So last school year was a really hectic one for me, with college apps and all. Starting out, I was pretty confident; I had a decent SAT (720 CR/780 M/800 W), a good GPA (4.33/4.00), and a good resume of extracurriculars (engineering internship, hospital volunteer work, involvement in music programs, golf, etc.) That being said, I knew the college admissions process was a harsh one, and that there were tens of thousands of applicants with resumes and scores even more impressive than mine. That being said, I didn’t fully understand the magnitude of this competition until I went through the same process.
My EA choices were Georgia Tech, MIT and Caltech. At this point (early October), I hadn’t done many college supplements (none, in fact), so writing additional essays proved quite challenging. The occasional question on “describe your interests” or “the world from which you come” became a huge source of pressure for me. I revised my MIT essays, I kid you not, nearly 300 times. I focused all my effort into getting in to MIT, but when I clicked that submit button, I somehow felt that I hadn’t done all I could; that by trying to cater to what I thought was the MIT standard, I had somehow ignored my own standards and that had influenced my writing in a bad way. So I thought: although I messed up (in my mind, I had messed up) these essays, I would work hard on all my other application essays and make sure not to pretend or be something else.
As Mid-December would progress, my nerves skyrocketed and I couldn’t sleep waiting for the MIT results. When they finally came, I had been deferred. “That’s fine,” I thought. Atleast it wasn’t rejection. Caltech was the same: deferral. Around early January I had been accepted to Georgia Tech, and I was happy with both. It was a huge confidence boost. But unfortunately, it didn’t last.
The biggest hit came on March 14th, 2015. I logged on to see MIT’s decisions. The website was down. I would try reloading for nearly 20 minutes, thinking about how important this was and how much I wanted it. When I saw the rejection, I was devastated. I tried my luck with Caltech’s site next, but I was rejected from there too. After that, the wait for late March/early April for my other decisions (Stanford, Carnegie Mellon, Cornell, Princeton, UPenn) was too much. I thought “What was the point of all my hard work if it just ended in failure?” Teachers tried to cheer me up by saying that MIT is unpredictable, that sometimes they admit students who no one thought was qualified; that only made me even more upset. By March, I learned that I had been rejected from Stanford and waitlisted on my first choice in Carnegie Mellon (CIT, which I would eventually be rejected from). Every time I would reload the site, I’d have hope–only for it to be crushed.
5 hours before the IVY decisions came out, my family and I were aboard a flight overseas. I wouldn’t receive the decision results until 14 hours later. I tried sleeping, watching movies or playing games to overcome the tension, but in the end I succumbed to my own thoughts:
I really had had no idea how hard this process was. At this point, I was just wishing that all my work had paid off–that all my studying and hard-work and honesty would be noticed by someone, ANYONE, and that I could get into one of my dream schools and make myself proud. When I applied, I thought I had done so because these schools were IVIES and getting into one was the ultimate source of pride. That may have been a factor. But honestly, I applied because these schools offered me unique things, and when I visited each one I felt a sense of camaraderie and devotion that I wanted to be apart of. If I had the privilege to get into any one, I would take it.
As soon as I got airport wifi, I checked each of my portals. Princeton was a rejection. My heart sank. UPenn was a waitlist–again, my heart sank. Then, I opened up my Cornell portal:
“Congratulations on your acceptance…”
I had done it. The hard work had paid off, although I had nearly lost hope.
The process if grueling, and it may not turn out as we had expected. But if you work hard, the end result can’t be that bad, can it?
Good luck to everyone! Thanks for reading~
