<p>I am a Singaporean migrant with a green card, and I first came over to the US at the age of 5, went back at 10 and returned (in the opposite direction) at age 14. In the process, I've felt like I have two homes, yet I have none, because I feel attached yet alienated from both cultures, like you're an outsider to both your motherlands.</p>
<p>This sentiment has been stirring in me for quite some time, so I sort of already have an essay/interview/etc. topic I already want to discuss without even having seen the prompts. I've kind of suddenly woken up to the college admissions process -- I thought I was doing reasonably well until I saw what other kids were achieving!</p>
<p>Anyway, I remember in second grade I would use to dream about how I would walk underneath down the steps from the second floor of my house in Maine and then suddenly I'd be in the warm familiar kitchen of my maternal grandmother's house on the other side of the world in Singapore, or that (around the same age) I'd dream about my American friends finally meeting my Singaporean friends but then I'd wake up and find that it was only a dream, and that no, that union which you have subconsciously wanted for so long was not real and it doesn't look like it's ever going to be. In Singapore I'd walk home from the language centre late at night along the tropical foliage and I'd be reminded of Maine's own forests and wonder, "were my experiences there real? Life there seems so distant, far away and fantasy-like now."</p>
<p>So a theme which I have really wanted to write about for a long time now but never got to fully express is the yearning to bridge the two sides of myself, which are rooted in two different countries on opposite ends of the Earth. For when I am in one country, it seems I am suppressing the other half of myself, a half that can only be accessible through memory or dreams, where it is only that it is in those dreams your memories are so real that the dreams really seem like interdimensional portals.</p>
<p>Of course, for a while I thought I was unique in this struggle, until I discovered that "third-culture kids" are quite a widespread phenomenon, and that there are probably tens of thousands of people with similar sentiments too. Of course, trying to connect my two cultures -- getting one side to like elements of the other (and not just say, the worldwide culture of pop music and internationally-broadcast Idol competitions) has pretty much epitomised my life. Yet whenever I meet multicultural kids (white kids who live in Singapore, and Asian immigrants in the US) they seem reluctant to focus on the multiculturalism anyway (perhaps out of self-consciousness), and they just want to assimilate and/or just act as though they're still living in their birth culture. I don't identify with the label "Asian American" (and in fact refused to put my race down for the PSAT, SAT and AP exams because I felt none of the ethnic labels fit who I culturally was and felt they were pretty arrogant and pretentious for assuming they could efficiently deal with the issue of ethnicity by rudely sorting people into half a dozen categories) because the Asian Americans I seem to come across either seem neatly assimilated or as though they're still living in their home country -- i.e. not true multiculturalism where you feel you <em>belong</em> to more than one country. So I don't feel "at home" with other Asian Americans either, save the occasional Singaporean.</p>
<p>Anyway. I probably just typed a full essay of my own right there, oops. (This subject just tends to flow out of me, you know?) Anyway, since this is a "what are my chances" subforum, I should post some of my academic stuff.</p>
<p>I have a 93.8 GPA average, which I am not sure how translates to the 4.0 scale. I came to my high school in the middle of freshman year (February to be exact) so I missed half of the year, which I am not sure how will affect admissions in terms of missed potential in courses I could have taken. I have to use a full slot to satisfy the missing half credit of fine arts this year, a slot I could have used for another AP course. My course only offers 10 AP subjects and eight slots per year (I am not sure how this compares to other schools? Seeing kids who take 16 AP courses in here makes me think that some schools have much more course capacity; I know it's definitely less than Singapore). I attended two years of secondary school in Singapore before I returned to the US for the second time, but I am not sure how that would factor in, because those years overlap what would be generally middle and high school in the US.</p>
<p>Some of my freshman grades took a hit because I was adjusting. I don't recall all of my grades off the top of my head, but I can roughly approximate them (I'll update if needed when I get a new copy of my transcript since I don't have mine on hand right now).</p>
