<p>Although I certainly won't be applying to any Ivy Leagues this fall, I will be applying to 3 of the top 10 schools for my major. Sophomore year I suffered a serious concussion resulting in my missing 2.5 weeks of school, permanent brain damage, and migraines almost every other day (luckily I now have medicine to halt my headaches when they start).
My sophomore year 2nd semester grades were greatly affected by this (dropping from 3.8 UW to 3.5 UW) but now I am working really hard and succeeding in bringing them up. How should I address this in my College Applications? Should I just write a note about it, or should I have my guidance counselor and/or my neurologist write a note?
Thanks!</p>
<p>This is something that your guidance counselor can write about for you.</p>
<p>Guidance counselor for sure, maybe you could also say in your essay how it hurt your grades but you learned something from it. Don’t overdo it though, just a little bit of reflection. </p>
<p>How did you do that in the first place? If you don’t mind me asking</p>
<p>I used to play soccer, basketball, and rugby. I never had had a concussion or headaches prior to my concussion.
During rugby game in a tournament 8 hours away from where I live a girl on my team was faking an injury so I was playing her position instead of my usual position. That is all I remember from the game where I got hurt. From what I’ve been able to gather I’ve determined that a scrum collapsed on top of me and I broke my nose and was unconscious for about 2 minutes. After my nose stopped bleeding, I had to change my jersey (you can’t play with blood on your jersey, I was covered with it) and I was put BACK INTO THE GAME where I sustained another concussion.
By sustaining 2 concussions within 1 hour I suffered from Second Impact Syndrome which caused the brain damage. I am very lucky though because Second Impact Syndrome can cause death, seizures, and must more brain damage than I have.</p>
<p>I know a girl who had a similar situation. She let her guidance counselor cover it in his letter. She did not make it a topic of any of her main essays, but there were some secondary or supplemental essays for certain schools where she wrote about the positive effects of that experience.</p>
<p>I have a similar question: I’m in my senior year (graduate in November, live in Australia) and I have been sick for the past four months with chronic tonsillitis and mono. This has obviously meant I’ve missed quite a bit of school and I’m guessing my end of semester exams won’t turn out to their usual standard. I know my guidance counselor will be happy to write about it, should I also get my doctor to put something in or no?</p>
<p>I’m applying for Ivies, Georgetown, Duke etc and really don’t want this to ruin my chances!</p>
<p>D had similar experience soph. year,dropped classes, etc. Best to be handled from guidance counselor. Don’t focus on it in essay, but it is a good topic for a specific overcoming adversity type question.</p>