College Admissions Essay: College Versus Secondary Education

I remember the way I felt upon seeing the college campus on move-in day. The jubilant golden sun shone across the ripened foliage of early August. The stunning fountain in the center of the jade green pond erupted jets of streaming liquid, which created a gentle ripple that filled the place with an ambient rumble. The paved sandstone walkways interweaved between the grand and antique structures of the campus like ornate streets of bronze. Opportunity hung in the air. On my very first day as a college student, I felt as if I couldn’t open my eyes wide enough to take in everything around me. Interestingly, forty whole days later, I still feel the same way as I go through my daily routine on campus. College, like life itself, is a continual learning …show more content…
Perhaps the greatest feature of college life, but the most difficult aspect to adjust to, is the high level of freedom. In an extreme contrast with the secondary education public school system, I was responsible for choosing all my classes, both the ones I need and the ones I want to take. I alone am responsible for learning the information and completing the class assignments. I choose my major; I choose my career. I choose my future. The freedom and burden of making choices can be overwhelming. To ensure that I make the right choices, I have learned to be self-motivated. Instead of thinking that I have to do an assignment, I think that I want to do an assignment. Instead of questioning if the information I learn will ever be relevant to my future career, I look for opportunities each day to apply the information I learn in class. For example, in Southwest Virginia, the ability to speak Spanish is not a highly prized skill. Therefore, I don’t get many opportunities to practice the material I learn in Spanish, which can make it seem as if Spanish is useless. However, instead of succumbing to the temptation of procrastination and, I started to implement speaking Spanish into my daily routine. While eating dinner or speaking to my family, I consider how I would talk about my day in Spanish. I share the information I learn with my younger brother. Immersing myself in the material I learn, openly and willingly, has allowed me to learn large volumes of information. Self-motivation— the unquenchable thirst of wanting and needing to learn and experience new things— has helped me to be successful and has allowed me to soak in more of college