fear of growing up college essay

Keeping Up With Dave!

MY FEAR OF GROWING UP, MATURITY AND RESPONSIBILITY: AN ESSAY KIND OF RANT

A series of uncoordinated thoughts and unrelated pictures to give this letter life..

The thing with being self-aware is you realize how much you don’t know yourself – every single day.

I think it’s because we are constantly changing, and our conscious mind is too slow to keep up with the changes that we’re making, or maybe it’s too tired, or too bored.

I'm scared of growing up.

I'm scared that if I grow up and change into a person capable of achieving all I need to achieve, people won’t accept me anymore.

This fear is exacerbated by the fact that it feels like people aren’t accepting me now.

I’m also scared of growing up because I fear it will make me “not fun anymore.”

I want to be fun.

I remember that I’ve always had the childhood fear of being rejected. This is apparently a common fear, but every person – you and I – experiences it differently.

I thought I had gotten over this fear, but apparently, I haven’t.

The question is why am I scared of being rejected. I already know that not everybody will like me.

Intrinsically, I think it comes down to the fact that I want the people I like, admire and accept to like, admire and accept me too.

I don’t know if that makes sense.

My Childhood

I was not a popular kid. I don’t think I was. I differentiated myself a lot, and I was never concerned with the idea of trying to fit in.

I wasn’t made into an outcast though, in fact when people got to know me they found me amusing and interesting. I was easy to talk to, and in my own way, very funny.

I used to like that about myself. Now, it feels like that person is far away from the person I am now.

So, I guess in a way, I want to get back to being that person.

On Being Smart

I want to get back to being that Dave who is weird and fun and surprisingly very smart.

I say “surprisingly” because I always did my best to not appear smart as my first impression.

That’s not how it is anymore, intelligence cannot be toned down forever,

But I'm thinking now and I want you to engage in this thought process with me;

Do you realize how people don’t like other people who act ‘smart?’

It’s not that they don’t admire intelligence; they just don’t want to be reminded of their own lack.

This sentence isn’t enough to walk you through my thought process, allow me break it down a little further.

You probably don’t like people who act like they know everything.

That’s because those people are usually proud, pompous, always in their heads and never concerned with the feelings of others.

But it may even be more than that,

Why is it that most of the time, it is the smart kids who are the ones always bullied, left out and turned into outcasts?

Most of these intelligent kids were just trying to socialize by talking about the things they loved and were genuinely interested in – values we want everyone to have.

Yet they were mocked and rejected for it.

But here is where it even gets deeper:

When other kids see that intelligent kids are being bullied and cast out for being so smart, their thought process goes

Well I shouldn’t be smart either so that I'm not thrown out from the group and left alone. I don’t want to be lonely.

This is the way most people go on living their lives and hiding their full potential just so they can fit in.

They don’t try hard at the things they care about, some don’t even try at all – they do anything to remain a part of the group.

This brings me to this point:

Humans Are Social Animals.

You and I are social animals.

We need community to survive.

We need people to survive.

And while this doesn’t mean the same thing to everybody, we should accept that at our core, we need the presence of other human beings in order to thrive.

This is why in a way society is important.

People validate us when we can’t validate ourselves.

People accept us when we can't accept ourselves.

People see us.

They understand and love us.

They take us in for who we are, no matter how ugly, and we are happier because of it.

And that’s because we know they can be ugly too.

I think my fear of growing up and being rejected actually makes sense.

Because when you think about growing up, this is the thought process you get into (or at least I got into):

If I became a person who got what they wanted to get in a world where most people talk about their dreams and never put in the work to achieve them, would I be ostracized?

Would I be made into an outcast?

Would people think of me like they think of the heroes, the billionaires and role models we look up to on TV, but in reality never want to hang around?

Would they think of me as intimidating? Someone to stay away from before he gets angry at you for not doing the thing you know you should be doing.

I don’t know.

Maybe, I will.

Maybe I will find a new set of people.

But what if these ones don’t want me either?

These Fears Are Useless

A close friend once told me that if I continued to focus on how people are/would reject me, then I’ll get into a mental space where I exclude myself from groups and friendships, and then blame it on people for rejecting me.

She had a point.

Adulthood & Maturity

Adults aren’t fun people.

At least most of them aren’t.

And how can they be?

They’re consistently burdened with the responsibility of their selves, their loved ones, their jobs and what other personal obligation they work to fulfill.

It’s really hard to see these people happy.

Or maybe, they define happiness differently from the way we did when we were kids.

 I don’t know. It’s just a thought.

As a child you love your free time, games, friends, parties.

You become teenagers/young adults and you still love the same thing, but now you can add sex, drugs and alcohol into the mix.

The difference between childhood and maturity is responsibility .

And my god is responsibility scary.

Because it means we will change into people who aren’t fun.

And what are we scared of the most intrinsically?

Not being fun.

Self-sabotage behavior stops us from growing up.

Self-sabotage is when we destroy the effort we put into achieving something with our own hands.

You can see it in relationships, friendships and money.

Think of a girl who finally gets into the relationship she’s always wanted acting in irrational ways that gets her kicked out of her relationship.

Or a gambling man betting all the money he just won – as high as millions of dollars – knowing subconsciously that he will lose it, and still never stops being a gambler.

Self-sabotage behavior is tied to things unconscious negative associations you may have.

What do I mean?

If you grow up thinking that all rich people are assholes and bad people, then you will always sabotage yourself when you have the opportunity to make big money because you have associated rich people with being bad people.

And you’ve resolved in your mind that you don’t want to be a bad person.

Another example could be if you were constantly excluded as a child, you would begin to think people hate you or come to you only when they want something.

This means that when someone wants to genuinely be your friend you won’t let them because you’ve made the negative association that people are your friends only when they want something.

And when somehow, by some miracle, someone stays to actually be your friend, you project your negative emotions unto them and soon they leave.

You prove yourself right, by acting in ways that make sure that you are right.

It’s a vicious cycle, difficult to break.

Re-defining Happiness

My point being, at my core, I associate adulthood and taking responsibility as a thing that’s not fun and that does not make you happy.

And guess what?

I want to be fucking happy man.

I want to be happy all day, every day, or at least, on most days.

And the thing is I find happiness in people. I find it in their laughter, in their love, in their solidarity.

If I'm going to be rejected by people, then I'm not going to be happy…

And if I'm not going to be happy, then I don’t want to fucking grow up.

I don’t care about carrying the responsibility of the world on my shoulders.

The world can burn for all I care, as long as I am happy.

This brings me to another thought.

Does this mean I have to re-define happiness?

When the people I love and care about are happy, I'm happy.

And when they’re not, I'm not.

That’s how it is most of the time.

And I'm sure, in a weird cycle kind of way, when I’m happy, they’re happy too.

So I suppose what I should be thinking of is making myself happy so that they, too, can be happy.

I know that I'm my best self when I'm happy and in a good mood.

This means that if I'm intrinsically happy, I can find ways to make them happy without losing my sense of self.

I can get them to open up to me, to talk to me.

Ideally, it sounds legit.

In the end the question I still have to answer is what do I want for myself?

Figuring Life Out

Recently a cute girl with full lips made a statement in a judgmental kind of tone, she said, I already have my life figured out.

She made this claim because of my consistency in putting out these letters and my lack of fear on what I’ll do when I graduate.

It irked me a little bit, but I don’t blame her.

She, like I am, is scared of being an adult too.

She’s scared of carrying responsibility.

Hell, we all are.

Why do you think unhappy people are the ones with unplanned pregnancies and forced marriages?

They haven’t fully learned how to take care of themselves and now you're forcing them to take care of another human being?!

Don’t be ridiculous!

Anyway, that’s a story for another day.

My point is, young lady, if somehow you’re reading this, I haven’t had my life figured out yet.

I don’t know what I want from life yet.

I don’t know what I want for myself yet.

And when I figure that out, then maybe, just maybe, you can say that I have my life figured out.

I doubt it though; I’ve read a lot of things those successful people say.

And the most recurring thing they always confess is they’re trying to figure things out, every single day.

Maybe because they, too, are self-aware that they’re constantly changing, and their conscious mind is too slow to keep up with the changes that they’re making, or too tired, or too bored.

I don’t know yet,

What I do know is I’ll talk to you next week,

But until then,

P.S: if you liked this letter, please subscribe

Want to reach out to me? Hit the button below.

Ready for more?

What are your chances of acceptance?

Calculate for all schools, your chance of acceptance.

Your chancing factors

Extracurriculars.

How to Write the “Overcoming Challenges” Essay + Examples

What’s covered:.

