Yay, finals.

Not going to lie, I kind of like having a two-hour thesis class. Then again, I'd hate for school to be any longer than it already is.

Today in thesis, I emailed my mentor again and updated her on my current status with thesis presentations. I have yet to hear back from Pallavi or Roonu Aunties after the last email that Vineeta sent out to everyone informing them of my interest in spearheading the Spring Carnival effort; I'm assuming that means they haven't planned any Kids Club meetings yet. If they don't email me by New Year's, I plan on emailing them and telling them about my thesis presentation, just to let them know that I'm actively researching and doing whatever preparation I can on my own.

I also spent some time re-reading the guidelines from the initial presentations as well as the new ones. I'm still trying to figure out how I want to start my presentation, since the guidelines recommend that we start off with a "hook" of some sort. I think what I was going to do was start off by briefly summarizing my initial presentation - mentioning the need for child education (explaining why it's important) and then discussing again my involvement with the Readathon. At that point, I'll talk about the Readathon wrapup, display my webpage and talk about the awards I won.

After that, I'll probably transition into the "next step," which is talking about the Spring Carnival and discussing how Pratham has other general fundraising events throughout the year (the Readathon is a summer-exclusive event). I have a few slides on the Carnival from 2012, so I'll probably display those and talk about the success of the event (though that was the one and only time it happened). I know when Vineeta and I were talking about this as my possible thesis product that she mentioned the amount of money Pratham was able to raise from it, but I didn't remember the exact amount; I've emailed her to ask about that as well.

After that, I plan to talk about my plan for the Spring Carnival this year, which is to bring it back and hopefully establish it as an annual event (for real this time).

Last regular school day of the year!

Wow, I can't believe finals start tomorrow. That means winter break is next week! Yay!

That also means college apps are due in two weeks. Not yay.

Well, anywho, in thesis today, I started preparing for my presentation. I created a PowerPoint presentation that I plan to use; it has about 7-8 slides right now. I also created a (very rough) outline of my actual presentation and planned out the basic structure of what I wanted to say.

Tomorrow I plan to figure out how I want to say, and then over winter break I plan on practicing/rehearsing my presentation several times. Hopefully I can get it to be 8 minutes; I don't know if I have enough to talk about, so I might do more research on the Spring Carnival (though, to be fair, I did find some information and a lot of pictures from the 2012 Spring Carnival) and maybe mention a few other fundraising events of the like. On the other hand, though, I think transitioning between my different visuals and other technology things will help make it longer. I'm fairly confident I'll be able to meet that 8 minute minimum requirement.

In other (read: college) news, I got my Yale decision today. I was deferred, which honestly I expected. I'm not upset at all, though, because I know I tried my best and I still do have a chance in the regular round. And even then, if they reject me in April, I'll be fine with it because I have quite a few other schools that I love just as much and would be just as happy to attend. So no disappointment on my part! Especially since I have UT in the bag already, I'm not too worried. Now it's just time to get the rest of my RD apps done and submitted in time. After that, I'll have time to concentrate on schoolwork a lot more (which I'm actually looking forward to).

Typing, typing away...

In thesis today, I worked on my research paper! I found a new source (a book that talks about child labor in India) and I was able to incorporate that source into my first few paragraphs. So far, I have one and a half pages of the paper done. I plan to continue working on it tonight as well as over the weekend (I probably won't have time tomorrow night because the choir concert goes till 9, which means I'll get home at 10, and then because I'll be so exhausted all I'll have time for is eating dinner and going to bed).

Vineeta Aunty also sent out an email to the rest of the DFW Pratham executives (including the chapter president and the Kids/Teen Club leaders) to let them know of my interest in helping spearhead the Spring Carnival effort. I got a reply from Pallavi Aunty, one of the Kids/Teen Club leaders, so I spent a little bit of time getting back to her and emailing the group at large as well.

Over the break, I plan to prepare for my presentation. I'm probably going to start off by updating everyone on my ultimate Readathon achievements, then move into explaining what I've done for my project thus far.

Started on my research paper!

In thesis, the guidelines for the midterm paper were finally posted on Edmodo, so I spent the entire class period going over them, reading the sample papers, and deciding how to best approach the assignment. I looked over my annotated bibliography - since I knew I'd be using those same sources for this paper - and I thought about how to use those sources in my paper. So far, I think what I'm going to do is focus on the need for child education; for this paper, I'm going to use my sources (many of which are from Pratham USA directly) to explain why child illiteracy in India is such a big problem; to support this argument, I'll incorporate some statistics straight from the Pratham website. I might also discuss the ways in which Pratham's work in India is addressing this issue and helping to promote child literacy and education instead. Now that the brainstorming/thinking stuff is done, next class, I'm going to actually start typing the paper.

Also, side note: I found out this evening that I got into the Plan II honors program at UT Austin! I'm super excited and incredibly relieved, now that I know I have a (very good) fallback in the event that none of my other college apps work out the way I'd like them to.

Working on thesis... Lots of communication.

I spent much of my time today in thesis emailing various people; first, I emailed my mentor to follow up on the discussion we had last night about the possibility of me helping to organize a large-scale fundraising and awareness event in the DFW community as the final product for my thesis. What we decided on was having me help organize a Spring Carnival, wherein people from all over Dallas could come to the event to learn more about Pratham and its cause. Apparently, the Pratham Kids Club had organized this in years past, but for some reason they didn't do it last year. Vineeta Aunty told me I could help lead the effort to bring it back for this year.

When we discussed yesterday, she asked me to confirm with Mr. Correa before we went ahead with this idea, so I also spent a good chunk of my time typing up a long email to him asking if this would be an acceptable product for my thesis project. If he says yes, Vineeta said she'll put me in touch with the Kids Club board members, who are the ones who manage all the non-Readathon events throughout the year. I met them in early June at the Walkathon (which was before I signed up for the Readathon), so it'll be a nice chance to catch up with them again (I haven't talked to them since then).

I also spent some time looking around on the Pratham website to see if they had records of any Spring Carnivals from past years that I could look at. An event of this size takes a whole lot of planning and effort; I was just curious to see whether they had any articles or reports on it from before like they do for the Pratham Galas. So far, I've found nothing, but I'm going to keep looking.

Transition back to thesis

I got to class after the 9:15 bell because my bus was late, which was annoying.

My classmates informed me that we were supposed to work primarily on our thesis projects and that college apps were only secondary in importance, so I contacted my mentor. Our last Pratham get-together was in mid-November, and she told me she was leaving to India right afterwards and returning at the beginning of December, so I wasn't sure if she was back yet. Either way, I emailed her today asking her if we could discuss the potential ideas I had for my thesis and figure out a time we could either meet in person and work on organizing it or keep in touch through email for now and maybe meet over Christmas break.

