Application Essay Excerpts

For my first major physics lab report this year, my partner and I decided to explore the effects of changing cadence of an engine on its overall efficiency. This topic has many practical and immediate applications, and our challenge was to find a relatively simple way for cars to achieve drastically better fuel economy. We discovered that at an extremely high or low cadence, efficiency can be less than forty percent of the maximum...

I am applying to Brown because it offers excellent academics and tremendous flexibility to take the classes that most appeal to me. During my visit to Brown, I was blown away by the enthusiasm of the professors and students, and I would love to work and learn with them...

Before starting my college search, I knew that Brown is renowned for offering an exceptional liberal arts education with a strong engineering program. To find out more, I contacted Professor Rick Fleeter, who graduated from Brown, teaches at Brown, and is a long time family friend, in the hope that he could show me why he loves Brown so much. He treated me to an excellent day at Brown...

When asked about their summer vacations, many students would respond with stories of sunbathing on beaches, air-conditioned internships, or touring Europe, but certainly none of my friends would say that they waged a brutal war against the land. My summer was a struggle, a merciless battle up heartbreaking hills, through stifling heat waves, weeks of stiff headwinds, and over thousands of miles of roads...

The three front entries of the Pentecostal church in town remind me of the entries to the three cella of Etruscan temples which differed from Greek temples not only in their three entries as opposed to one but also in their large porches and high bases. It spews out of me. I inform people, but somehow they don’t understand...

When I wrote an editorial for my middle school newspaper, I learned the profound effect my words could have on my world. Written by a straight eighth-grader questioning the use of “gay” and “fag” as synonyms for “annoying,” my article surprised some readers...

I see my hero through his gait. I remember that he rarely wears a jacket, never carries an umbrella, sometimes uses a cane, but I know him for his speed and his pronounced limp. Though he would probably deserve just as much recognition without the limp, I may not have noticed him if his walk wasn’t unique...

No one directly related to me died in the Holocaust, so when I went to Poland in April 2007 in order to experience Nazi concentration camps and Jewish shtetl life, I didn’t expect to feel personally attacked.But when I was walking through Majdonek, a camp eerily close to a major city, I was confronted in real time by what struck me as indifference, ignorance, and callousness...

I became interested in Brown University after speaking with an undergraduate student who is currently attending Brown University and graduated from my high school. She told me about Brown’s unique academic structure and I was immediately intrigued...

The topics that I have always found most interesting have been in the field of science. Throughout high school, I have enjoyed learning about the nature, principles, and ideals of the various sciences. The most intriguing to me have definitely been biology and chemistry...