• What is the Overcoming Challenges Essay?
• Real Overcoming Challenges Essay Prompts
• How to Choose a Topic
• Writing Tips

Overcoming Challenges Essay Examples

• Where to Get Your Essay Edited

While any college essay can be intimidating, the Overcoming Challenges prompt often worries students the most. Those students who’ve been lucky enough not to experience trauma tend to assume they have nothing worth saying. On the other hand, students who’ve overcome larger obstacles may be hesitant to talk about them.

Regardless of your particular circumstances, there are steps you can take to make the essay writing process simpler. Here are our top tips for writing the overcoming challenges essay successfully.

What is the “Overcoming Challenges” Essay?

The overcoming challenges prompt shows up frequently in both main application essays (like the Common App) and supplemental essays. Because supplemental essays allow students to provide schools with additional information, applicants should be sure that the subject matter they choose to write about differs from what’s in their main essay.

Students often assume the overcoming challenges essay requires them to detail past traumas. While you can certainly write about an experience that’s had a profound effect on your life, it’s important to remember that colleges aren’t evaluating students based on the seriousness of the obstacle they overcame.

On the contrary, the goal of this essay is to show admissions officers that you have the intelligence and fortitude to handle any challenges that come your way. After all, college serves as an introduction to adult life, and schools want to know that the students they admit are up to the task. 

Real “Overcoming Challenges” Essay Prompts

To help you understand what the “Overcoming Challenges” essay looks like, here are a couple sample prompts.

Currently, the Common Application asks students to answer the following prompt in 650 words or less:

“The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?”

For the past several years, MIT has prompted students to write 200 to 250 words on the following:

“Tell us about the most significant challenge you’ve faced or something important that didn’t go according to plan. How did you manage the situation?”

In both cases, the prompts explicitly ask for your response to the challenge. The event itself isn’t as important as how it pushed you to grow.

How to Choose a Topic for an Essay on Overcoming Challenges

When it comes to finding the best topic for your overcoming challenges essays, there’s no right answer. The word “challenge” is ambiguous and could be used to reference a wide range of situations from prevailing over a bully to getting over your lifelong stage fright to appear in a school musical. Here are some suggestions to keep in mind when selecting an essay subject.

1. Avoid trivial or common topics

While there aren’t many hard-and-fast rules for choosing an essay topic, students should avoid overdone topics.

These include:

• Working hard in a challenging class
• Overcoming a sports injury
• Moving schools or immigrating to the US
• Tragedy (divorce, death, abuse)

Admissions officers have read numerous essays on the subject, so it’s harder for you to stand out (see our full list of cliché college essay topics to avoid ). If events like these were truly formative to you, you can still choose to write about them, but you’ll need to be as personal as possible. 

It’s also ideal if you have a less traditional storyline for a cliché topic; for example, if your sports injury led you to discover a new passion, that would be a more unique story than detailing how you overcame your injury and got back in the game.

Similarly, students may not want to write about an obstacle that admissions committees could perceive as low stakes, such as getting a B on a test, or getting into a small fight with a friend. The goal of this essay is to illustrate how you respond to adversity, so the topic you pick should’ve been at least impactful on your personal growth.

2. Pick challenges that demonstrate qualities you want to highlight

Students often mistakenly assume they need to have experienced exceptional circumstances like poverty, an abusive parent, or cancer to write a good essay. The truth is that the best topics will allow you to highlight specific personal qualities and share more about who you are. The essay should be less about the challenge itself, and more about how you responded to it.

Ask yourself what personality traits you want to emphasize, and see what’s missing in your application. Maybe you want to highlight your adaptability, for example, but that isn’t clearly expressed in your application. In this case, you might write about a challenge that put your adaptability to the test, or shaped you to become more adaptable.

Here are some examples of good topics we’ve seen over the years:

• Not having a coach for a sports team and becoming one yourself
• Helping a parent through a serious health issue
• Trying to get the school track dedicated to a coach
• Having to switch your Model UN position last-minute

Tips for Writing an Essay About Overcoming Challenges

Once you’ve selected a topic for your essays, it’s time to sit down and write. For best results, make sure your essay focuses on your efforts to tackle an obstacle rather than the problem itself. Additionally, you could avoid essay writing pitfalls by doing the following:

1. Choose an original essay structure

If you want your overcoming challenges essay to attract attention, aim to break away from more traditional structures. Most of these essays start by describing an unsuccessful attempt at a goal and then explain the steps the writer took to master the challenge. 

You can stand out by choosing a challenge you’re still working on overcoming, or focus on a mental or emotional challenge that spans multiple activities or events. For example, you might discuss your fear of public speaking and how that impacted your ability to coach your brother’s Little League team and run for Student Council. 

You can also choose a challenge that can be narrated in the moment, such as being put on the spot to teach a yoga class. These challenges can make particularly engaging essays, as you get to experience the writer’s thoughts and emotions as they unfold.

Keep in mind that you don’t necessarily need to have succeeded in your goal for this essay. Maybe you ran for an election and lost, or maybe you proposed a measure to the school board that wasn’t passed. It’s still possible to write a strong essay about topics like these as long as you focus on your personal growth. In fact, these may make for even stronger essays since they are more unconventional topics.

2. Focus on the internal

When writing about past experiences, you may be tempted to spend too much time describing specific people and events. With an Overcoming Challenges essay though, the goal is to focus on your thoughts and feelings.

For example, rather than detail all the steps you took to become a better public speaker, use the majority of your essay to describe your mental state as you embarked on the journey to achieving your goals. Were you excited, scared, anxious, or hopeful? Don’t be afraid to let the reader in on your innermost emotions and thoughts during this process.

3. Share what you learned 

An Overcoming Challenges essay should leave the reader with a clear understanding of what you learned on your journey, be it physical, mental, or emotional. There’s no need to explicitly say “this experience taught me X,” but your essay should at least implicitly share any lessons you learned. This can be done through your actions and in-the-moment reflections. Remember that the goal is to show admissions committees why your experiences make you a great candidate for admission. 

Was I no longer the beloved daughter of nature, whisperer of trees? Knee-high rubber boots, camouflage, bug spray—I wore the g arb and perfume of a proud wild woman, yet there I was, hunched over the pathetic pile of stubborn sticks, utterly stumped, on the verge of tears. As a child, I had considered myself a kind of rustic princess, a cradler of spiders and centipedes, who was serenaded by mourning doves and chickadees, who could glide through tick-infested meadows and emerge Lyme-free. I knew the cracks of the earth like the scars on my own rough palms. Yet here I was, ten years later, incapable of performing the most fundamental outdoor task: I could not, for the life of me, start a fire. 

Furiously I rubbed the twigs together—rubbed and rubbed until shreds of skin flaked from my fingers. No smoke. The twigs were too young, too sticky-green; I tossed them away with a shower of curses, and began tearing through the underbrush in search of a more flammable collection. My efforts were fruitless. Livid, I bit a rejected twig, determined to prove that the forest had spurned me, offering only young, wet bones that would never burn. But the wood cracked like carrots between my teeth—old, brittle, and bitter. Roaring and nursing my aching palms, I retreated to the tent, where I sulked and awaited the jeers of my family. 

Rattling their empty worm cans and reeking of fat fish, my brother and cousins swaggered into the campsite. Immediately, they noticed the minor stick massacre by the fire pit and called to me, their deep voices already sharp with contempt. 

“Where’s the fire, Princess Clara?” they taunted. “Having some trouble?” They prodded me with the ends of the chewed branches and, with a few effortless scrapes of wood on rock, sparked a red and roaring flame. My face burned long after I left the fire pit. The camp stank of salmon and shame. 

In the tent, I pondered my failure. Was I so dainty? Was I that incapable? I thought of my hands, how calloused and capable they had been, how tender and smooth they had become. It had been years since I’d kneaded mud between my fingers; instead of scaling a white pine, I’d practiced scales on my piano, my hands softening into those of a musician—fleshy and sensitive. And I’d gotten glasses, having grown horrifically nearsighted; long nights of dim lighting and thick books had done this. I couldn’t remember the last time I had lain down on a hill, barefaced, and seen the stars without having to squint. Crawling along the edge of the tent, a spider confirmed my transformation—he disgusted me, and I felt an overwhelming urge to squash him. 

Yet, I realized I hadn’t really changed—I had only shifted perspective. I still eagerly explored new worlds, but through poems and prose rather than pastures and puddles. I’d grown to prefer the boom of a bass over that of a bullfrog, learned to coax a different kind of fire from wood, having developed a burn for writing rhymes and scrawling hypotheses. 