As of now, I have a lot of material to use as the foundation for my thesis project. What I hope to do is organize an event in the Dallas/Fort Worth community that acts as both a fundraising as well as entertainment event. Below is an excerpt from my email to my mentor:

"What I basically hope to do is organize an event of some sort in the Dallas-Fort Worth area where anyone could come to learn more about Pratham and its cause. I’d like for it to be a one-time fundraising event, but also an event where people can come out with their families. I’m still not sure exactly what this event will be, but I’m thinking of something like a large outdoor get-together where there will be exhibits and maybe even a slideshow running..."

Shortly after that, my mentor texted me saying I should call her this evening to discuss things further. Hopefully we can get something sketched out in the coming weeks, in time for the mid-term presentations in January.

After that, I made a short visit to Ms. Marberry and spent the remaining time looking through the resources posted on Edmodo. I also spent a few minutes emailing myself all the college essay files I had saved on my network drive.

Also, SCEA decisions in 15 days! (Not that I'm keeping track or anything... Okay, maybe I am.)

DISD technology hates me.

It's like a conspiracy, I swear.

Every night before thesis, I email myself the essays I need to work on and a to-do list to make sure I remember everything I plan to do the next day. Today, I had planned to continue working on cutting down my essays for UC Berkeley and completing the UT-PACT application. I also needed to get a blank envelope for a recommendation letter.

Guess which of these things I was able to accomplish.

That's right. The one that doesn't use technology.

Getting the envelope took literally less than a minute, but my files wouldn't download properly from the email - no, scratch that, they wouldn't download at all - so I spent a good 20 minutes trying all the possible ways I knew how to get around it. Eventually, I was able to download them using the right click and "save target" option.

But then, the files took another hour to open.

After a few minutes, I got tired of waiting, so I moved onto the next thing on my list: the PACT application. At first, all was well - I was able to log in perfectly and fill out a good two activities in the "Extracurricular activities" section before Internet Explorer decided to be stupid and refuse to let me type any more.

I had to log out, close the browser, and log back in at least ten times to continue working on the application. What's worse is that each time I did that, the amount of time it would allow me to type normally got shorter and shorter until I wasn't able to type anything at all.

At that point, I had to type everything into a document on Google Drive (because Microsoft Word was still opening my essays and trying to open a blank Word document just froze the entire thing), and then copy and paste each part manually (i.e. using the right-click option). Even that didn't work at times, especially when I needed to change what I'd already pasted into a box, because then I would have to cut what was in the box, paste it back into the Google Drive doc, make the changes, and then copy and paste it back into the PACT application.

On top of that, the Internet tab that had the Google Drive doc started doing the same stupid thing, so I had to close that tab and open a new document each time. To illustrate my point: I currently have ten "Untitled Documents" sitting in My Drive right now.

I am so done. Honestly, I can get so much more stuff done at home, and literally the only reason for that is because Dallas ISD has stupid technology that doesn't let me do my work.

And let's not even talk about the fact that the login box doesn't even show up on Common App anymore.

On a happier note, though, I was ultimately able to complete the PACT application (excepting the statement of motivation, for which I've found resources to help me as I brainstorm and write my first draft). I also helped a fellow student by proofreading his essay. Yay for productiveness in spite of technology issues!

It's crunch time (again!)

Well, today I realized that my UC Berkeley app is due in less than ten days, so I spent today's thesis period going over my UC application one more time. I still had to finish the activities and awards sections so I did that for a while. (I hate character limits with a passion!!)

I also opened my ApplyTexas Essay A and tried to cut it down to 500 words so that I can use it for the second personal statement on the UC app. So far, not much luck: it's still more than 300 words over. It'll get there, though.

I still wish I'd been more productive, but I was feeling so sick this morning that I actually had to rest my head on the table for a while before I could pull myself together to actually get some more work done.

All I really have left to do for the UC app at this point is copy and paste the second essay once I can get it down to meet the limit. After that, I'll need to make some serious progress on the PACT statement of motivation (yeah, I'm still applying, but only because I've been advised to keep my options open) and the Rice supplement. I need to write a few more of those short essays (including "Why Rice") and have my teachers look over them. Then, after my parents read them, I'll be able to submit.

All of this needs to happen by December 15th. I also have a ton of choir stuff going on that week (Open House on the 10th, concert on the 13th, lots of rehearsals before then) so I'm not sure how I'll be able to manage my time. I'm hoping to make some serious progress over Thanksgiving break, though - I think I'm just going to hole myself up in my room and type away at these essays all day. Hopefully then, I'll be able to make some significant progress.

Today's the day!

My Yale interview was today, so I tried not to freak out and instead spent the entire class period going over my notes and practicing my responses just to get comfortable with it and to ease my nerves. I also found a really awesome interview blog that has some really fantastic tips and advice for the alumni interview process.

The interview itself went fairly well; it was less formal than I was expecting, and I walked out of it feeling like I'd made a pretty good impression.

Now all I have to do is interview for several of the other schools I'm applying to! (No doubt that's going to be more difficult; since Yale is my top choice, it was easy for me to explain to the interviewer why I applied to Yale SCEA and why I want to go there so badly. The other colleges... Not so much.)

On a completely unrelated note: this morning, I discovered the existence of something absolutely amazing and wonderful.

South Asian a cappella groups.

They have them everywhere! Stanford, Princeton, Penn, and Carnegie Mellon are just a few of the colleges whose South Asian a cappella groups are especially popular. Not only do they perform Bollywood music, though - they also frequently create mashups of Hindi and English (Hinglish?) songs, as well as perform in some other Indian languages (including Tamil!). And there are videos and recordings and albums everywhere.

Overall, it's a wildly popular trend and it's spreading. The Yale South Asian Society actually has its very own a cappella group, as well as lots of other Indian cultural events throughout the year!

As if I needed another reason to want to go to Yale.

But oh my gosh, I can't even describe how excited I am about this. I mean, seriously! Bollywood music and a cappella - two of my most favorite things combined. What could be better?

I seriously need some Hindi a cappella music in my life.

More interview stuffs.

I spent literally the entire class period today trying to shorten my resume to two pages. I tried messing with the formatting (margins, line spacing, etc.), but I was only able to get it down from four to three and a half pages. After that, I removed the activities and awards that aren't as important to me, but then my resume was still two and three-quarters pages long.

The struggle is real.

By the end of the class period, I was able to cut it down to almost two pages. There's only about two or three lines of text on the third page, so hopefully with a few more formatting changes I can finally get it down to two pages exactly.

