This is my personal statement, I was just curious about your thoughts.
I plan on being a philosophy major, so I just would like to hear some input…
I’ve had the best of times, I’ve had the worst of times, I’ve had springs of hope, I’ve had winters of despair, I’ve had everything before me, I’ve had nothing before me - in short, these have been parts of my life, but they aren’t my life. Life is literature. Friedrich Nietzsche said in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, “Of all that is written, I love only what a man has written with his blood. Write with blood, and you will find that blood is spirit.” That explains more about who I am, rather than me rattling on about why I’ve done so poorly these past years. I believe that to make a true masterpiece, you must first say what you really feel. I consider Aristotle’s Poetics a much better literary piece than Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. Aristotle explains his own thoughts, rather than focusing on the thoughts of others. It is a very debatable topic but shouldn’t my essay reflect my thoughts? This essay is my example of Aristotle’s Poetics.
“Success has always been a great liar” - Friedrich Nietzsche said in Beyond Good and Evil. GPA’s and SAT’s are known as a measure of success. An attempted measure of success can not tell you who I am. By looking at my grades, could someone possibly tell that in my first three years of high school, I was too ignorant to seek help for my high anxiety? There was a large gap in my grades from freshman, sophomore, and junior years to my senior year. That could help a person assume something changed. The question is, could they assume that Prozac and Zoloft played a large role in that change? Success is the biggest liar out there. There is no level of measuring success. The circumstances, the opportunities, and the ignorance of man, all play roles in defining success. For someone to call another person “less-intelligent” because their GPA is lower, or SAT’s aren’t in the top of their class, is just as ignorant as the man who threw stones when he lived in a glass house. To say there is a proper scale to judge success in the school systems today is a very bold statement.
I by no means am trying to put the fault of my previous ignorance on the school system. I am however, trying to show that I have new system of learning with an uncommon energy. I know my grades have sloped down in the years, then sharply gone upward and that is where the energy starts. I can only imagine where I would be academically if I put my full potential into my classes during freshman, sophomore and junior years. I have character, intelligence, and the will and potential to learn. With the proper education I can honestly say that I have the capability to accomplish great things. I am working on near full potential now, with room to grow. I would hope that I’m not being judged on my past levels of success and hope that I am being judged on my current level. That is who I am now, isn’t it?
''Now I am light, now I fly, now I see myself beneath myself, now a god dances through me. Thus spoke Zarathustra." - Friedrich Nietzsche in Thus Spoke Zarathustra.
that statement you make is obviously very loaded. point of fact is you try to argue and convince whatever college admission officer that your standardised scores should be discarded, or less taken into consideration, and some assesment of “self” should be used, or at least more taken into consideration. this is not a bad approach, especially for somebody with crappy gpa/sat scores.
there are inherent flaws in that argumentation however, that are likely to prevent you from being successfully persuasive. i will list some so you can go about improving your original statement, if you feel so inclined
colleges are not there to promote any other value than success. it is a known fact that success tends to yield success. they are not there to educate the smartest, the best, the ones that can accomplish great things. they are there to educate the successfull. it is confusion on your part to consider going to college is anything about what you call who you really are and what you could really do, in fact going to college is about how successfull you are and are likely to be. that said, it would help if you showed you do not make that confusion, and while regarding who you really are as more important than how successfull you are, you still manage to be sucessfull regardless of who you really are. going on that line, especially the last bit, will probably give you more punch.
you are packing too many issues in a single statement to be persuasive. even you notice this when you try to plug the maverick point of school system critique. brush your argument so it only follows a single logical line. as it reads now, you are writing to express yourself. if you write to express yourself to the oficer himself, you might be better off. thus, take into consideration the mind of the reader as much as your own mind while writing
the i had all of it type of statement might sound belivable coming from a 50 year old ex dictator but not from a bellow average on sat tests teenager. it simply sounds insane. that sort of overly-self appreciating comment, especially as it is right in the beginning, will force the reader to read with a key, ie always bearing in mind what you say comes from someone at least seriously prone to overestimate the scope and impact of their own experience. modesty would serve alot better.]
the parts of my life but not my life comment might lead to the supposition that later on in your life, college might be regarded as part of your life but not your life, and if it is likely to have that little impact, it might be better used on someone else.
while the anxiety and prozac discussion serves, one would want to be assured you are doing alot better now, and that you are very stable. treat that argument with the due care, because it can make you and break you with the same ease.
you must understand the position your reader is in. the marks being poor and deteriorating then sharply going up is by far the most common pattern in highschool. you need to show you know that, but it is not you, or otherwise they will think you are just covering your own superficial way of life (ie only work when the rewards for working are strong) and reject your application. you make a stab at showing this, but maybe it should be better explained.
the entire talk about full potential and room to grow is very presumtious, how would you know what the potential is and where and how big room to grow is ? you dont think you already know college do you ? and their point is not who you really are now, but how likely who you are now is to serve for who you will be later on.
on the positive side,
the fact that you dont grovel and arent obnoxious or unreadable is a significant asset
the statement about being truthfull is an excellent asset, it opens the door for your argument.
with the hope these comments might help you achieve your goal,
It’s interesting to note your observations on the American SAT systems and your questioning of the extent to which one may truly have a fixed, assigned level of ‘intelligence’ designated at a specific period in which your identity is largely open to influence (high school years). This is a dilemma which the English ‘A’ Levels face also. I, like yourself, find it extremely disconcerting that the years in which I seemed to least fulfil any academic potential were the ones which arguably counted the most. Since leaving further education at the age of 18 with an array of mildy passable ‘A’ Levels, I have hit this curve with which you identify. Perhaps then, a great deal may be said in light of identity formation and the years in which they are subject to the most profound biological catalyst:the hormones.There are of course a great many distractions and conflicting interests at the teenage era and no doubt they impinge heavily upon an individuals academic performance. Now,several years on and having managed to get to university, I’ve become fascinated with the many different philosophical projects which have evolved through time and the importance of academia. A great deal may thus be said about age and the latency of academic intellect. Antonio Gramsci may well throw a new spanner into the works here with the subject of the intellectual!