That night, I stayed up late with my journal and wrote about the spider I had decided not to kill. I had tolerated him just barely, only shrieking when he jumped—it helped to watch him decorate the corners of the tent with his delicate webs, knowing that he couldn’t start fires, either. When the night grew cold and the embers died, my words still smoked—my hands burned from all that scrawling—and even when I fell asleep, the ideas kept sparking—I was on fire, always on fire.

This essay is an excellent example because the writer turns an everyday challenge—starting a fire—into an exploration of her identity. The writer was once “a kind of rustic princess, a cradler of spiders and centipedes,” but has since traded her love of the outdoors for a love of music, writing, and reading. 

The story begins in media res , or in the middle of the action, allowing readers to feel as if we’re there with the writer. One of the essay’s biggest strengths is its use of imagery. We can easily visualize the writer’s childhood and the present day. For instance, she states that she “rubbed and rubbed [the twigs] until shreds of skin flaked from my fingers.”

The writing has an extremely literary quality, particularly with its wordplay. The writer reappropriates words and meanings, and even appeals to the senses: “My face burned long after I left the fire pit. The camp stank of salmon and shame.” She later uses a parallelism to cleverly juxtapose her changed interests: “instead of scaling a white pine, I’d practiced scales on my piano.”

One of the essay’s main areas of improvement is its overemphasis on the “story” and lack of emphasis on the reflection. The second to last paragraph about changing perspective is crucial to the essay, as it ties the anecdote to larger lessons in the writer’s life. She states that she hasn’t changed, but has only shifted perspective. Yet, we don’t get a good sense of where this realization comes from and how it impacts her life going forward. 

The end of the essay offers a satisfying return to the fire imagery, and highlights the writer’s passion—the one thing that has remained constant in her life.

“Getting beat is one thing – it’s part of competing – but I want no part in losing.” Coach Rob Stark’s motto never fails to remind me of his encouragement on early-morning bus rides to track meets around the state. I’ve always appreciated the phrase, but an experience last June helped me understand its more profound, universal meaning.

Stark, as we affectionately call him, has coached track at my high school for 25 years. His care, dedication, and emphasis on developing good character has left an enduring impact on me and hundreds of other students. Not only did he help me discover my talent and love for running, but he also taught me the importance of commitment and discipline and to approach every endeavor with the passion and intensity that I bring to running. When I learned a neighboring high school had dedicated their track to a longtime coach, I felt that Stark deserved similar honors.

Our school district’s board of education indicated they would only dedicate our track to Stark if I could demonstrate that he was extraordinary. I took charge and mobilized my teammates to distribute petitions, reach out to alumni, and compile statistics on the many team and individual champions Stark had coached over the years. We received astounding support, collecting almost 3,000 signatures and pages of endorsements from across the community. With help from my teammates, I presented this evidence to the board.

They didn’t bite. 

Most members argued that dedicating the track was a low priority. Knowing that we had to act quickly to convince them of its importance, I called a team meeting where we drafted a rebuttal for the next board meeting. To my surprise, they chose me to deliver it. I was far from the best public speaker in the group, and I felt nervous about going before the unsympathetic board again. However, at that second meeting, I discovered that I enjoy articulating and arguing for something that I’m passionate about.

Public speaking resembles a cross country race. Walking to the starting line, you have to trust your training and quell your last minute doubts. When the gun fires, you can’t think too hard about anything; your performance has to be instinctual, natural, even relaxed. At the next board meeting, the podium was my starting line. As I walked up to it, familiar butterflies fluttered in my stomach. Instead of the track stretching out in front of me, I faced the vast audience of teachers, board members, and my teammates. I felt my adrenaline build, and reassured myself: I’ve put in the work, my argument is powerful and sound. As the board president told me to introduce myself, I heard, “runners set” in the back of my mind. She finished speaking, and Bang! The brief silence was the gunshot for me to begin. 

The next few minutes blurred together, but when the dust settled, I knew from the board members’ expressions and the audience’s thunderous approval that I had run quite a race. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough; the board voted down our proposal. I was disappointed, but proud of myself, my team, and our collaboration off the track. We stood up for a cause we believed in, and I overcame my worries about being a leader. Although I discovered that changing the status quo through an elected body can be a painstakingly difficult process and requires perseverance, I learned that I enjoy the challenges this effort offers. Last month, one of the school board members joked that I had become a “regular” – I now often show up to meetings to advocate for a variety of causes, including better environmental practices in cafeterias and safer equipment for athletes.

Just as Stark taught me, I worked passionately to achieve my goal. I may have been beaten when I appealed to the board, but I certainly didn’t lose, and that would have made Stark proud.

While the writer didn’t succeed in getting the track dedicated to Coach Stark, their essay is certainly successful in showing their willingness to push themselves and take initiative.

The essay opens with a quote from Coach Stark that later comes full circle at the end of the essay. We learn about Stark’s impact and the motivation for trying to get the track dedicated to him.

One of the biggest areas of improvement in the intro, however, is how the essay tells us Stark’s impact rather than showing us: His care, dedication, and emphasis on developing good character has left an enduring impact on me and hundreds of other students. Not only did he help me discover my talent and love for running, but he also taught me the importance of commitment and discipline and to approach every endeavor with the passion and intensity that I bring to running.

The writer could’ve helped us feel a stronger emotional connection to Stark if they had included examples of Stark’s qualities, rather than explicitly stating them. For example, they could’ve written something like: Stark was the kind of person who would give you gas money if you told him your parents couldn’t afford to pick you up from practice. And he actually did that—several times. At track meets, alumni regularly would come talk to him and tell him how he’d changed their lives. Before Stark, I was ambivalent about running and was on the JV team, but his encouragement motivated me to run longer and harder and eventually make varsity. Because of him, I approach every endeavor with the passion and intensity that I bring to running.

The essay goes on to explain how the writer overcame their apprehension of public speaking, and likens the process of submitting an appeal to the school board to running a race. This metaphor makes the writing more engaging and allows us to feel the student’s emotions.

While the student didn’t ultimately succeed in getting the track dedicated, we learn about their resilience and initiative: I now often show up to meetings to advocate for a variety of causes, including better environmental practices in cafeterias and safer equipment for athletes.

Overall, this essay is well-done. It demonstrates growth despite failing to meet a goal, which is a unique essay structure. The running metaphor and full-circle intro/ending also elevate the writing in this essay.

Where to Get Your Overcoming Challenges Essay Edited

The Overcoming Challenges essay is one of the trickier supplemental prompts, so it’s important to get feedback on your drafts. That’s why we created our free Peer Essay Review tool , where you can get a free review of your essay from another student. You can also improve your own writing skills by reviewing other students’ essays. 

If you want a college admissions expert to review your essay, advisors on CollegeVine have helped students refine their writing and submit successful applications to top schools. Find the right advisor for you to improve your chances of getting into your dream school!

Related CollegeVine Blog Posts

College Essay: Overcoming Social Anxiety

“William, you’re up first,” the teacher said excitedly. 

I was instantly anxious when my ninth-grade English teacher announced I would be the first person presenting. As I walked to the front of the classroom, I was fidgeting and could feel  my face turning red. My classmates’ eyes followed me, looking like they were planning something. I started by introducing the title of the poem I was going to recite. I included some hand gestures and facial expressions while reciting the poem to make it better and less awkward, but I was still stiff. I felt like I did a solid job of engaging the audience and helping them understand the poem. People started applauding for me because they didn’t expect me to be that good because I was a shy dude. I finished by making some personal connections to the poem I chose. I went back to my seat, my face feeling hot because of how red I was. A classmate who sat next to me told me I did an outstanding job. This compliment really made my day because I thought I did OK.  This experience was the moment I realized I had some hope of overcoming my social anxiety. At the end of the presentation I felt like it wasn’t that bad, and I overcame something that was always with me throughout middle school. Now, it could change.

Social anxiety has especially affected me during middle school. I probably first realized I had social anxiety when I had to present in front of the class in seventh grade; I felt a little weird as soon as my classmates’  eyes were on me. In the middle of my presentation, I started crying because my teacher insisted I continue after pausing multiple times because of my nervousness. Since I refused to present in front of the class again, my grade was an automatic zero. 

I finally overcame my social anxiety after joining a program called Minnesota Business Venture, which was recommended by the college counselors. I signed up for it because it was going to help me feel and live a little bit of that college experience at St. Thomas by staying in dorms and learning on campus for a whole week. This program helped with my social anxiety significantly because I was able to see new faces and meet really kind people. Being in an inclusive environment allowed me to express myself better, without being judged or teased. I realized I have had some friends in the past who made me feel like I was kinda worthless. But since my peers from the St.Thomas program helped me and complimented me on my work. I felt like I had worth and confidence in expressing myself.