Meanwhile, I'm really not sure if I want to apply to the UT-PACT program anymore... I know I want to be a doctor, obviously (I literally can't see myself doing anything else in the future), but I'm not sure I want to enroll in an accelerated medical program just to get there quicker. At this point, I just want to go to college and have that full college experience. If I do PACT, I'm going to spend almost all my time during the year (summer included) taking exclusively science courses to get those pre-med requirements out of the way in three years. That means I won't get to take classes in a lot of other subjects that interest me, including literature, anthropology, and psychology. It also means I won't have any summers off for those first three years, and that I won't have as much time to participate in things outside of the classroom (like singing in an a cappella group or taking advantage of other non-medicine related opportunities) as I would otherwise.

I really don't mind applying to medical school in four years. Besides, UT Southwestern is great, but how do I know it's the right school for me? I want to have options. I'm going to apply to many of the same places again in four years (Yale, Tufts, etc.) for medical school, so I don't want to commit to a school right now when I have no idea what college will bring. Seriously, I've changed my mind about which college I want to attend so many times in the past four months that there's no doubt I'll change my mind about which medical school I want to attend in the next four years.

Also, UT Dallas... It's really not for me. (Sorry. It's just not. I can't see myself there at all.)

On another note, though, the Pratham post-Readathon congratulations party is this Sunday! I'm super excited to get the chance to see everyone again and catch up with Vineeta after so long. (Also the awards ceremony, but yeah.)

This isn't that bad.

I'm still working on the responses for my Yale interview questions, and I'm discovering that I actually have a lot to talk about. A LOT. I mean, first of all, I need to explain what TAG is like to my interviewer - and that'll probably take a good ten minutes - and then talk about all my extracurricular activities (choir and Pratham are my two main ones that I'm definitely going to talk about). Just to give you some perspective: I've written a total of 1,379 words about my experience with Pratham and the Readathon. That's 12 paragraphs.

And, on top of that, I'm hoping to tell him about my heritage/background and share my story of how I moved here when I was little and what it was like growing up with the resulting culture clash (and the identity crisis that followed). Which is basically what I wrote my Yale supplement essay about.

Also, my response to "Why Yale" is 726 words long. I think it's pretty legit, though - I connected my experiences at TAG to what I'm looking for in a college and the fact that Yale has exactly that.

I'm also writing a lot about my passion for science and talking about the experiences that made me want to become a doctor. Just in case he asks me what I want to do with my life, I have two responses. (Really, though, I'm not sure whether neonatology or anesthesiology is more interesting to me. At this point, I just like medicine in general. I'm sure once I get to medical school, I'll be able to decide for sure.)

So. Hopefully, since I have all this stuff to talk about, I'll be able to mention everything, even if he doesn't ask me the exact questions I've been answering. And hopefully, since I'm going to be talking a lot, he won't have the chance to interrupt me or ask me extremely probing questions that I won't have an answer for. Or, by the end of the interview, hopefully I'll be able to get him talking enough about his experience at Yale that I won't have to say much at all!

Whatever happens, I think I'll be okay. Even though this is my first college interview, it's not the first interview I've done. So it's not like I'm completely unprepared - I sort of know what to expect.

I also updated my Common App to include the fact that I received the Young Leader Award from Pratham USA (this morning!!) for leading the team that raised the most money on a national level. As in, Team Aishwarya raised more than $12000 total. And no other team in the United States could raise more than that. :D

Interviews, ahh!

Over the weekend, I got an email from a Yale alum in Dallas asking when I'd like to have an off-campus interview!

*screams*

Well, we emailed back and forth a few times and now I have the official date: next Tuesday, November 19th. Which means I have just over a week left to prepare.

Yikes.

Let me start off by saying interviews aren't really my strong suit. I'm good at talking about myself- that's not the problem. The problem is that I get really nervous in situations like that, to the point where I stumble over my words a lot and my face starts heating up and I sometimes lose track of what I'm saying.

Okay, maybe I'm making it sound a little worse than it is. Whatever it is, I'm just hoping the interview will just be like what most Yale alumni interviews are like- informal conversations that seem shorter than they are. And I know that even if it doesn't go that well, it's not going to have that much of an impact on my admissions decision.

Anywho, I spent all of thesis today compiling a list of 20-30 typical college interview questions and typing out answers to them. So far, I've answered about 10, so I'm about halfway through. Not bad! Hopefully I can get this done by Wednesday so that my parents and I can review the responses together and edit them so that by Saturday I'll have a finalized "Interview Q&A" list. I do plan on interviewing for several other schools (most notably TUFTS <3) so I'm sure this document will come in handy in the future as well.

I also re-wrote my Tufts supplement essays, so now I have three essentially complete essays. I gave them to Mr. Correa today, and I'm meeting with Mr. Templet Thursday at lunch to go over them. All that needs to be done is a few words need to be cut from the last essay and they need to be looked over for grammatical accuracy (to make sure there aren't any awkward phrases or anything).

More college stuffs.

Today, I worked on several different things. First of all, I called Jostens to find out exactly what the graduation order form was about and how much I needed to pay today if I wanted just a cap and gown. Once I did that, I found out that I could use the check I had and pay the rest later. That phone call cleared up a lot of confusion I had earlier about the whole graduation deal. A lot of people I knew seemed to be confused too, which I thought was rather odd.

Anywho, though, that's been cleared up now, which is good. After that, I worked on my Tufts supplement essays. I'm still struggling to decide whether I want to use the Common App or the Universal College App. Each has its own benefits and drawbacks, so I'm trying to weigh them and see which one is ultimately the best. The good thing about Common App is that it's all already filled out. The bad thing about it is that the word limits on the supplement mean I need to edit my essays (which worries me because I love my "Why Tufts" essay as it is, and I really don't want to make it any shorter because I feel like that would take away some of my voice from it). The good thing about Universal College App is that all the essay word limits are much more generous than they are on Common App, so I won't have to cut anything. The bad thing about it is that the character limits on the "Extracurriculars" and "Honors and Awards" sections are so tiny I can hardly fit anything I want to write. That means I'll have to write something for literally every single activity and award/honor in the "Additional Information" section. And that's just ridiculous.

I don't know. I'm going to try and see if I can rework my essays to meet the limit. At this point, the UCA is becoming so exasperating that I'm probably just going to stick with the Common App. (That, and my teachers and guidance counselor will have to re-input all their recs and stuff for the new app, which I feel is rather unnecessary.)

I emailed Tufts and asked them if there was any way I could get around the limit (e.g. by emailing them my essays directly), and they said no. Well, no surprise there. I guess I'll just have to work with the Common App and its stupid word limits that shouldn't even be as stringent as they are.

I also worked on writing a new short extracurricular essay for the few other schools that had a 150 word limit on it. At first, I tried cutting down my 247-word version to meet the limit but it was of no use. I guess I'll have to start anew, then. Hopefully this new one will turn out just as good as the longer one.

