Admissions Impossible?

By Arielle Turner

I’m currently in the thick of filling out the UC application, feeling stressed because I don’t know my ELC number or how many hours per week I’ve devoted to National Honor Society over the past two years, and I’m suddenly forced to contemplate the best and worst parts of this insanity commonly referred to as college admissions.

Of course, my first thought is, "There are good parts of the admissions process?"

Parts of it may be easier than others, but I personally find the whole thing nerve-racking, tedious and the No. 1 cause of stomach ulcers among 17-year-olds. "Best" is not a word I imagine would ever come up in discussing any aspect of college applications. "Best" is a word used to describe things that don’t make people want to tear their hair out, such as "the best day of my life" or "the best song I’ve ever heard." No one looks back on their senior year and thinks, "Filling out my college applications was totally the best part of those 10 months."

But the worst parts of the admissions process? That’s a list that could practically go on forever.

First of all, there are the pages of lists to fill out. Addresses, classes, extracurricular activities, what I ate for breakfast this morning, etc. In reality, it’s only eight sections, but it feels longer, much like my statistics class or the SAT.

The most difficult sections, by far, are the personal statements. All they really are is essays; in fact, they’re essays in which you have quite a bit of freedom to carry on about anything. Yet they are the essays on which the rest of your future may hinge and are thus some of the most important essays you’ll ever write.

Over the past few years, as senior year crept inevitably closer, I’ve given a lot of thought as to what I want to write about in my personal statements. I had a few topics thought up – ones I hoped were as cliche-free as possible – but when the time came to write those amazing ideas into 700-word statements, they didn’t seem so brilliant anymore. I eliminated them all one by one, throwing them all out for various nit-picky reasons.

They really should be fun. This year’s new prompts are extremely vague, leaving a lot of room for creative freedom, which is especially nice for someone who enjoys creative writing as much as I do. Yet the pressure is so intense that I might as well be trying to sing opera to a full house (and believe me, that’s something no one wants to hear). Thus something that I would normally enjoy is eliminated from being the best and sent straight to the bottom as the worst.

I suppose if there has to be a "best" part of the admissions process, it’s that I’m one step closer to escaping – I mean, graduating – from high school.

And I don’t know this for a fact yet, but I’m sure pressing the "send" button will be quite exhilarating as well.

Turner is a senior at Narbonne High School in Harbor City.