I noticed how having this social anxiety and awkwardness had really taken a toll on me and prevented me from making friends and feeling comfortable talking. I feel confident now that I’m opening up more. When it’s time to start college, I will be facing many obstacles, but I feel like I just took my biggest obstacle away. Joining a new university will help me start fresh. As I’m becoming  friends with the right people, I will be able to feel more comfortable because I know I am able to socialize with strangers. 

Through this program, an experience of meeting new people, I felt relieved and free. I interacted with random people and made new friends. Now, when I am connecting and collaborating with my classmates, teachers and relatives I am confident, feeling like I’m a new and improved person. What I learned is how putting yourself out there not only reduces your shyness; everyone can go far if they push themselves out of their comfort zone.

© 2024 ThreeSixty Journalism • Login

ThreeSixty Journalism,

a nonprofit program of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of St. Thomas, uses the principles of strong writing and reporting to help diverse Minnesota youth tell the stories of their lives and communities.

LAST STRETCH!

You can still support your source of education news this teacher appreciation week.

The Hechinger Report

Covering Innovation & Inequality in Education

STUDENT VOICE: The pervasive and crippling fear of college

Share this:

• Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on WhatsApp (Opens in new window)
• Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)

The Hechinger Report is a national nonprofit newsroom that reports on one topic: education. Sign up for our  weekly newsletters  to get stories like this delivered directly to your inbox. Consider supporting our stories and becoming  a member  today.

When I graduated with my associate degree from LaGuardia Community College earlier this summer, I found myself thinking back to my first days here — when the campus felt like a maze and the pace seemed incredibly fast. I worried that it was going to be too much for me, and wondered whether college would always seem so confusing.

I realize now that what I felt was fear. As one of the first in my family to go to college, I didn’t know who to ask for guidance about how to adjust to the requirements of college.

Fear of college is both real and common. A Google search for “fear of college” returns over five million results! Based on my own experience and conversations with friends, just thinking about going to college can fill people with anxiety and self-doubt.

Some respond by coming up with reasons not to go. Or they start but then quickly drop out, blaming life complications or busy work schedules. Maybe impostor syndrome — the feeling that you’re not good enough or smart enough to be in the position you are, or want to be, in — is to blame.

When I came to LaGuardia in 2016, I didn’t plan on going to college. I’d dropped out of high school when my daughter was born but had gotten connected to LaGuardia’s Fatherhood Academy , which supports young fathers by helping them to finish high school and more. I planned to earn my high school equivalency and then get out.

I was content working as a barista. But my Fatherhood mentors were so motivating; they shared their personal stories, many of which were just like mine. With their help, I began to see that a college degree was attainable, and that I could continue working while also going to school. So I decided to pursue my associate degree at LaGuardia. Fatherhood even paid my enrollment fee.

But then more hurdles came up, and again I found myself worrying whether college was right for me. Thankfully, I’ve been able to connect to amazing resources and programs that have helped me along the way.

When I didn’t do so well on the  CUNY assessment test — particularly in math, which has always been my kryptonite — I was referred to CUNY Start . My CUNY Start teachers were incredibly supportive, even providing math tutoring before and after class. They helped me get ready for college — not only improving my math skills, but also teaching me how to seek out resources for help.

After completing CUNY Start, I was ready for college-level classes. I was accepted into LaGuardia’s  College Discovery  program, which paid for my textbooks and MetroCard, and gave me access to other helpful resources, including an advisor who guided me throughout my time at LaGuardia.

When I found myself running back and forth between work, school and my daughter’s daycare, with little time to study or breathe, I searched for on-campus jobs and was thankful to find many opportunities. I landed two on-campus jobs — one as a mentor to new Fatherhood recruits, and one as a Civic Fellow working with the college’s government relations manager. Through these jobs, I’ve grown professionally and connected with people who support and inspire me.

Despite these jobs, new childcare expenses kept coming up, so I applied for and was granted a scholarship from the  LaGuardia Community College Foundation .

Today I’m confident about my future. I am now working toward my bachelor’s degree in creative writing at Hunter College , where I’m matriculating into SEEK , the College Discovery program at CUNY four-year institutions. With the tools I gained at LaGuardia, I know how to seek out and find help.

When I see students paying for their tuition out-of-pocket or prioritizing work over school, I tell them about the resources I found at LaGuardia to help me stay on track. I used to think that if I became a full-time student and made education a priority, I wouldn’t have enough money to pay my rent, take care of my daughter and meet all of my other daily responsibilities. With my on-campus jobs, my LaGuardia Foundation scholarship, CUNY Start and College Discovery, I was able to focus on my education and dedicate time to my daughter.

I want to tell anyone feeling nervous about starting college that they’re not alone — that if they look around, they can find programs and people to help them get to graduation. If I hadn’t found these resources at LaGuardia, I doubt I’d be where I am today.

Going to college has made my life so much better. My mom was right about the value of education. One of the last things she told me before cancer took her in 2012 was not to leave school. When I dropped out of high school, I felt ashamed — that I was letting down her memory. I know she’d be so proud of me today. I am honoring her memory by sharing her words of advice with my daughter, who’s now 6 years old and the light of my life. Children are great imitators, so I’m giving her a blueprint that includes education, seeking out resources for help and not being afraid to try something new.

This story about overcoming fears and doubts about attending college was produced by  The Hechinger Report , a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for  our newsletter .

Christian Ortiz graduated from LaGuardia Community College in 2019 with his associate degree in writing and literature. Today he begins classes at Hunter College toward a bachelor’s degree in creative writing.

Related articles

The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn't mean it's free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

Join us today.

Christian Ortiz

Christian... More by Christian Ortiz

Letters to the Editor

At The Hechinger Report, we publish thoughtful letters from readers that contribute to the ongoing discussion about the education topics we cover. Please read our guidelines for more information. We will not consider letters that do not contain a full name and valid email address. You may submit news tips or ideas here without a full name, but not letters.

By submitting your name, you grant us permission to publish it with your letter. We will never publish your email address. You must fill out all fields to submit a letter.

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Sign me up for the newsletter!

College Essays That Worked: See Examples

Experts say a good college essay features a student's voice and personality.

Getty Images

Students should know themselves and write authoritatively so they can share a sense of their lives with admissions officers.

Many college applications require a personal essay, which can be daunting for students to write.

But a few simple tips, some introspection and insight into what admissions officers are looking for can help ease the pressure. U.S. News has compiled several college essay examples that helped students get into school. Shared by admissions staff or referenced from admissions websites, these essays stand out, they say, because the student voices shine, helping the school get to know the applicants.

"Students can get caught in the trap of overthinking it and write the essay that's going to impress the admissions committee," says Andrew Strickler, dean of admission and financial aid at Connecticut College . "The best essays, the ones that really pop, are the ones that come across as authentic and you really hear the student's voice."

The essay gives schools a feel for how a student writes, but it's the content of the essay that matters most, admissions professionals say. In other words, while it's important to showcase sound grammar and writing, it's even more important to showcase your character and personality.

"I care more about their stories than if it is a perfect five paragraph essay," David Graves, interim director of admissions at the University of Georgia , wrote in an email.

Many schools give students a wide range of topics to choose from, which experts say can be beneficial in helping students find their voice.

While you want your voice to be apparent, it's wise to be aware of your tone, says Allen Koh, CEO of Cardinal Education, an admissions consulting company that works with students to craft and revise their college essays. The goal of the essay is to make a strong case for why you’re different from all the other applicants, not necessarily why you’re better, he adds.

"You have to pass the genuine likability test. Sometimes kids are so busy trying to brag or tell their story that they’re forgetting they have to sound like a likable person. That’s a very simple test, but it’s really important."

Good essays tend to be "positively emotional," he says. It's best to avoid using sarcasm because it tends to fail on college essays.

Any humor used "really has to be a very positive, witty humor, not sarcastic," which he says can be hard to pick up on in an essay.

The Perils of Using AI for Essays

Choosing the right tone can be a challenge for many students, but admissions pros encourage them not to take shortcuts to completing their essay.

Though some college professors have embraced artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT in their classrooms, Strickler says he's begun to stress in recent talks with high school audiences the importance of original work and avoiding the use of AI tools like ChatGPT to craft college essays. While it might produce a technically well-written essay and save time, your unique voice will be stripped away, and it may leave a bad impression on admissions offices as well as prevent them from truly getting to know you, he says.

