Iowa State University Admission Essay Sample

Growing up in Massachusetts I never considered attending a university in Iowa. But now, as my undergraduate education comes to a close, I find myself looking forward to unexplored territories. When I received a letter from the department of physics and astronomy chair, Dr. Frank Krennrich, informing me of the possibilities for graduate students at Iowa State I was compelled to explore this opportunity further. The programs at Iowa State are consistently highly ranked, especially those of complex materials and condensed matter physics where groundbreaking work is being done to improve healthcare accessibility. The prestige of these programs is paralleled by the professors at the institution, many of who have received competitive awards such as CAREER awards from the NSF. I find myself most interested in the works of Dr. Paul Canfield and of Dr. Costas Soukoulis, involving condensed matter physics and complex materials respectively. But, the most alluring prospect of attending Iowa State University is the Ames Lab, the only National Laboratory on …show more content…
This summer I had my first research experience, with Dr. English, investigating symmetry-breaking states in coupled electronic oscillators. This project gave me experience in experimental construction, data taking, and simulations with Python and Mathematica. Even though this work is outside the field of condensed matter physics and complex materials, the experience taught me valuable lessons for physics research in general, including how to allot tasks and experiments, how to determine proper resources and critically analyze them, as well as how to overcome frustrations and compulsions from unpredicted complications. What’s more, I recently achieved my first publication from the work I did this