I'm going to college!!

Got my third acceptance today from Baylor University. Yay!

I spent today's thesis period working on (more like wrestling with, to be honest) my UT-PACT application. I thought ApplyTexas was bad, but PACT is worse! I had no idea how many awards/honors I could even list and it wouldn't let me add another award unless I had filled out all the "required fields" for the previous one. So figuring that out took literally the entire class period. Turns out I can list 20 awards/honors, so now I have to go back and figure out which ones I want to list.

That's just the awards/honors page. I still have to fill out the extracurriculars and healthcare-related experiences pages. And, on top of all that, I have to write my "statement of motivation" for why I want to pursue medicine.

Boy, am I excited.

In terms of the rest of my college apps, I still have to finalize finalize my college list. My dad took out some schools from my list (saying that my list needed to be shorter), but I'm probably going to apply to those schools anyway. I still need some match schools, and right now I have next to none. Not good.

Happy ED/EA deadlines day!

(I know, Yale extended its deadline to November 4th. But I don't care - I'm going to have all my stuff in for them by tonight.)

In thesis today, I showed Correa the few minor edits I made to my Common App essay as well as the Short Takes I wrote. He liked them and suggested a few changes, which I then made.

Do you know what this means? This means I'm officially done with all the writing I have to do for my SCEA app. Yay!

Now I only have about 20 more essays to go. How exciting.

I also went and got my supplementary recommendation letter ready; all I have to do is drop it off at the post office tomorrow morning to make sure it gets postmarked and sent in time.

I'm so glad I'm finally submitting this app. I've put a ton of thought and effort into it, and I feel like it's ready. I'm also kind of tired of revising the same old essays when I still have some that I haven't even started yet.

As for thesis, I worked on my annotated bibliography. The kind of frustrating thing about my thesis is that my resources are going to be different from everyone else's. Most people are writing research papers or studying a topic on which extensive research has already been done; for those kinds of projects, the resources they'd cite on a bibliography are things like abstracts of scientific research, newspaper/magazine articles, Internet articles, etc. Mine are completely different, though - because my thesis is specifically based on one organization (that is Pratham), it really only makes sense to use their resources and publications. Which is all well and good except for the fact that some of their publications are things I'm not sure how to cite because they don't easily fall into the typical categories. For example, one of my resources is a Pratham USA 2012 Annual Report, but there's not really a section in the Purdue OWL website that talks about that directly. So I'm going to have to do a little bit of searching to make sure I do it right. (Even then, I'm not completely sure it'll be accurate because of other weird things like authors and publishers.) A few of my resources are going to be YouTube videos as well, and I've never heard of anyone citing a YouTube video before. (Thank goodness there's a section for that on the OWL site, though.)

Anywho. Tomorrow is Diwali (my favorite holiday of the year!) so I'm probably not going to have much time to do anything, either college apps or thesis related. Hopefully I'll find time to finish either tonight or Sunday.

College apps: 5 down (technically 8), 10 more to go.

College acceptances: 2.

It's (finally) coming together!

The moment is almost here...

I have my Common App and Yale supplement essays pretty much done. Both meet the word count limit (they're 650 and 500 words respectively, haha), which in and of itself is a pretty big accomplishment for me. Why do I always write so much?!

All I have left to do is write a few more short takes. I really don't like some of my responses to the questions (well, two of them), but I'm pretty sure my admissions decision won't be based on two sentences. (Not that I'm expecting much of a "decision" anyway, but...)

I plan to submit my SCEA app tomorrow night. Once I do that, I can work on my application to UT-PACT. I also need to organize the rest of my colleges into a specific order so that I know which supplements I should tackle first and which I should save for last.

I'm so ready to submit this Common App, though. I've struggled with that essay enough as it is (seriously, I started working on it in August. Technically in May, but I discarded that one and chose a different prompt), I really don't need to agonize over it any longer.

After all, I have a statement of motivation to write for PACT which I have no idea how I'll go about doing... And it's due December 15th.

Yay, college apps.

On another note, I've decided to use the Universal College Application for several of my schools because a) that app allows me to send my extracurricular essay (in its entirety!) to ALL those schools and b) there's no stupid word limit cutoff like there is on the Common App! Which means I can use my supplement essays in their entirety too! So I don't have to waste time trying to edit out parts that are "unnecessary" and diluting the effect of the essay overall.

I wish more of my schools were on the UCA.

Oh, speaking of UC- I need to submit my UC Berkeley app by the end of November too.

Grr, why so many deadlines?!

Absent! 10/25/2013

I was not here on the 25th because I was in Las Vegas with my family. (Wow, so much fun. Can you hear that sarcasm?)

Too many things to keep track of. 10/23/2013

I seriously wish I didn't have to go to Las Vegas. Like, are you kidding me? A (rather unnecessary) trip that's not only going to make me miss 2 days of school, but also takes time away that I could've used to work on my Yale app?!

This is too much.

The trip is really stressing me out too. I have to remember to finish packing a few last-minute things, I have to pick up my Yale supplement essay at the end of the day from Mr. Correa, I have to print my essay drafts so that I can edit them whenever I have time (which I expect to have none of, ugh), I have to figure out what homework/tests I'm going to miss while I'm gone so that I can make them up when I get back...

And, on top of all that, my Yale application is due in a mere 9 days. (I know they extended it, but I don't care. I'm still going to get my app materials in early.) And I want to have everything in early next week.

WHY.

Plus, I have to remember to work on my UT-PACT application (and to send the evaluation form to my three recommenders...) and to submit that Coca Cola Scholars app (which is still annoying me).

Hopefully (hopefully!) I won't miss much. And hopefully I'll be able to cut down my Common App and Yale supplement essays in time. And hopefully I'll be able to finish and submit all of this stuff by next week.

Hopefully.

Yay, Monday! It was actually a good day.

I got a lot of stuff done today, hooray! I'm finding that typing out a to-do list to myself in an email is actually really helpful. I have so many things to keep track of that I often forget to do them if I use a mental checklist. (Although let's be real, when did that ever work? ... Maybe last year.) So I'm definitely going to keep doing that in the future.

In thesis I printed several of my essays for Correa and Templet to edit - my Common App essay (which is 362 words over the limit, ha ha), my Yale supplement essay (which is basically finalized at this point) and one of my Tufts supplement essays. Agh, I love Tufts! I really really do. It's basically my secondary dream school. If it weren't for Yale, it would be my first. I think I even love it more than Dartmouth, to be honest. If I get in, I think I might cry tears of joy.