<p>Freshman year:</p>
<p>Honours Biology 96
Honours World History 93
Algebra II 88
French III 90
Honours English 9 99
Ceramics 100 </p>
<p>Sophomore Year</p>
<p>Honours American Traditions 99
Honours Chemistry 88 [lost my lab book final quarter -- was a real hit on my grades]
Honours English 10 99
French IV 95
Pre-Calculus 95
Real Life 100 (some kind of career-preparation course which was really condescending)
Health 100
Gym 100 (had to make up for my lack of it due to the transition freshman year)</p>
<p>Junior Year </p>
<p>AP Language and Composition 93
AP Calculus AB 94
French V 94
Honours U.S. History 88 [surprisingly, I think this was harder than the AP course]
Politics and Government 93
Physics 92 </p>
<p>Senior Year (grades pending, naturally)</p>
<p>AP Physics
AP Biology
Economics
AP English Literature and Composition
AP World History
Art I [a level one course looks really funny on my transcript...]</p>
<p>I'm also taking two additional courses this semester at University of Southern Maine for Third-Year French Conversation (apparently each two years of a language subject of high school scales to one year at college) and Calculus B, because my school lacks an AP Calc BC course. I'm planning to go with the second semester portion of the same French course next semester, along with Calculus C. </p>
<p>I am currently arranging with my teacher to take the AP Economics exams (both of them) and bolstering my general Economics course to an AP course. I am also reasonably confident of passing the AP French exam (if not with flying colours), as well as a self-study in the AP government exams, and AP Calc BC, (which is not really self-study since I am furthering my Calc at USM, but I am not taking an AP course for it per se), and I am also thinking of taking the AP Statistics exam. </p>
<p>What I'm worried about is that I thought I was doing fantastic, but I was brought down to earth recently when I saw that my class rank was only 23/223 (which is not even in the top 10%) and that my achievements look really mediocre compared to the others I have seen here. When I was in Singapore, I used to win distinctions (for both primary and secondary school) from the international competitions held by the University of Southern Wales in Australia, which Singaporean schools took part in, and competed in both the Junior and Senior sections of the Singapore Mathematics Olympiad. I don't know how this will factor into admissions, since this occurred when I was 12-14 (but mostly in secondary school!) but I know Singapore has an international reputation in math.</p>
<p>In some ways I feel stifled by my school. I don't know whether my immigrant experiences (or writing about them) will help me out a lot, but does being from Maine compensate any? Not a lot of stuff happens in Maine. I never even heard of the Biology Olympiads (and only heard about the American Mathematics Competition), etc. because my school doesn't inform us too much about competitions (and I don't know whether they're even in Maine). In freshman year I took a really light course load (I thought it was suspiciously easy until I realised the guidance office had basically wasted 2 slots for me). For some reason they seem to assume that just because you're an immigrant, your main purpose is to graduate, not get into a good college, and it is only in the past two years that I got really assertive and signed up courses that fit my ambition, not their lack of it. So I feel I have wasted lots of opportunity in the last 2 and a half years.</p>
<p>Another worry is about my having to compete with kids who take 16 AP courses -- at this moment by the end of the year I will only have 6. I am not sure if there are even schools whose students take more than 10 in my state. I also felt that the high school French courses were really slow, unlike the French courses at the Ministry of Education language centre in Singapore. I am unable to take AP Statistics or AP Chemistry because of schedule conflicts, and I was unable to take AP U.S. History because when I signed up for sophomore courses at the end of freshman year I never realised that I had to take a pre-AP US History course to qualify -- leaving AP Music Theory as the only course I wouldn't have taken had everything gone ideally. This is really frustrating for me. </p>