Instead, Graves says, start early and take time to write it yourself, then "actually read it out loud to someone ... to listen to the rhythm and words as they are 'read.'"

Each spring on his admissions blog , Graves shares an enrolling student's essay and why it was strong. The essay excerpted below, shared with the permission of the University of Georgia, uses descriptive word choice and gives the admissions office deep insight into the student's life, their love for writing and their connection to their family, Graves says.

It was chosen as an example "to show our applicant pool how to express themselves through similes, sensory language (words that capture the senses of the reader), and emotion," Graves wrote on the blog.

Here's how the essay opened:

If you asked me what object I’d save in a burning fire, I’d save my notebook. My notebook isn’t just any notebook, it’s bubble gum pink with purple tie dye swirls, and has gold coil binding it together. But more importantly, it’s the key that unlocked my superpower, sending me soaring into the sky, flying high above any problems that could ever catch me. However, my notebook is simply the key. My real power rests in the depths of my mind, in my passion for writing. But to know how my powers came to be (not from a spider or a special rock), I must travel back to the first spark.

Four years ago, I wrote my first 6-word memoir in my eighth-grade rhetoric class. Inspired by my father’s recently diagnosed terminal illness, I wrote “Take his words, don’t take him”. It was as if all the energy of my powers surged into six meaningful words meant to honor the man that I would soon lose to a villain known as ALS. This was the first time I felt my writing. Three years ago, my dad’s disease severely progressed. The ALS seized his ability to speak and locked it in a tower with no key. The only way we could communicate was with an old spiral notebook. ...

The essay counted down each year ("three years ago," "two years ago," etc.) and concluded with this paragraph:

One month ago, I needed my powers more than ever before. I needed them to convey who I truly am for the chance at the future of my dreams as a writer. Except this time, I didn’t need the key because my powers grew into fruition. Instead, I opened my laptop only to type out one sentence… “If you asked me what object to save in a burning fire, I’d save my notebook.”

This style of storytelling, which shows not just the triumph at the end but also the conflict, struggle and evolution in between, makes for great essays, Koh says.

"The student also used an intriguing timeline (counting down years and month) to tell their story, and showed how she had grown," Graves says.

This next essay, by an anonymous writer and shared on Connecticut College 's admissions page , "manages to capture multiple aspects of the writer's personality, while not becoming overly cluttered or confusing," writes Susanna Matthews, associate director of admission at the school.

Every person who truly knows me believes that I was born in the wrong century. They call me "an old soul" because I'm a collector, attracted to books, antiques, vinyl records and anything from the 80's. But they also think I am unique in other ways. I believe it is because of the meaningful connections to my two languages and two cultures.

When we moved into our first American house, I was excited to decorate my new room. The first thing I knew I needed was a place to organize my most cherished possessions I have collected throughout my life. I searched and finally found a bookshelf with twenty-five thick sections that I could build and organize alphabetically ... Each shelf holds important objects from different parts of my life. ...

These books are a strong connection to my Brazilian heritage. They also remind me of the time when I was growing up in Brazil, as a member of a large Italian-Brazilian family.

The writer continues on, describing the types of books on each shelf, from Harry Potter to books used to learn English. They describe the bottom of the bookshelf housing some of their most prized possessions, like an old typewriter their grandfather gave them. They wonder about the words it has crafted and stories it has told.

As I grab my favorite Elvis vinyl to play, I can only wonder about the next chapter of my life. I look forward to adding new books, new friends, and a wide variety of experiences to my bookshelf.

"By placing one subject (the bookshelf) at the center of the piece, it lends some flexibility to layer in much more detail than if they had tried to discuss a few different interests in the essay," Matthews writes. "You learn a lot about the person, in a way that isn't in your face – a great thing when trying to write a personal essay."

Some colleges require a supplemental essay in addition to the personal statement. Typically, admissions pros note, these essays are shorter and focus on answering a specific question posed by the college.

The University of Chicago in Illinois allows students to submit essay prompts as inspiration for the admissions office and gives students some latitude in how they answer them. Essay prompts range from questions about the school itself to asking students to pick a question from a song title or lyric and give their best shot at answering it.

"We think of them as an opportunity for students to tell us about themselves, their tastes, and their ambitions," the school's admissions website reads. "They can be approached with utter seriousness, complete fancy, or something in between."

While the University of Chicago says there is no strict word limit on its supplemental essays, other schools prefer brevity. For example, Stanford University in California asks students to answer several short questions, with a 50-word limit, in addition to answering three essay questions in 100 to 250 words.

Georgia asks for a school-specific supplemental essay that's 200-300 words in addition to a 250- to 650-word personal essay.

"Sometimes a shorter essay response is not as polished an essay, but instead is a more casual, more relaxed essay," Graves says. "In addition, sometimes a student needs to get to the point or be concise, and this helps see if they can give us their story without overdoing it."

Other schools allow for a little more creativity in how the supplemental essay questions are answered. Babson College in Massachusetts, for example, gives students a 500-word limit to answer a prompt, or they can choose to submit a one-minute video about why they chose to apply to the school.

One student, Gabrielle Alias, chose to film a "day-in-the-life" video , which she narrated to answer the prompt, "Who Am I?"

"Visiting campus twice, I know I could see myself as one of the many interesting, innovative, and enticing students that come out of Babson," she says in the video. "But who am I you ask? I am a student. I am a reader. I am a researcher. I am a music lover. ... I am Gabrielle Alias and I am excited for who I will be as a graduate of Babson."

An essay by Babson student Bessie Shiroki, seen below, describes her experience in the school's admissions office and how she immediately felt comfortable.

I immediately smiled at the sight of my favorite board game. Babsonopoly. I love the combination of strategy and luck in this traditional family pastime. Seeing this on the wall in the admissions office gave me immediate comfort; I knew I was home.

Shiroki describes what she felt set Babson College apart from other schools, such as being surrounded by "sophisticated and mature individuals" and a tight-knit, entrepreneurial environment that would help her reach her career goals.

It is natural for me to be in a small class where more than one language is spoken. I am accustomed to discussions with diverse viewpoints, open minds, and where differences are seen as advantages. I embrace my cultural uniqueness, and I will add my voice to the community. I can’t imagine not continuing this in college.

She notes that as she toured the campus and saw students studying, she could see herself as one of them, feeding off of their studious and entrepreneurial energy. She mentions that Babson's Foundations of Management and Entrepreneurship class got her attention immediately and she saw it as a launch pad for a future that included running a business.

Babson recognizes the potential of their students, and FME is a great way for young entrepreneurs like me to find our place in the business world and learn from our mistakes. I am capable of this challenge and will conquer it with tenacity. I will bring my dedication, commitment, and innovative skills to Babson College.

Now it’s my turn to pass go and collect my Babson acceptance letter. I’ve found my next challenge.

Babson College offers several tips for what make good essays, including a strong "hook" to engage the reader from the start and a topic that allows you to share something that's not as obvious on your application.

When it comes to writing a college admissions essay – whether personal or supplemental – experts advise students to follow these rules:

• Find your voice.
• Write about a topic that matters to you.
• Share your personality.
• Express yourself.
• Proofread extensively.

With both traditional essays and supplemental essays, Koh says it's best to write long and work with someone you trust to edit it down. Teachers, friends and parents can all be helpful proofreaders, but experts note that the student voice should remain intact.

A good editor can help edit a long essay to keep the main message but with fewer words. “If I see 400 words, I know I’m a dozen drafts away from getting it to 650,” he says. “If I see 1200 words, we might just be one or two away. It’s at least going to be a shorter haul.”

Strickler encourages students not to stress too much over the essay or put unnecessary weight on it as part of their college application . While a strong essay helps, he says, it doesn't make or break an application.

"There's this sense that you write the most amazing essay and it gets you over the top because it opens the door to the pathway to the Magic Kingdom," he says. "But it's just one piece of a myriad of pieces that allow us to get to know a particular student and help us figure out if they're a good fit and how they're going to contribute to our community."

Searching for a college? Get our complete rankings of Best Colleges.

18 Tips for Incoming College Freshmen

College Admissions

• See College Essay Examples
• How to Write a College Essay
• How to Complete a College Application
• Use the Common App to Apply to College
• College Application Essay Grammar Tips

Tags: college admissions , college applications , colleges , students , education

2024 Best Colleges

Search for your perfect fit with the U.S. News rankings of colleges and universities.

College Admissions: Get a Step Ahead!

Sign up to receive the latest updates from U.S. News & World Report and our trusted partners and sponsors. By clicking submit, you are agreeing to our Terms and Conditions & Privacy Policy .

