<p>Greetings, all. This is my first post, though I've been sporadically reading the forum for over a year. I'd appreciate if anybody could tell me if it'd be worthwhile to apply to Columbia's GS program. I feel I have an interesting history that may make up for my relatively sparse educational record.</p>
<p>I'm a Marine Corps veteran, having served for close to five years as a military journalist. I spent most of my time in Southeast Asia, where I documented and assisted in various humanitarian assistance projects and disaster relief operations. I have also worked in New York City as part of a small group organizing events and maintaining positive public relations with local and national media outlets. I've received relatively high honors from the Marine Corps and the Department of Defense for my work. </p>
<p>Since my time out of the Corps, I've begun working towards a bachelor's degree in Philosophy at a local college, and after one semester I have maintained a 4.0 in 13 credits covering a relative breadth of subjects (Political Philosophy, Introduction to Philosophy, General Biology with lab, and English 1.) </p>
<p>I'm a first generation American and the first in my Cuban family to attend college, as I was the first to attend high school (I am a bastard proper, haha, and my mother stopped attending school after 7th grade.) We were what would be economically defined as impoverished, with an annual income that averaged around $14,000 per annum, though I feel I would be doing my mother a disservice if I didn't add that I never experienced a poverty of love or ethic. I was raised my whole life with a constant appreciation of my circumstances and the multitude of factors which led to them, but also ingrained with a sense of personal responsibility. </p>
<p>Of course, I faltered in the youthful angst of my conditions, directed at authority figures and an educational system that I felt had greatly contributed to the relegation of lower-income schoolchildren to third-rate citizens. I dropped out of high school with a 0.5 GPA, mainly due to my notion that to succeed in such a system was to fail oneself and the dignity of what learning truly means (I know that this is a controversial assertion, especially on an Ivy League forum, but it is what I've estimated from my own experiences and I hope none of you take offense to it.)</p>
<p>I consider myself an autodidact, and it was through firsthand experiences and my own studying outside of school that I founded my personal and political philosophy. The Marine Corps felt to me both a duty (as an able-bodied seventeen year old in a post-9/11 society) and an escape from the patterns of poverty which had up until that point led me. The opportunity to participate in the third world at its most vulnerable moments, whether due to famine or flood or both, impressed upon me the necessity to stop considering myself a victim of my circumstances and work towards real political change in the world and communities like mine. And so, Columbia. </p>
<p>I am hoping that with a proven sense of duty, a strong essay and excellent grades, though they are scant, I can transfer to the GS program for my second semester. I spoke with a counselor at the admissions office who suggested I submit my application with what I have done so far and that I might have a pretty good chance of gaining entry, but wanted to see others opinions here before I make a potentially premature journey towards my admission.</p>
<p>Thanks in advance for all your help, and sorry for my deficit of brevity.</p>