application with special case

College Essays
1

<p>this is the first 2 pages of my additional information</p>

<p>"Maybe you are wondering what I’m trying to do with my application. Well…
- I left all required essays blank.
- I didn’t submit my college transcript.
- I didn’t submit any letter of recommendation. </p>

<p>First and foremost, let me clarify one thing: in the last academic year, I abandoned my study in the middle for an extreme working experience. I didn’t attend all of my classes and I received a GPA of 0.15. I wish that I could apply as a freshman but I’m not eligible.</p>

<p>On the positive side, I have 10,000 hours of working experience. These works are serious works related to my major and are supported by a substantial list of achievements. Now I’m attending college again because I realize that I need it for my future career. </p>

<p>So why did I leave all required essays blank? </p>

<p>Well, I have a unique life circumstance and I have been living like this for several years. The way I was raised, the way I grew up, the way I studied, the way my ability developed… all are unique and are based on my life circumstance.</p>

<p>Required essays are the place where I’m supposed to express my thoughts, personality, commitment and passion, right? So what if my life circumstance is unique and I wouldn’t be able to explain to you in the assigned essays? </p>

<p>That’s why I have to do this. </p>

<p>In the pages below, I will submit an alternative essay. This essay is 4444 words in length – I know it’s long but I have my reasoning; you need to read it first and then you’ll understand it. Please be assured that I’m not trying to constrain your patience – I’m not stupid to do that. My life circumstance is unique and that’s why I have no choice but to write this long essay. To avoid confusion, I will briefly summarize my essay first.</p>

<ul>
<li><p>My essay started with an illness – I used to suffer from a serious and destructive illness that lasted for years. </p></li>
<li><p>But what I was afraid of wasn’t the illness itself, but how others would think about me. I endured a lot of pain and suffering and I was so scared of stigma of my illness; then I managed to hide it from everyone: I had girl friend several times; I had a lot of friends; I was in a sport team. And, in all those years, I suffered silently; no one, even my closest friend, knew of that – I was too scared of discrimination to reveal. </p></li>
<li><p>However, the illness disrupted my life heavily with many frustrating experiences. Then I was always tempted to abandon my study and devote myself fully to my passion – and I ended up doing so. In my essay, I wrote about how painful I felt, how my illness stripped me away from the inessential and gave me the courage to abandon my study, ignore everything else in my life and commit myself whole-heartedly into the work and passion where I truly belonged to. </p></li>
<li><p>In the end, I had more than 10,000 hours of work. I also had a substantial list of achievements. These achievements are considered impossible and unachievable (because they were all too difficult at my age) but the pains I endured gave me an incredible strength and courage to ignore everything else and put all of my heart and soul into my work which made the impossible possible. </p></li>
</ul>

<p>The essay submitted is coherent – it talks about my endless battle against illness and stigma, my thoughts when time was hard and my extreme working experiences and achievements."</p>

<p>Does any one have any advice on this? Will this work?</p>

2

<p>

</p>

<p>You still submit the required essays and, in addition, you submit a supplemental statement.</p>

<p>A supplemental statement that is far, far, far shorter than 4444 words.</p>

<p>You will be putting yourself at an immense disadvantage if you fail to submit required essays, or if you submit anything like the supplemental essay that you have in mind.</p>

3

<p>Only if your goal is to be denied admission.</p>

<p>Submit the college transcript. Get some letters of recommendation from someone who can testify how fabulous the 10,000 hours of work experience is.</p>

<p>Write an essay about your commitment to your passion. Try to keep the sob story to a minimum. </p>

<p>Add a supplemental statement explaining your college transcript.</p>

<p>If what you’ve done is really unique and wonderful, it won’t take 4,444 words for the adcoms to figure it out.</p>

4

<p>thank you for your opinions. hehe</p>

5

<p>Most kids have relatively standard histories, and you don’t. But you still have to stuff your non-standard history into the standard application. The application has a lot of flexibility and many ways to make it fit your needs. Totally refusing to obey their formats is not the right way. A frequent topic on the homeschooling forum is “how do I present my non-standard education in a standard transcript?”. THAT’S what you need to be thinking about - making your non-standard life fit onto a standard application. The admissions officers don’t have the time, the desire, or the need to spend 5 times longer on your application trying to figure out what’s even going on before they are allowed to compare you to their school and the other applicants.</p>

<p>Although your history is more different from the norm than most, your desire to say more than the admissions officers want to hear is not different at all. It doesn’t require 4000 words to describe what’s NECESSARY to know. I truly believe that you can cut the 4000 words down to the recommended amount - your summary you posted here looks pretty good. It’s always tough to cut down you want to say to just the essentials. I’ve seen plenty of kids say what you’ve said here “I can’t say it in so few words!!!”. My own kid said the same thing. I’ve had classmates say “My presentation is 30 minutes because there’s too much that’s important to say in just the 10 allotted.” You’re all wrong. It can be done and needs to be done. There’s a somewhat famous quotation: ““I have only made this letter longer because I have not had the time to make it shorter.” (Letter 16, 1657)” ― Blaise Pascal, The Provincial Letters".</p>

<p>Also, why do you want to hide your transcript? You’ve already admitted that it stinks so there’s nothing to gain by refusing to show why. Why don’t you want to submit letters of recommendation? You must have some people who are happy with your 10000 hours of work!</p>

<p>If you think my post is long and it was written especially for you, how do you expect an admissions officer to read what you want to write?</p>