<p>Also, I am not sure if this even mattered, but I got disqualified from the National Merit Scholarship thingy (I got a 208 sophomore year, I can't remember what I got junior year but I think it was higher) because I wrote down on the test sheet that I was not seeking US citizenship as soon as possible (I don't know whether I should have bothered to be truthful, since do they check that you are trying to apply anyway?). The reason is that I would seek US citizenship if not for the fact that Singapore disallows dual citizenship and therefore seeking US citizenship means giving up my Singaporean citizenship: currently retaining both a Singaporean citizenship and US PR status means I am attached to both countries, which to me is a superior arrangement. So I feel quite slighted if not angry, because not seeking US citizenship does not mean I am not committed to this country and they seem to arrogantly assume otherwise and seem to have no sensitivity or flexibility with immigrant issues. I am in fact trying to lobby (in my limited capacity) for Singapore to allow dual citizenship back home so I can become a US citizen with no worries. I am not sure if explaining this circumstance will help my situation at all, but can this be mentioned on admissions anyway?</p>
<p>The other thing is that I do not really have that many CCAs. I was involved in the student government during Sophomore and Junior Years as a Representative, and am applying to be a Student Judge on the Student Supreme Court this year, but I am sure this is all superficial. I've been involved in a board-games intramural the last three years, which is not that exciting as sports, I realise. I've been on the Debate Team for the last two years, and I dropped out of Model U.N. my junior year because I couldn't pay the fees to attend the meeting (my family divorced in 2001 and my father abandoned the family leaving us with virtually no income save for skipped child support some years -- long story, part of why we moved back to Singapore for a while). I've also been on the Math Team for the last three years. I participated in virtually no CCAs my freshman year because my guidance counselor apparently never told me about them when I came! (I've noticed an interesting trend in my school because very few of the other immigrants -- a considerable amount -- are in CCAs also -- they apparently profile what your ambitions are by your national origins, and the more I think about it, the angrier I get.) No outstanding leadership positions -- a lot of the CCAs I join don't seem to have leadership positions anyway. Outside I've been played in chess tournaments and am part of the chess club of the next town (a formal competitive one doesn't really exist in my school) -- we travel hundreds of miles up north to compete in really rural-yet-tough-chess-playing towns. </p>
<p>However, I've been spending lots of time corresponding with the Singaporean blogosphere. My country held its general elections in 2006, and if you know of its political situation, you would know that as opposed to PRC our civil rights situation is generally good but political rights are under serious threat and our press ranks 147th out of 177th in press freedom (!) I keep a blog on immigrant issues and Singapore's political situation as well as linguistics, and my essays have circulated amongst the Singaporean blogosphere. Promoting democratic reform in Singapore is an area that I am really passionate about -- and spending time on this has sort of eaten time away from participating in other CCAs. The problem is that it's hard to represent on paper -- anyway I could get this in? Would it even be significant anyway? Would this be a good essay topic? I'm not sure if the "introduce political reform" subject is really cheesy. I write regularly to the Singapore national state newspaper forum, though they really tend to be liberal (in the other sense of the word) in their application of censorship! You can't get one word in without the press effectively twisting what you say. </p>
<p>I am planning to major in both linguistics and physics. I am trying to get into MIT, University of Pennsylvania as well as Bates and Bowdoin. I think the latter two meets by standard but I have always dreamt of MIT. Is it a long shot? Will linguistics help me? There aren't a lot of linguistics events here so I want to know whether my circumstances will be taken in to consideration. Linguistics is somewhat tied to my yearn for multiculturalism and my interest was sparked in it because as a Singaporean I speak a semi-creolish dialect called Singlish with unique grammatical features and after defending it from government attacks in the press and the blogosphere I began research into linguistics in depth, initially as a hobby, but now an obsession.</p>
<p>A really long post .... but this is where I say, chance me please? Some of the seniors from last year I know well got into Bates and Bowdoin, and I am not sure if I am arrogant to think I can get into them easily enough, especially since they were in the top 10 and I am not. Also, if you've received an invitation for a multicultural open house to Yale, would that say something about your chances?</p>