<p>I'm writing here because whenever I post questions on the "college essay" forum, I never get much reply..</p>
<p>so the first UC prompt is:</p>
<p>describe the world you come from - for ex, your family, community or school and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.</p>
<p>the first thing that came to mind was writing about the city i live in and what kind of people live here. obviously because the topic asks basically what kind of background you're from. but i realized that writing about that won't really do much as to describe who i am..which is what college essays are for.</p>
<p>so I was wondering how flexible these questions are, and is it okay if I stretch it out a bit?
I want to take it a little less literally.</p>
<p>by that, i mean focus on just one part of my life/background</p>
<p>I"m a musician so I can write about how i have been introduced to music since i was young, and how that has shaped my identity, teaching me perseverance and discipline.</p>
<p>is this stretching the prompt too far?</p>
<p>Spend some time looking into how the UCs evaluate apps, and why they’ve moved to holistic admissions. The quick answer is they want to bring more disadvantaged (and esp. minority) students into the UC system. See, for example, [Holistic</a> evaluation makes admissions fair / UCLA Today](<a href=“http://www.today.ucla.edu/portal/ut/janina-montero_admissions.aspx]Holistic”>http://www.today.ucla.edu/portal/ut/janina-montero_admissions.aspx) </p>
<p>So that essay prompt is not really about writing a captivating account of your city. An important role of the essays is explaining how difficult your life has been, and if you’re a minority member it would be a smart idea to work that in too. You should explain how difficult your situation has been, and how much you’ve struggled to overcome the limitations placed on you by your family, school, community, societal prejudice, etc. Read carefully through the evaluation criteria for admission, such as the one given by UCLA at [Freshman</a> Selection - UCLA Undergraduate Admissions](<a href=“http://www.admissions.ucla.edu/Prospect/Adm_fr/FrSel.htm]Freshman”>http://www.admissions.ucla.edu/Prospect/Adm_fr/FrSel.htm) Then plan your essay so that you hit as many of the criteria as you can. So mentioning music and your devotion to it helps you with items (2) and (3) on the list, “Personal Qualities” and “Likely Contributions”. But with a little thought, you can also score points in (7) and (8), explaining how you’ve taken advantage of opportunities and the challenges you had to overcome.</p>