I also worked on my Coca Cola Scholarship application (which, incidentally enough, is due October 31st. Yay, deadlines.) and finalized that. The thing that really annoys me about this app is that they've set it up in a way that prevents me from listing most of my extracurriculars (i.e. summer programs and the like) that aren't school-sponsored. So it basically looks like I've done nothing for 4 years, when that couldn't be farther from the truth.

But if I don't make semifinalist, oh well. It's not the end of the world.

I also went and talked to Mr. D about a letter of recommendation and told him I wouldn't be in 9th period today because I'd be editing my Common App essay.

I decided not to apply to the McDermott Scholars program at UTD because I'm already applying to Collegium V honors, which is basically the same thing except the fees aren't paid for. I really doubt I'll be able to finish that app in the next two weeks. I'm applying to UT-PACT anyway, and that requires a completely different type of essay (a statement of motivation), so that's already extra work on my part. Besides, UTD isn't really one of my "preferred" college options.

Anywho. Tonight I hope to cut down on what I think is unnecessary in my Common App essay so that I can go over it with Templet tomorrow morning and Correa (hopefully) during lunch.

EA deadline is 11 days away!

PSAT? Ha.

It seriously didn't feel like a Wednesday today. I guess that's because of PSAT, but still.

The shortened class periods were too short in my opinion. I didn't get to do very much because we only had like 30 minutes. I went over my UC app one more time to make sure I had filled in everything (except for the essays, of course). I added the 'course level' designation to all my Pre-AP courses (I wasn't sure whether they were "UC-approved honors courses" or not, so I'd left that part blank before).

I also filled out the short college apps survey. Unfortunately, I couldn't remember the exact dates I asked my teachers for recs, but I put down the weeks so that should be a fairly good estimate.

I seriously need to finish my Common App essay!! I feel like I'm so behind in that respect, because I know some of my classmates have already finished theirs (in fact, I even know some other seniors who have finished and submitted Common App!).

Since it's crunch time in terms of college apps, I really haven't gotten any time to work on thesis stuff. But hopefully once the November 1st deadline passes, I'll be able to find more time to do that. I haven't talked to Vineeta in ages, to be honest - though, to be fair, she's been pretty busy as well. Hopefully we'll get time to catch up in November (since the Readathon will have ended by then).

Oh my god.

This morning, I realized that November 1st is only two weeks away. That means I have only two weeks left to finish my Yale application.

I guess the immediacy of that deadline didn't hit me till now.

I'm kind of freaking out.

Just a little.

I still have to complete my Common App essay (draft!!) and finish a few short takes before I can send my application out. I also need to cut down on the words for my supplement essay - it's stuck at 674 words, which is still 174 words more than the limit.

I'm not okay with this. I wanted to have all my applications in a month before the deadline. (Clearly, that was too optimistic. And now I know that it's because I didn't take into account how much work school itself would be.) If not that, I wanted them in at least two weeks before! But now even that is hopeless. I still haven't submitted all my materials for the UT honors app, which is due tomorrow.

What is my life.

People tell me that I'm pretty far ahead on my applications, but honestly? I'm not. This isn't just false humility, either. I don't think people realize this: I'm applying to so many places that in the grand scheme of things, having 3 apps completed isn't a big accomplishment. At all.

EDIT: I just realized my Yale supplement essay is actually not more than 100 words over the limit. It's only 35. Thank goodness! I can work with that.

Anywho, though. Today in thesis I gave Mr. Correa one of my UT essays to read and he gave it back to me at the end of the day. I also got Mr. Templet's edits as well as my mom's. Hopefully now I can sit down with all three versions, edit my real one and submit it tonight.

I also looked at the INROADS internship thing Ms. Marberry emailed us about. I tried to register, but I'm not sure exactly what happened. I think it saved my information, but then it wouldn't let me log on. Maybe it's because they have limited positions for high school students? I'm not sure. Either way, though, I'll just let it sit there and see if they contact me in the future.

But seriously, deadlines. Too soon.

The stress never ends.

(Sorry, late post. Life is crazy, as usual.)

Whew. Now that we're back from TREK (which was a lot of fun! More fun than I was expecting, to be honest) I can get back to actually working on my college apps again. Deadlines are coming up fast (October 15th, ahh!) and I need to make sure I get everything done in time. For UT honors, all I have left to do is to submit the two ApplyTexas essays, submit the online honors application, and upload my expanded resume.

After that, my next deadline is the November 1st for Yale. I seriously need to complete my Common App essay! That's literally the only thing keeping me from submitting my application already.

In thesis on Thursday, I checked my UTD application status. I've been accepted! Yay, my first offer of admission! This is really exciting, haha. (Even though I was assured admission, it's nice to receive an acceptance letter. At least now I can be sure I'll be going to college somewhere next fall!)

Now that I've been accepted to UTD, I can start working on my UT-PACT application. I tried accessing the portal but for some reason, it wouldn't let me go to the next page on the app. I was using a netbook, though, and it was having issues with the Internet anyway, so that's probably why.

I also looked at my McDermott Scholars app again to see where I am. All I have left to do is fill in all the short descriptions for my activities, upload a 2-page resume (but first I have to shorten my resume to 2 pages, haha), write the short essays, and request recommenders. I'm looking to meet the November 5th deadline, so we'll see how that turns out.

Also #dayofconfessions.

Yay for productiveness!

I've been feeling pretty good about myself these past few days, to be honest. I submitted my ApplyTexas app to UT Dallas and UT Austin a few days ago, and since then I've been working on getting the other required items checked off my list for UT. I sent out my last few recommendation requests today and completed as much of the Supplemental Info Form and Honors App as I could.

I also got Mr. Correa to read my essays today. He liked them too! I was relieved, but for some reason I still don't feel like either of them were that extraordinary. I mean, Correa and Templet both liked BOTH of them, but... Still. I just don't have complete faith in my abilities as a writer, okay. That's kind of why I want to minor in English in college - so that I can build my writing skills (and my self-confidence, haha) along the way. Anywho, though, I'm going to submit Essay A over the weekend for ApplyTexas and save this supplemental one for later. (And you know what? I think I'm actually going to use these two essays for UC Berkeley. I mean, if both of my teachers liked them... I may not have faith in myself, but I do trust their judgment, so I'm going to go for it.)

I also typed up my "Why Brown" supplement essay. I'm almost - well, not quite - done with it. All I've finished talking about is the Open Curriculum and my academic/extracurricular interests, and I'm already at 157 words. The limit is 200. Why.

OH, that brings me to another point - I'm glad they liked that second essay I wrote about my culture and heritage, but guess what? It's 174 words over the limit. (I hate my life. Why do I always have to write so much?!) I'm going to sit down with them again and ask them to help me get it down to a manageable size. I mean, the ApplyTexas essay I wrote was 901 words, for goodness sake! (I don't even know how it happened. Thankfully, neither of those in-state schools I'm applying to have an essay word limit, yay!)

