College Essay Prompts

University of California Los Angeles 

Describe the world you come from — for example, your family, community or school — and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.

New York University

Describe an experience that has impacted who you are as a person. What is special, unique, distinctive or impressive about you or your life story?


University of California Berkley

Prompt #1: Describe the world you came from – for example, your family, community or school – and tell us how your world shaped your dreams and aspirations

Prompt #2: Tell us about a personal quality, talent, accomplishment, contribution or experience that is impotent to you. What about this quality or accomplish makes you proud and how does it relate to the person you are.

Coming of Age Graphic: Rough Draft

Coming of Age: Final Draft

        It’s actually pretty funny. How a simple thought can lead you to another and eventually become something great, amazing, and extraordinary. But that was the thing with me, everything stayed simple.  Practical. Believe me, I have absolutely no problem with it. It leads me to be focused, driven to work. Never to stop, never to relax. I’ve always been raised and told that the world was an extremely dangerous place and I’ve believed that for a huge part of my life. I was trapped in my own mind, with no interest in taking risks. It came to the point where I was scared to try new things and explore new places; instead I stayed home a lot not knowing the endless possibilities there were to discover. 

            Towards the middle of the freshman year, there was a day that I had to stay late after school and the only choice I had was to take the bus to my mother’s clinic. I’ve never taken the bus by myself all the way to downtown and I despised waiting. “Where is the bus? It should be here by now.” I thought as I brought out my dollar and twenty-five cents. It came to the point where I thought the bus wasn’t even come, but in reality I’ve probably been waiting for only 5 minutes. I see the bus arrive and I’ve entered, placed my money in the slot, and looked for a seat. And what do I come to find? No darn seats. I basically was thrown around in that bus literally bumping into others around me, refusing to hold the pole that could be covered with disgusting particles. I hated it. I hated the bus. I have vowed to myself that I would get my license and laugh at the days where I had to take the bus. Yet taking the bus to downtown had been a regular thing I would do. I hated the feeling of being on the bus yet I loved being by myself, alone in downtown.

            Each time I would step off of that bus, I knew I was free to do whatever I wanted. Well at least until 5:00.  But being alone in this part of the island made me realize that I am so drawn to the “city life” and this is as close as it’s gonna get. I loved everything about it. The only problem left, was the fact that I would have to take the bus in order to get here, which definitely didn’t stop me. But the main point of what I’m trying to say is that even though I absolutely hated taking the bus, it eventually came to a stop. I’ve grown into a person that faces any challenges in front of me to reach the “destination” I desire. I realized that I am on my own, I am responsible for my own decisions and what I choose to do, and to think a couple bus rides and trips to downtown got me to think about my future.

            I’ve learned taking risks sometimes has to be the only option you have in order to move on and experience brand new things. I think that everyone's life is always full of good and bad experiences. I’ve realized the key to success is to appreciate the good and find a way of turning a negative situation into a positive, which is something I’d keep in mind for the rest of my life. Whether it’s having a huge, drastic change in a single day or even learning how to take the bus to a certain place I’ve come to love, I am gaining the knowledge and realization I need to grow as an individual.

Blog Revision

        For my blog revision I've decided to change the entire "look" of my blog yet keep it how my title represents itself. Simple. I believe that with the simplicity of my blog, the readers would be drawn more into what I post. As for my header, I decided to keep my title along with a quote. "Good things come to those who wait. But better things come to this who work for it." This quote describes what I personally believe, that working hard is a must to gain a better success. Designs such as background choice, the picture of myself being somewhat transparent, and even the change of color scheme represents what I like as a person. As for my archive organizations I kept the original archive list of the years and months on the bottom but then added links of the work done in freshman year on top of that.

Coming of Age: Rough Draft

          It’s actually pretty funny. How a simple thought can lead you to another and eventually become something great, amazing, and extraordinary. But that was the thing with me. Everything stays simple.  Practical. Believe me, I have absolutely no problem with it. It leads me to be focused, driven to work. Never to stop, never to relax.  And where did that get me? An emcee for weekly assemblies, roles in the student council, plays, and sports (well sport). But sadly, that was in the eighth grade, so that didn’t matter. I still had no idea what was in store for me. And yet I still don’t, which frustrates me to death.

