Trust the Trip People talk about how Canada is cold year-round, but skidding in my socks on a polyfoam mat laid across the gravel of my summer camp in Ontario, I might as well be in São Paolo, because every five seconds I brush my left hand across my forehead to wipe away more sweat. Meanwhile, my right hand is occupied with a four-pound rapier hilt, a purple string tied around the pommel identifying it as mine. As I...

If you walked into the Jefferson Market branch of the New York Public Library last spring and tried to find a book about Dante's Divine Comedy, the elderly librarian would regretfully tell you that some overachieving high school student had checked them all out and reserved them for the next few months. Sorry for the inconvenience, but that was me. Last year, I wrote a research paper about Dante's Inferno in the context of its author's exile from Florence. While...

If I wrote my memoir today, I would call it "Unbated." In fencing, a bated sword is one with a bead on the tip to keep it blunt, so that the fencers will be safe in case of an accident. I don't fence, but I do a lot of stage combat, and I use bated swords in choreographed fights. A bated sword is really a safety net, and while I settle for bated rapiers in stage combat, I try to...

I met Alec in the winter of my sophomore year. The contrast between us (our “otherness” to each other) was clear from the moment I saw him. It was a weekday afternoon in November, just after school dismissal, and students were milling around the school lounge. I had started on my homework, while Alec was dancing on his toes around the room, announcing in song to his friends, “I love Shakespeare!” I ended up formally meeting Alec later that week –...

Dear Future Roommate, I hope you don't mind me reading by flashlight at night as I try to finish one more chapter – actually, the entirety of whatever book I'm reading on any particular day. Or that I sing pretty much 80% of the time when I'm at home and not doing anything – not in the Snow White whistle-while-you-work sense, more in the sense that I love singing, really love it, and I don't think I'm that good at it but it's...

I could tell you a million stories about why I want to attend Stanford. I could tell you about the time I toured the school with my sister in sophomore year and was struck by how nice everyone was, how everyone seemed laid-back and friendly (and decidedly Californian). I could tell you about the time I attended a Stanford Leading Matters conference in Boston and how moved I was by the video of these different undergraduate students and their respective...

Greek life. Definitely the biggest....

Competitive, curious, smart, focused, stressed. Northwestern has a ton of really smart...

Better mental health services are a must. Also better diversity trainings at the beginning of freshman...

I interviewed for Northwestern, Stanford, Tufts and Skidmore. Possibly others that I can't remember. Each time the school-specific questions...

If you can afford it, take pre-college classes. They don't have to be in subjects that will...