As I was writing the Brown essay, I looked up their study abroad programs so that I could talk about a specific one and I found a "Distinctively Brown" program in India that I actually found rather interesting. It's a program in which you live in Delhi for a semester and get to experience all of India's cultural events and things. The one thing that caught my eye about it, though, was that students who choose that program actually get to learn Hindi. How cool is that?! I always refused to consider going to India for study abroad, but this opportunity sounds pretty awesome. I'd love to learn Hindi! I can speak a little bit of it, just from what I picked up while living with my grandparents in Mumbai over summer vacations, but I'd like to actually learn to speak it fluently. I just might do it - if I get into Brown, that is. (On a somewhat tangential note, they had a picture of all the students dressed up in sarees. It was interesting.)

Le sigh.

Before I came to thesis today, I had a whole list of things typed out that I wanted to accomplish. Guess how many of those I was actually able to finish?

About half. Which isn't bad, but I wanted to get a lot more done than I was able to. Let's just say I wasn't counting on the announcements taking that long today; I wanted to go to my locker and get both of my essays edited and printed in the first 10 minutes of class, but because of the announcements, Mr. Correa wasn't able to say what he wanted to say till 9:30, which is really unfortunate because that meant I only got to start the senior survey at 9:40, when my plan was to have it done by then. Ah, well. I worked on it for a good 25 minutes and at this point, I only have two more questions left to answer. Hopefully I can finish those tonight and email it to him.

(Yes, I plan things out with exact timings. What can I say? It helps me stay on track and be organized.)

What's more is that, for some reason, I can't find my AP Spanish binder anywhere! I was sure I left it in my locker yesterday evening, but when I went to get it today it wasn't there. It wasn't in my backpack, nor was it in Mr. Buchanan's room (I went and checked). That frustrated me to no end because my main goal in thesis today was to give Mr. Correa my revised essays so he could read them and tell me what he thought before I submitted them to their respective schools! Arghhh. I still have no idea where the binder is, but I'm going to keep searching. Hopefully it'll turn up soon! It's a one-inch orange binder with no clear front cover, and it has all my Spanish stuff in the rings and my essays in the front inside flap.

I also wasn't counting on the fact that I'd have to help some people with Common App stuff. That took up more time than I expected it to, honestly. Which I don't mind, because I like helping people, but it was unexpected. I got stuff done today in thesis - it's not like I was slacking off or anything - I just spent the time doing stuff I wasn't expecting to do. Productive stuff, but still.

On a brighter (or maybe not-so-bright, I don't know) note, I listed the rest of my schools on the paper in my blue file. (I had to add lines and write a few outside of the given box. I'm not sure what that says about my college list...) In terms of college apps, though, I've submitted both my Baylor app and my University of Pittsburgh app. Hopefully I'll get a decision from Pitt soon. (They still haven't received my test scores and transcript! I don't know why, I sent those in several weeks ago. Hopefully I won't have to do all of that again... We'll see.) I've also started my application to UC Berkeley; I'm about halfway through with it as of now. Hopefully I'll be able to recycle some of the essays I've already written for other schools! (I have to write enough essays as it is, okay. Give me a break. Besides, I'm 95% sure two essays I've already finished will work for Berkeley.)

More college apps

In thesis today, I finalized my ApplyTexas application to UT Austin and UT Dallas. I had to change around the order of some of my activities and honors, and once I did that I went through the entire application (twice!) to make sure everything was filled in correctly. I did catch one mistake, so I fixed that.

I also got my internship badge made. (My picture actually looks good, yay! The guy almost spelled my last name wrong. Thank goodness I was standing next to him so I caught the error before he made the actual badge.)

I'm also working on the senior student survey. My goal was to have it done today in class but I didn't expect the ApplyTexas to take as long as it did, and I didn't know we were getting intern badges today, so that took up more of my time. Anyway, I'm almost done with it, so hopefully I'll have it completely filled out by Wednesday.

Presentations, Day 2

So yesterday, I did my thesis presentation. I think it went pretty well! I wasn't quite as nervous as I thought I would be, which was nice. I also covered pretty much everything I wanted to - I did want to mention how I went about raising money, but it wasn't something I was planning on doing because I didn't think I'd have time to do so. I didn't skip anything that I'd written down on the notecards, so I was pretty pleased with that.

We didn't have much time to work on stuff after everyone presented, so all I really got to do was check my email. I got an email from UT Austin about an event in Dallas related to their honors programs, so I registered for that. That's about it, though. Next week I hope to have the senior survey completely filled out - I've started on it, but I had so much work this week that I didn't have time to finish - as well as my ApplyTexas app submitted.

I also met with Stefani D'Angelo - the woman who works with Childrens Miracle Network and runs Dance Marathon - after school to talk about the possibility of starting Dance Marathon at Townview. She was an awesome person and she seemed excited about the idea! I brought along some of my friends and though at the beginning they had no idea what they were really there for, at the end, all of them seemed really interested! I think it would be great if we could do it in March sometime, but I honestly still don't know if I'm up for it. Either way, though, I feel better now that I know more about it. Besides, I'm sure that at least one of us would be willing to work with Stefani to figure something out.

Presentations, Day 1

Today was the first day of thesis presentations in our class. I watched several of my classmates present their thesis topics.

After the first eight people presented today, I finalized and submitted my National Merit Scholarship application. I also looked at the senior survey again for letters of recommendation. Hopefully I'll have that completed by the end of this week.

Thesis Things

Last Friday in thesis I actually got a lot of stuff done relating to my thesis project. I looked up the presentation handouts again on Edmodo and made my outline. I have a good idea of what I'm going to say now - I'm also thinking about using my webpage as my visual. Then I can show them what I've actually done over the summer with my project already.

I also got an email from a lady who works at Dallas Children's about an opportunity to start something at our school called a Dance Marathon to raise funds for patients. I emailed her back to find out more about it and she responded almost immediately. We emailed back and forth for a while and decided to meet this Thursday after school to talk about the possibility of starting a DM at Townview. I'm honestly not sure whether I'm willing to lead the effort, because I'm already so busy with 9 APs, choir, a cappella choir, and college apps. Plus, I'm already doing the Pratham Readathon as a community service/fundraising type deal. So I'm not completely sure if I'll be able to make the commitment without overburdening myself. *sighs* We'll see, I guess. I still don't know how the whole 'starting a Dance Marathon' process works, so once Thursday rolls around I'll have a better idea of what to do.

Still working...

In thesis yesterday I worked on my ApplyTexas Essay A, the prompt for which is as follows:

Describe a setting in which you have collaborated or interacted with people whose experiences and/or beliefs differ from yours. Address your initial feelings, and how those feelings were or were not changed by this experience.