            Freshman year I began to experience both the good and bad side of high school. I had a taste of what I wanted, but that wasn’t enough. It was a huge transition coming from a small private school that had about 500 people from kindergarten to eighth grade, and now there are along the lines of 500 people in just my grade. I thought I was gonna go big, but to go from seeing 30 faces for 9 years then just becoming a single fish in a huge ocean, terrified me. 

            Towards the middle of the freshman year, there was a day that I had to stay late after school. The only choice I had was to take the bus to my mother’s clinic. I’ve never taken the bus by myself all the way to downtown and I despised waiting. “Where is the bus? It should be here by now.” I thought as I brought out my dollar and twenty-five cents. It came to the point where I thought the bus wasn’t even coming, but in reality I’ve probably been waiting for only 5 minutes. I see the bus arrive and I’ve entered, placed my money in the slot, and looked for a seat. And what do I come to find? No darn seats. I basically was thrown around in that bus literally bumping into others around me, refusing to hold the pole that could be covered with disgusting particles. I hated it. I hated the bus. I have vowed to myself that I would get my license and laugh at the days where I had to take the bus. Yet taking the bus to downtown had been a regular thing I would do. I hated the feeling of being on the bus yet I loved being by myself, alone in downtown.

            Each time I would step off of that bus, I knew I was free to do whatever I wanted. Well at least until 5:00.  But being alone in this part of the island made me realize that I am so drawn to the “city life” and this is as close as it’s gonna get. I loved everything about it. The only problem left, was the fact that I would have to take the bus in order to get here. But that definitely didn’t stop me. I have no idea what my “coming of age” story is or if it just sounds like a huge joke. But the main point of what I’m trying to say is that even though I absolutely hated taking the bus, it eventually came to a stop. I’ve grown into a person that faces any challenges in front of me to reach the “destination” I desire. I realized that I am on my own with the problems I have to confront, and to think a couple bus rides and trips to downtown got me to think about my future.

            Taking risks sometimes has to be the only option you have in order to move on and experience brand new things. I think that everyone's life is always full of good and bad experiences. I’ve learned the key to success is to appreciate the good and find a way of turning a negative situation into a positive. Whether it’s having a huge, drastic change in one day or even learning how to take the bus to a certain place I’ve now come to love, I am gaining the knowledge and realization I need to grow as an individual.

Mini Essay: Positions on Incidents

           Hawaii is known for it’s remarkable areas that are unlike anywhere else, but also face the issue of the amount of incidents that has happened throughout the years due to the dangerous site around the islands. Although there are many people and tourists that expect to be safe at all times and take the risks, they have no idea what is bound to happen if something dangerous occurs. But, aside from the careless and reckless mistakes people have made, the government has been the top reason that the injuries and even deaths of individuals are continuing to happen today.

            Disappearances, injuries, and even deaths have become an issue do to the government’s lack of attention to the site’s people and tourists visit. “41-year-old Kevin Oakley of Sun Valley, drowned at Maui’s Pools of Oheo after rescuing his son, who had been swept away by a strong current.” The death of this man should have opened the eyes of the government to set more rules and hire more lifeguards in order to help protect others. “He was the fourth person to drown in the vicinity of the pools over a two year period.” Not only should the government be blamed for these incidents, but also the workers should have been watching over to ensure the safety of the people.

            Although it is a reasonable statement to assume the reason why events like these happen due to the many explanations, the government is responsible for the amount of accidents that have happened. The government and land owners is to blame due to the fact no attention is given to the safety of the people nor the possible risks of having no signs or precautions on dangerous sites. Mistakes like these have been a major issue for a very long period of time and its time for the government to instill the importance of safety onto the community.

Group Work: Positions Statments

Location has been a major factor to why people are getting injured. Not enough specific signs, railings for protection, and the lack of guides around to assist the visitors in sure of their safety should be an improvement that should be established.

Individuals have a big impact to the reason why they get injured. People should be aware that they are trespassing at their own risks, ignoring the safety precautions, and of course testing their own limits, which can lead them to injury or even death.

The government is responsible for the amount of accidents that have happened. The government is to blame due to the fact no attention is given to the safety of the people nor the possible risks of having no signs or precautions on dangerous sites.