focus. When I stand in front of my straw-bale range, watching the trees...

Stanford students possess an intellectual vitality. Reflect on an idea or experience that has been important to your intellectual development. (100 to 250 words) “Vive la Revolution!” So went one of the few things I knew about the French Revolution, prior to the spring of my junior year. The spring semester, however, housed the most action-packed and influential class I’ve ever taken: historiography. In seminar form, the course covered Arendt and Aristotle, Fanon and Foucault. We dove into the coarsely charismatic...

What matters to you and why? [Stanford] "As a guy," my classmate Malik said, “your speech bored me.” Really? My college speech class last summer required a praise speech, and I chose to praise the author Tamora Pierce. Delighted to express my admiration for an influential, feminist author, I was shocked by Malik’s statement, as he insinuated that empowering girls is boring for men. Even stranger, Malik’s speech earlier had mentioned the importance of equality, so I was...

When I first began my college admissions process, I definitely had no idea how to begin. I knew that Stanford was my dream school, and that I wanted to apply to similar schools as well, and hope that I'd get into at least one of them through luck, but I had no idea how to actually prepare myself for the level of self-presentation that's necessary in college admissions. Thankfully, with some research, I was able to realize that the college admissions process, contrary to what seems to me to be common belief, shouldn't be focused on showing off your accomplishments,...

I started choosing schools to apply to extremely early, in my freshman year of high school. I knew from 8th grade onwards that I wanted to apply to Stanford, I knew from 2nd grade onwards that I wanted to apply to Harvard, and during freshman year or so, I started actually looking at college's websites to see which schools sounded interesting. Junior year, I finalized my list, and I ended up with around 15 schools to apply to: Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, UC Berkeley, UC Davis, Barnard College, UC Santa Barbara, Claremont McKenna, Boston College, Boston University, Brown, Johns Hopkins, and...

I decided I wanted to go to Stanford when I was in 8th grade and first went to the campus for a math competition. That was just a dream, though, and although I secretly hoped beyond all hopes that I'd actually get in, I knew that was probably never going to happen. So when I got my acceptance email, I was honestly in shock for weeks-- couldn't stop smiling, almost squeezed my best friend's hand off when I read the email in class, sat crying in a parking lot with my mom for 3 hours because we were just so emotional......