Ask an Alum: Making the Most Out of College

You May Also Like

Federal vs. private parent student loans.

Erika Giovanetti May 9, 2024

14 Colleges With Great Food Options

Sarah Wood May 8, 2024

Colleges With Religious Affiliations

Anayat Durrani May 8, 2024

Protests Threaten Campus Graduations

Aneeta Mathur-Ashton May 6, 2024

Protesting on Campus: What to Know

Sarah Wood May 6, 2024

Lawmakers Ramp Up Response to Unrest

Aneeta Mathur-Ashton May 3, 2024

University Commencements Must Go On

Eric J. Gertler May 3, 2024

Where Astronauts Went to College

Cole Claybourn May 3, 2024

College Admitted Student Days

Jarek Rutz May 3, 2024

Universities, the Police and Protests

John J. Sloan III May 2, 2024

Growing Up Essay: Guide & Examples [2024]

What does it mean to grow up? Essays on this topic might be entertaining yet challenging to write. Growing up is usually associated with something new and exciting. It’s a period of everything new and unknown.

Our specialists will write a custom essay specially for you!

Now, you’ve been assigned to write a growing up essay. You’re not a kid anymore, but not quite the adult. It would be interesting for your teacher to learn about your childhood memories or read what you think about the experience of growing up.

That’s why:

In this article, we will provide a guide on how to write an essay on growing up. Our team listed some topics to make your writing process more manageable.

• 📍 How to Write It

🏡 About Your Childhood

🧒 about someone else.

• 👧 Growing Up

🔗 References

📍 how to write a growing up essay.

Writing an essay about growing up can seem complicated, but it’s always easier to handle when you have a plan. In this section, we will talk more about how to write an essay on the topic.

• Reflective essays focus on the author’s attitude towards individual experiences. This type is often required during the college admissions process. For instance, one may write about growing up in poverty and how it shaped his character.
• Narrative essays focus on a specific event or sequence of events. For example, you might write about the most memorable trip from your childhood.
• Choose the topic on the familiar subject. It will be easier to reflect on the issue when you have a lot of relevant experience.
• Choose the topic of interest. Write about something that provokes a strong emotional reaction from you.
• Show a unique vision on the topic. Try to approach writing college essays about growing up from a different perspective. When writing a narrative essay, you need to remember that your work should tell a story. Your essay topic about growing up needs to agree with the paper’s length and follow the essay structure. Focus on a specific point in your writing.
• Think about the event in your life that provokes a strong emotional response;
• Write what you have learned from the experience;
• Consider writing about experiences with your friends or relatives. What those events taught you?
• Introduction : Your growing up essay introduction is an opening paragraph of the work. It grabs a reader’s attention and contains a thesis statement.
• Body Paragraphs : The childhood and growing up essay can contain three body paragraphs. In each one, provide an example of an event or situation that supports the general topic.
• Conclusion : In your growing up essay, the conclusion is the final paragraph. It summarizes the main points and brings the paper to an end.
• Revise your draft a couple of days after writing it. That way, you will be able to notice mistakes or typos you missed.
• Try to avoid passive voice . Rewrite the sentences in an active one, if possible.
• Read your essay out loud. If it doesn’t meet the set criteria, keep revising it.

👩‍👦‍👦 Growing Up Essay Topics

You may not know what your essay on growing up should be devoted to. If it’s the case, look at this section. Earlier, we talked about how to write, but here we will tell you what to write about.

Just in 1 hour! We will write you a plagiarism-free paper in hardly more than 1 hour

See the topics that can navigate an essay about your childhood experience:

• Your family values and how they have been shaping your personality. Engage in reflective writing to show how certain factors of growing up influenced your character. What do you think were the effects of your growing-up period? 
• What various roles have you had in your family? How and why did they change? As children grow, the family adjusts accordingly. Remember your roles as a child, adolescent, and young adult . How did they change?
• Your personal changes over the course of growing up. Write an essay describing your personal development . What caused those changes? 
• Sudden adulthood. Write a “growing up too fast” essay. Reflect on your feelings and emotions about growing up so suddenly. 
• Growing up with siblings . Write an essay about your childhood experience in a house where you weren’t the only child. Remember what it was like growing up with blood brothers and sisters? Or, maybe you have step-siblings? How did it influence you?
• A short memoir . You don’t need to have a dramatic adolescence or an out-of-ordinary story to write about yourself. Share your most exciting stories from childhood.
• A significant event from my childhood.
• Personal experience of parenting styles .
• Describe the events that helped you to learn about life .
• Tell about the time you tried to challenge gender norms.  
• Analyze your experience of growing up in another culture and the influence it had on your adult life.
• Most memorable Christmas of my childhood.
• Discuss how the relationships with your parents influenced your growing up and character formation.
• Describe the experience of self-disclosure in your childhood and the consequences it had.  
• How I used to cope with stress at high school. 
• Write about your family trips and the effect they had on the relationships within your family.
• Analyze how the relationships with your peers impacted your growing up and adult life.
• How I learned to ride a bicycle .
• Examine how different teaching styles you’ve experienced in childhood influenced your growing up.  

In other words, try to focus on something that made your growing up experience memorable and tell about it.

What if you do not feel like talking about your own experience in the essay on growing up? Do not worry. There are many other ways to complete your paper.

What follows next are additional ideas for you:

• Write essays on growing up based on a work of literature or songs . Choose your favorite piece of literature or a song that talks about growing up. Write several paragraphs about the portrayal of the growing up period in music or literature.
• Write essays on growing up with a single parent . Write an essay about growing up without a father or mother. What is it like? What impact can it make on a person’s character? 
• Write about growing up without parents . A childhood spent in an orphanage or with distant relatives can have lasting consequences. Think about the effects it can have on a person’s character. 
• Write an essay about growing up in a small town. Think about the advantages and disadvantages of living in a small town . Why do you think it’s good or bad to live in a small town? 
• Write about youth growing up fast. Children become adults quite quickly. Discuss the possible reasons for children to grow up faster. 
• What happens to the mentally challenged children when they grow up? 
• Examine how Nhuong depicted childhood in the book Water Buffalo Days: Growing Up in Vietnam .
• Discuss the changes digital technology brought into a growing-up process.
• Childhood’s effect on adulthood: the story of John Wayne Gacy .
• Explain how the environment influences the growing up and physical development of a child.  
• Describe the relation between difficult childhood and personal development .
• Description of lost childhood in Night by E. Wiesel. 
• Analyze the consequences being bullied or being a bully in childhood may have in adult life.
• Frank Conroy’s childhood in his book Stop-Time.
• Explore how childhood development and growing up shown in Born to Learn video .
• Examine the stories about coming of age and infantilism in literature.   
• Discuss the peculiarities of growing up in multiracial family .
• Analyze the authors experience in Country Pride: What I Learned Growing Up in Rural America by Sarah Smarsh .
• Describe the problem of childhood obesity and the ways it influences children’s life.

👧 Growing Up Topics for College Essays

Writing a college essay about growing up essay is a great opportunity to reflect on the challenges and triumphs that made you who you are. Here are some compelling essay prompts and topics that will help you share your unique coming-of-age experience.

Receive a plagiarism-free paper tailored to your instructions. Cut 15% off your first order!

• Essay on how growing up has shaped my life. Describe the pivotal moments from your upbringing that have had an impact on your personality and aspirations. You may also reflect on the lessons learned from your family, friends, community, and cultural surroundings. How did these experiences shape your values and worldview?
• What are the effects of growing up in poverty? Essays on this topic can explain how growing up in financially disadvantaged circumstances shapes people’s lives. If it’s something that resonates with you, you can write about it in your college essay. For example, describe the challenges you’ve faced and the experiences that have fostered your resilience. You can also analyze how these circumstances have impacted your values, such as a passion for social justice.
• What are the challenges of growing up? Consider the impact of family dynamics and cultural influences on your personal development. You can also discuss how overcoming these challenges has influenced you as a person and how it made you stronger.
• Is taking risks a necessary part of growing up? An essay on this topic can discuss the potential benefits and drawbacks of taking risks at a young age. Is taking risks an essential part of maturing and gaining independence, or are there other ways to learn? Remember to provide examples to illustrate your point.
• Fear of growing up. For this essay, consider how young people grapple with the challenges of transitioning to adulthood. What anxieties are associated with leaving behind the safety of childhood? Discuss the potential consequences of the fear of embracing adult responsibilities and provide real-life examples.
• Explain how peer influence shapes a person’s identity.
• The challenges of being the oldest sibling.
• How does one’s cultural background determine one’s childhood milestones?
• Social media and the coming-of-age experience.
• How education shapes a person’s future opportunities.
• The impact of childhood experiences on adult development.
• Explore the influence of gender identity on your journey to adulthood.
• The connection between your childhood hobby and adult career choice.
• The importance of self-discovery in the process of growing up.
• Write about the challenges and joys of adolescence.