For this essay, I'm talking about my experience with the Best Buddies program in middle school; each of us was assigned to a special education kid and were supposed to get to know them and interact with them on a daily basis for an hour after school from January-June. I personally thought was a pretty neat experience; I really enjoyed getting to know my "buddy" over the course of six months, and I also learned a lot from it. So hopefully this essay will work out!

For thesis, I looked over the documents that were posted on Edmodo relating to the presentations and thought about what I was going to say when I got up there. I also turned in my community service hours from this summer (which totaled almost 150 hours!) and my change of address form.

Well.

Today, I made some progress. I worked on my expanded resume for UT Austin, looked at more colleges and programs, and spent some time doing miscellaneous Readathon stuff. (Now that we actually have a concrete date for presentations, I'll be able to plan ahead accordingly with that!)

For my thesis project, I did some snooping around on the SeeYourImpact website and apparently, there's an option for you to start your own fundraiser for Pratham independent of the Readathon. I'm thinking that I could probably just do that for the rest of the year; at least that would resolve the issue of the Readathon ending next month and leaving me with nothing much to do. I still have to talk to Vineeta about it, but if she approves of this idea I'll set up that fundraiser after October 31st as well as figure out something else to do with Pratham. The online fundraiser will be on the side.

I also crossed the $2,000 mark on my fundraiser! I'm so excited! The $250 matching donation was added to my total this morning, so now I'm at $2,013. I also have several checks that have yet to be deposited as well as a few other donors lined up. I'm really glad that this fundraiser is going so well. I honestly didn't expect to make it this far when I started fundraising in July :D

In terms of college apps, I figured out exactly how to format the expanded resume for UT - by using a table! The formatting was seriously bothering me so much that I just quit and didn't come back to it until after I went to my other resume and looked again to see how they figured out a way to make everything so perfectly aligned. That was when I realized they did all of it in a table but just made the borders invisible. Now I've tried it with this UT resume and - yay! - it works. So I worked on that for a bit. (Wow, it's going to be a really long resume...)

I also looked into the McDermott Scholars program at UT Dallas and at the University of Pittsburgh as another school I might apply to.

Update

(Sorry that this blog post is late. My wireless keyboard died and I've been trying to fix it. I've replaced the batteries so it should work temporarily, but I'm not counting on it.)

Anywho, a few days ago in thesis I made a list of things I need to do. Mr. Correa read off how many documented community service hours we have, and apparently I have somewhere in the ballpark of 36 hours. The only thing is, I don't remember which activities I've already turned in hours for and which I haven't. Ah, well. I'll just add the hours I've gotten from this past summer (which will take me way past 100 hours) and that should be fine. I'm pretty sure I turned in my Volunteens hours from last summer, but I guess I can always go ask them to make sure.

I also (FINALLY!) got my report card from the end of junior year. I also got a change of address form so that they can actually send my stuff to the right address this time. (I guess I didn't realize the reason why I never got my report cards at the end of the year is because they had the wrong address on file. And we moved two years ago, too. Oops.)

As for the Pratham Readathon, Vineeta and I have been communicating and she gave me a list of ideas for what I could do after the Readathon ends in October. A lot of them were just basic fundraising ideas (e.g. bake sales, talent shows, selling other random things to make money) but it got me thinking. I really hope we'll be able to come up with something that'll actually work.

Also, I'm now the reader who has raised the most money in the United States! I'm at $1,753 right now. Not only that, but I've also gotten 18 new readers on my team. Hopefully (hopefully!) I'll be able to motivate some of them to raise money by the end of the fundraiser. The only challenge is that a) most of them have been inactive for the past few months and b) I can only contact them via email, so if some of them don't even check their emails I won't be able to do anything about it. Still, I'm just going to hope for the best. (Go Team Aishwarya! :D)

Today was a good day.

I did lots of different things in thesis today none of which involved writing college essays.

The first thing I did was look up Northeastern University to find out whether or not they took essays into consideration in the application process. According to the "What We Consider" section of their website, they don't, since nowhere on that page are the words 'essay' or 'writing' mentioned at all. I find that kind of odd, since they're on the Common App, and they'll receive my Common App essay anyway. So are they just not going to read it? Or are they going to read it and not factor it into their official admissions decision? Whatever it is, I'm happy. I can get into Northeastern, because they're not super duper selective (32% isn't that bad!) and they put a really strong emphasis on academic performance.

I also checked briefly to see if I could apply to Northeastern EA, but I can't because it's a private school and my heart is already set on Yale SCEA. Ah well, I'm okay with RD too.

After that, I called CollegeBoard and asked them about the AP free response booklet I requested a month ago. Four weeks ago, I sent a request to AP Services asking them for my AP English Language and Composition free response booklet (containing my written essays) along with the $7 check, but I never got any response from them as to whether the booklet was on its way or whether they'd even received my letter. Thankfully, when I got in touch with one of the agents she was able to pull up my file and find out for me. Apparently they'd received my request on August 29th, but I'll have to wait till the end of September for it to be processed. Then, it'll probably take another few weeks for it to actually arrive at my address. Ah, well. I'm okay with waiting; I just wanted to make sure they got my stuff so I wouldn't have to send another check and miss the September 15th deadline. (I don't know, but for some reason, I have a bad history with the things I send getting lost in the mail.)

Slowly making progress

I've been making progress - slowly, but surely. Today in thesis, I looked up the application requirements for UTD and the PACT program (the joint 7-year UT Dallas/UT Southwestern accelerated medical program). It seems that all I have to do is send one of the transcripts I requested to them and submit my (already completed) ApplyTexas application. (All I have to do is write that one optional essay, and I'm not sure if I really want to do that. I'd like to receive the AES Academic Honors merit scholarship, but I don't know if the essay would help me with that or not.) I'll have to wait till October to access the PACT application, though.  The nice thing is, I feel like I have a slightly better chance at this program than at other 7-yr med programs. Besides, it's a collaboration with my dream medical school, UT Southwestern! What could be better?

In other news, I read through some Yale student blogs, which only served to make me fall in love with the school even more. Seriously, I love Yale so much. I can't even describe it. (If I don't get in, I might cry. A little. And then sigh and move on.)

All sentiment aside, I think I've made my decision. I'm going to apply to Yale SCEA instead of Princeton, because I'm almost done with the Yale supplement already. (Besides, I have to rewrite my Princeton essay because apparently what I wrote didn't fit the prompt.)

I'm also making steady progress on the Readathon. Now I'm at $1,542. (So exciting, ahh!) Vineeta also got back to me about continuing with the Readathon, saying this:

"I love your enthusiasm. Yes, we will think of something for you to do after oct 31st. :)"

She's organized a Pratham get-together next Sunday, so hopefully then we'll get some time to sit down and discuss this in further detail.