📝 College Essay about Growing Up: Example

For your inspiration, we came up with a growing-up college essay example. It will provide insights into the content and structure and help you write an outstanding paper.

I have always been captivated by the world of art. Throughout my childhood and adolescence, I have been experimenting with different forms of self-expression, such as painting and sketching.

As a child, I was fortunate to have a supportive family that nurtured my love for art. My mother enrolled me in an art class and was always ready to provide me with supplies. All this helped foster my creativity to the point where I decided to pursue an art education in college.

During my teenage years, I was surrounded by a diverse group of friends who shared my interests. We went to galleries, attended art events, and collaborated on projects. These friendships enriched my artistic perspective even further. They also taught me about the diversity of creativity and expression.

In addition to art, I have various hobbies that help me become better at what I do. In particular, I enjoy reading non-fiction about renowned artists. Aside from traditional art forms, I also experiment with photography and digital design.

My family and friends played a major role in my decision to pursue a career as a creative. Their support and my belief in the power of self-expression will help me contribute to our school and the whole community.

Thank you for reading this article! Hopefully, you found the information written here useful. If so, don’t forget to comment and share this article with your friends.

This might be interesting for you:

• School Days Essay: How to Describe a Memorable Event
• Childhood Memories Essay: Brilliant Writing Ideas
• Writing Essay about Someone Who Has Made an Impact on Your Life
• Excellent Remembering a Person Essay: Free Writing Guidelines
• Life Experience Essay: How to Write a Brilliant Paper
• Essays that Worked: Hamilton College
• Essay Growing Up: Bartleby
• Narrative Writing: Brigham Young University
• Reflection Essay: Kent State University
• My Childhood Memories Essay: Cram
• Share to Facebook
• Share to Twitter
• Share to LinkedIn
• Share to email

Probably, a murder essay is not a fascinating assignment to complete. Talking about people’s deaths or crazy murderers can be depressing. However, all assignments are different, and you are supposed to work on every task hard. So, how are you going to deal with a murder essay? You can make...

Are you a nursing student? Then, you will definitely have an assignment to compose a nursing reflective essay. This task might be quite tough and challenging. But don’t stress out! Our professionals are willing to assist you.

Environment vs. development is a multifaceted present days’ dilemma. On the one hand, environmental problems are increasing year after year. We have more polluted areas on our planet, more polluted rivers, fewer trees that produce oxygen. On the other hand, can we stop development and progress in various fields? Is...

What does an essay look like? At a glance, the answer is obvious. An essay looks like a mere piece of paper (one page or several pages) with an organized text. It’s generally divided into five paragraphs, though there may be more. The essential essay structure includes: Yet, will this...

Some students find writing literary analysis papers rather daunting. Yet, an English class cannot go without this kind of work. By the way, writing literary analysis essays is not that complicated as it seems at a glance. On the contrary, this work may be fascinating, and you have a chance...

These days, leadership and ability to work in a team are the skills that everybody should possess. It is impossible to cope with a large educational or work project alone. However, it can also be challenging to collaborate in a team. You might want to elaborate on importance and difficulties...

Racial profiling is not uncommon. It’s incredibly offensive and unfair behavior that causes most of the protests in support of people of color. It occurs when people are suspected of committing a crime based on their skin color or ethnicity. Unfortunately, most people are unaware that racial profiling is an everyday...

Without a doubt, a natural disaster essay is a tough paper to write. To begin with, when people encounter a disaster risk, it’s a tragedy. Emergency situations can affect hundreds, thousands, and millions of people. These are the crises and events that change people’s lives drastically. So, disaster and emergency...

“You are not only responsible for what you say, but also for what you do not say”Martin Luther There are a lot of other good quotations that can serve as a good beginning for your essay on responsibility and provide good ideas for writing.

Exemplification essays, which are also called illustration essays, are considered one of the easiest papers to write. However, even the easiest tasks require some experience and practice. So, if you are not experienced enough in writing exemplification essays, you will face certain challenges.

You push the snooze button once again and finally open your eyes. It is already 8:50, and your classes start at 9. “I’m going to be late again!”— you think, already in full panic mode. In a minute, you rush out the door half-dressed, swallowing your sandwich on the go.  ...

An essay about Harriet Tubman is to focus on the biography and accomplishments of a famous American abolitionist and political activist of the 19th century. Harriet Tubman was born into slavery, escaped it herself, and helped others escape it. She changed many jobs throughout her lifetime, being a housekeeper, a...

I’m so happy to find your site. I like your posts on writing various papers! Now I’m working on my essay on growing up, and your post on this topic is very helpful for me!

Marvelous tips for writing essays on growing up! Thanks so much for this! I’m a fan of your blog!

Duke TIP Navigator

The official magazine for TIPsters in 4th–6th grade

Turning Fear into Confidence—A Personal Essay

October 14, 2020

Facing obstacles throughout your life is inevitable, and the obstacles you overcome can define who you are as a person. Not only will this build character and self-confidence, it will show others how strong you remained and inspire them to overcome their own challenges.

But overcoming obstacles is no simple task. Most obstacles are incredibly hard and testing. Yet, by overcoming them, you will come to understand why they are important. The significance of overcoming obstacles in life is to make you more grounded, courageous, and wise. For me, one of these life-altering obstacles emerged during my undergraduate years.

I had a serious fear of public speaking. There were times where I would struggle with presentations and in-class discussions. When these sessions would take place, my fear built up in a pressure cooker of discouragement and convulsive anguish. I felt humiliated before my teachers, partners, and most of all, my close friends. I soon realized, however, that the same people who seemed to be the source of my fear became my lifeline, their inspirational words filling my mind and heart with positive thoughts.

Seeing my struggles, my peers tried to build me up, to increase my confidence in myself and convince me that anything, including overcoming my fear of public speaking, could be accomplished with enough enthusiasm and belief in oneself.

The obstacles we face in life can distort how we see ourselves and cripple our ability to face our fears. By facing these conflicts head on, though, we can completely flip their effect on us, transforming them into experiences that strengthen our resilience and push the boundaries of what we think is possible to achieve.

Taking everything into account everything I’ve learned from this experience and many others like it that I’ve encountered in my life, it’s clear that obstacles are impossible to avoid, and when you do encounter them, you must view them as learning opportunities. You might just surprise yourself at how easily you overcome them.

This post was written by Duke TIP’s outgoing Marketing & Communications intern, Christina Gordon. Christina graduated from North Carolina Central University in the spring of 2020.

About Duke TIP

The Duke University Talent Identification Program (Duke TIP) is a nonprofit organization that has served over three million academically talented students in grades 4–12 since it was founded in 1980. Collaborating with educators and parents, TIP helps gifted students assess the extent of their academic abilities with above-grade-level testing, recognizes them for their achievements, and provides them with a variety of enrichment benefits as well as accelerated face-to-face and online educational programs.

Forgotten password

Please enter the email address that you use to login to TeenInk.com, and we'll email you instructions to reset your password.

• Poetry All Poetry Free Verse Song Lyrics Sonnet Haiku Limerick Ballad
• Fiction All Fiction Action-Adventure Fan Fiction Historical Fiction Realistic Fiction Romance Sci-fi/Fantasy Scripts & Plays Thriller/Mystery All Novels Action-Adventure Fan Fiction Historical Fiction Realistic Fiction Romance Sci-fi/Fantasy Thriller/Mystery Other
• Nonfiction All Nonfiction Bullying Books Academic Author Interviews Celebrity interviews College Articles College Essays Educator of the Year Heroes Interviews Memoir Personal Experience Sports Travel & Culture All Opinions Bullying Current Events / Politics Discrimination Drugs / Alcohol / Smoking Entertainment / Celebrities Environment Love / Relationships Movies / Music / TV Pop Culture / Trends School / College Social Issues / Civics Spirituality / Religion Sports / Hobbies All Hot Topics Bullying Community Service Environment Health Letters to the Editor Pride & Prejudice What Matters
• Reviews All Reviews Hot New Books Book Reviews Music Reviews Movie Reviews TV Show Reviews Video Game Reviews Summer Program Reviews College Reviews
• Art/Photo Art Photo Videos
• Summer Guide Program Links Program Reviews
• College Guide College Links College Reviews College Essays College Articles

Summer Guide

College guide.