College Things

At the beginning of class today, Ms. Marberry came and talked to us briefly about graduation requirements and college stuffs. She gave us a counselor's report (basically a transcript, except not) and a paper that had the list of credits we needed to graduate. Sadly, my rank didn't go up. (Honestly, though, I don't really care all that much. My GPA went up and that made me happy.)

She also handed out a paper to everyone which asked for the schools we were applying to and how (ED, EA, or RD) so that she could schedule appointments with each of us. (Thank GOODNESS, because I seriously need to talk to her about things. And thank god she's putting ED/EA people first.)

After that, I started working on the short answer questions for my Baylor Honors Program app. I'm applying to the honors program of every 'lower-tier' school (i.e. Northeastern, Baylor, BU, UT, etc.) because I want that extra challenge and I think it'd be fun. I desperately want to get into one of the three honors programs at UT - Plan II, Dean's Scholars or Health Science Honors.

Anywho. Thesis-wise, I'm still waiting to hear back from Vineeta on the possibility of me continuing to fundraise or work with Pratham in some way even after the Readathon ends. In other news, I'm still raising money! As of right now, I'm at $1,462. I know there's more on the way, though, since I won the matching challenge (for $250!) and several other miscellaneous donations. I really hope people will continue to support me as I work towards achieving (and even exceeding) my current goal of $1,750! :D

Progress has been made.

Today, I got the chance to talk with Mr. Correa about my thesis idea. He seemed interested in it and said that it held a lot of promise, which I'm happy about because I'd really like to use this as my topic. The only thing is, we still have to figure out exactly what I could do for a product. The hard thing is, with a fundraiser, it's already been going on since June, so it's almost like I've been working on my thesis all summer! I've raised over a $1,000 already, but I'm not sure if that would count as a 'product' of some sort. I don't think it does...

The other thing is, the Readathon ends on Halloween, and our final presentations are near the end of the year, in March/April/May. So I have to figure out a different way of continuing to work with Pratham (possibly by fundraising on my own?) in order for this to really work.

I guess I could always just talk about my experience and what I learned from it... (Vineeta already wants me to write an essay about my experience fundraising and how it's influenced me so that she can send it to everyone on the Readathon mailing list or post it on the Pratham USA website as a 'personal account of a Readathon participant' for anyone who'd be interested in reading it.) That doesn't sound like much of a 'product' though. Anywho, I've already emailed Vineeta to ask about possibilities of me continuing to work with Pratham, so we'll see what she says.

In other news, I'm slowly making progress on my college essays! I've been starting a lot of different ones, instead of continuing to work on the few I'd already written, so I feel more productive. (I'm applying to a bunch of schools anyway, so it's a good thing that I've at least got some rough drafts typed up.)

I also went down and met our new registrar; she seems pretty nice! I filled out the clipboard to request official transcripts. I'm going to go and pick those up on Wednesday.

A New Idea

At the end of junior year, back in May, I was considering doing my thesis on Star Trek - specifically, analyzing the relationship between Kirk and Spock and how different elements of the show play into that.

I've decided to do away with that idea, for two main reasons - first because I feel like when I created that idea I was too obsessed with Star Trek and too much into the fangirl side of my life (I've distanced myself from tumblr and fangirling in general now to focus on college apps) to really think about it seriously, and because I'd like to do something more... serious? That's not the exact word I'm looking for, but what I'm trying to say is that I want to do my thesis on something that's more useful or relevant to the world. And besides, I feel like people wouldn't take me seriously if I did my thesis on crazy fangirl stuff. (Most people don't even get it, so my presentations would probably consist of the class staring at me as I stand there and watch literally nobody get my fandom references or understand why Spirk is so important to me.)

Instead, I've decided now to base my thesis off something I've actually been doing. Since this past summer, I've been involved with a not-for-profit organization called Pratham. What Pratham does is host charity events and fundraising initiatives to raise funds and awareness for children in India to help them receive an education. This summer, they had a fundraiser called the Readathon that I participated in. What I did in the Readathon was read books and maintain a webpage, where I would post updates about the books I'd read (usually, I wrote a short summary/review), write short thank you messages to my donors, and just generally update on my progress throughout the fundraiser. The thing is, though, for every book I read, I had to raise a certain amount of money. I had some people do a "rate," where they would donate $10 for every book I read, but ultimately most of my contributions came from people who were interested in supporting me - they'd just donate a set amount (whatever they could afford).

I've been having a great time doing this fundraiser (it's still continuing, so that's another plus in terms of using this idea for thesis) and so far I've been pretty successful - as of now, I've raised $1,162 and there are more donations on the way. I also loved doing this because it feels good to give back to the community and make a difference in the world. Besides, I was able to do that just by doing what I love - reading! It all worked out.

I'm hoping I'll get to use this as my thesis project. The only thing is, I'm not sure exactly how I can do that and what my product would be. But we'll see. I'm honestly looking forward to it, because with this idea, I already have my mentor! I've been working with a lady named Vineeta Salvi; she's the national co-chair of Pratham and I'd say we've gotten to know each other pretty well. We email back and forth frequently and I always contact her if I have any questions or anything. I know for sure that if I get the okay on this idea for thesis, I'll email her and ask if she'd be willing to serve as my mentor. Hopefully she'll say yes!

Thesis and Essay Ideas

I've been thinking about what to do for a senior thesis project, and - as of now - I've decided to explore the ways in which Kirk and Spock's relationship is depicted on the science fiction show "Star Trek." In this project, I will endeavor to analyze the various scenes - referencing the actors' techniques as well as the filming/camera techniques - that depict Kirk and Spock, and explain how they function in the greater story arc. Possible products for this thesis include a series of short commentary-type essays, each accompanied by a picture of the respective scene, or an oral presentation with video clips of the scenes themselves. I chose this thesis topic because I wanted to combine my love of Star Trek and the Kirk/Spock pairing with my propensity for analysis and commentary. Academic fannishness for the win!

As for my college essay, I am going to use one of the Common App essay prompts (copied below) and talk about choir, as it is my main extracurricular activity. I'm going into this process thinking about the essay as less of an essay and more of a creative writing assignment, because I feel that my writing is a lot better if I take a more creative approach to it. I was also excited because I'd been thinking about doing this as my Common App essay for several months, but I was not aware that Common App was getting rid of the 'topic of your choice' prompt, so I was a bit worried that I wouldn't be able to write about my choir experiences. Luckily, this prompt turned up on this year's list of prompts, which made me happy! I am excited to get started on this essay.

Describe a place or environment where you are perfectly content. What do you do or experience there, and why is it meaningful to you?