• Song Lyrics

All Fiction

• Action-Adventure
• Fan Fiction
• Historical Fiction
• Realistic Fiction
• Sci-fi/Fantasy
• Scripts & Plays
• Thriller/Mystery

All Nonfiction

• Author Interviews
• Celebrity interviews
• College Articles
• College Essays
• Educator of the Year
• Personal Experience
• Travel & Culture

All Opinions

• Current Events / Politics
• Discrimination
• Drugs / Alcohol / Smoking
• Entertainment / Celebrities
• Environment
• Love / Relationships
• Movies / Music / TV
• Pop Culture / Trends
• School / College
• Social Issues / Civics
• Spirituality / Religion
• Sports / Hobbies

All Hot Topics

• Community Service
• Letters to the Editor
• Pride & Prejudice
• What Matters

All Reviews

• Hot New Books
• Book Reviews
• Music Reviews
• Movie Reviews
• TV Show Reviews
• Video Game Reviews

Summer Program Reviews

• College Reviews
• Writers Workshop
• Regular Forums
• Program Links
• Program Reviews
• College Links

Growing Up Is Scary

We all have our dreams of what we’re going to do after high school whether it be going to college or finding work or even traveling the world for a while. The reality is that in the way of those dreams are nightmares (nightmares that come with growing up) I’m talking about becoming independent and making your own decisions. When we’re young we love to imagine how our lives are gonna be after high school and how we’re going to be getting away from our parents, having fun with our friends on the weekends not worrying about writing papers in school. The thing is life after high school is a scary thing to think about mostly having to make your own decisions and relying on yourself instead of your parents or friends. Once you hear these reasons it’ll make you want to get a happy meal to remind you of when you were a carefree kid. I’m sure we’ve all been there in our lives when we we’re hitting puberty, worrying about braces, getting zits and hair everywhere, and we just wanted to have our freedom and to be independent. Average whiney teenage girl: “You never let me do anything FUN! Or make my own decisions! OMG! UGH! I wish you would leave me alone! AND LET ME LIVE MY LIFE!!!!1! !!1! 2.” #I’msomature #itsmylife Average whiney teenage boy: “mom I don’t wanna pull my pants up , sagging and swaggin is what makes me ME it’s my style and I’m gonna grow up to be a rapper like Two-Pac Shake-your-butt and B.I.G E. FAT and lil’ puff-pants-party-pee-prince or whatever his name is this month” I’m sure many of us remember saying this or something similar when our parents wouldn’t let us go out. But at that age ‘making our own decisions’ and ‘being independent’ was just us in our adolescence wanting to go out with our friends not go to work from 6AM to 6PM, pay for our own cell phone bill and apply to college. Once you turn 18 you’re expected to be self-reliant and individual by society but what they didn’t tell you is you’re expected to be in debt from college loans, rent, insurance, having fun and so on. Another reason that makes growing up bad is everyone asking you what you wanna do when you grow and then question you’re decision like you’re planning to kidnap the president or something. Mom: “what do you wanna be when you grow up?” 5 year old child: “I wanna be a FBI agent” Mom: “how wonderful! Well just remember the sky’s the limit” Mom: “what do you wanna be when you grow up?” High school student: “I wanna be a FBI agent” Mom: “yeah… there’s no way you’ll ever be good enough for the FBI pick something else ” Isn’t that a weird thing to think about? I mean when we’re little we were told we could be whatever we wanted to be (like president or a football player) and then when we’re 18 we’re told to be something practical with a high income like a doctor or an architect. I’m not saying it’s bad to be contemplating what you’re gonna do after high school, but when everyone showers you with questions like • What are you gonna be? • How are you gonna be that? • Why do you want to be that? • How much are you going to get paid? • Where are you gonna go? • Are you moving out or what? • Do you even have a job? • Where do you see yourself in 5 years? • How are you gonna pay for the national debt? • How are you going to make our economy better? • What are you going to do to save the whales? • How are you going to make the future a better place for the children? • What are you going to do to improve global relations? • Why do I have so many questions? • What’s the meaning of life? Sure it can be overwhelming and stressing when you’re flooded with questions and have little answers at the moment but there upsides to growing up too. For one you get the freedom you always wished for as a teen and learn to be a responsible adult. Growing up may seem scary but when you’re planned for it and work hard to reach your goal it’s not so hard to be self-reliant and independent. Unfortunately some of us are less prepared than others and we want to go back to times of being a carefree kid hopefully you don’t turn out to be one of those people now if you’ll excuse me it’s lunch time. “Hey mom can I get a happy meal” Mom: “why do you want a happy meal when you’re 17?” “I just want to be reminded of when I was a carefree kid” Mom: “you just want the toy don’t you?” “Yes”

Similar Articles

Join the discussion.

This article has 1 comment.

• Subscribe to Teen Ink magazine
• Submit to Teen Ink
• Find A College
• Find a Summer Program

Share this on

Send to a friend.

Thank you for sharing this page with a friend!

Tell my friends

Choose what to email.

Which of your works would you like to tell your friends about? (These links will automatically appear in your email.)

Send your email

Delete my account, we hate to see you go please note as per our terms and conditions, you agreed that all materials submitted become the property of teen ink. going forward, your work will remain on teenink.com submitted “by anonymous.”, delete this, change anonymous status, send us site feedback.

If you have a suggestion about this website or are experiencing a problem with it, or if you need to report abuse on the site, please let us know. We try to make TeenInk.com the best site it can be, and we take your feedback very seriously. Please note that while we value your input, we cannot respond to every message. Also, if you have a comment about a particular piece of work on this website, please go to the page where that work is displayed and post a comment on it. Thank you!

Pardon Our Dust

Teen Ink is currently undergoing repairs to our image server. In addition to being unable to display images, we cannot currently accept image submissions. All other parts of the website are functioning normally. Please check back to submit your art and photography and to enjoy work from teen artists around the world!

• International edition
• Australia edition
• Europe edition

‘A night for growing up’: how a terrifying college ‘prank’ taught me about fear

Every day, men did far worse things than the soccer players did to me. But that night was the first time I accepted that the stranger coming toward me may not just nod

A few weeks into my first fall semester of college, I left our library around 11pm to walk to my dorm. The New England campus was quiet. The air smelled like pine trees and old rain, and my mind was full of Robert Hass, the California poet whose words I had been introduced to in class that week.

His poems were full of droopy trees and fog-soaked mornings, and I was surprised how swiftly my longing for Oregon had gotten caught between his words, gathering like lint in a comb. The nostalgia flustered me, revealing a homesickness I had so far kept tamped down.

That was what I was thinking as I kicked my sneakers through the moonlit grass: how sorely I wanted a sign. A sign I belonged here, a place where people referred to “the city” and only meant one place, New York, even though many took planes to arrive, passing over other cities as they went.

As I rounded the curve of a shadowy path about 200 yards from my front door, I saw a pack of guys walking toward me through the trees. I do not know whether to call them men or boys. I could not tell if they were talking, but they had the straight gait of people who were not engaged in conversation but purpose. Their bodies were muscular, solid as a wall of trees.

Some sparkplug in the root of my spine told me to panic, but I was what my parents called “jumpy” and I was trying to learn to control it. Besides, this was a small town of students and retirees on the Maine coast. I was used to seeing others returning from the library at this hour, and I imagined the group would murmur hello as we slouched past one other.

They did not. When we were a few feet apart, the line of guys formed a tight semi-circle around me. They did not speak, but they stared, and when I looked back, I saw their faces were masked in white cotton T-shirts, with slits for eyes and mouth. The white athletic socks they wore on their hands turned their fingers into paws.

I do not need to tell you what my heart did in those moments, or for the rest of the night or for the nights that followed. What happened to my body is that it froze. The men were frozen too. It was a terrible dance. The moon gaped above us.

Pray, I thought. Also: Prey.

Nobody talked. I waited for their hands to reach for me; they did not. Finally, my body pushed through their bodies and ran. Nobody followed.

Years later, in graduate school, I found an old version of Little Red Riding Hood in the University of Minnesota archive. The library said it was from 1911; online someone estimated it closer to the 1890s. The book had a Kewpie-like girl on the cover, described inside as “rather forgetful, as you know, she did not think enough when she was told to do, or not to do something, that was why she was naughty sometimes, she did not mean to be, but she ‘forgot’”.

She reminded me I could not see the “symbolic biology” of the wolf without seeing what – whom – the “beast” was supposed to be chasing. In the original telling of Little Red, she is punished for being spoiled, gullible and absentminded, and the wolf is animated in her inverse. He is scrappy, wry, cunning. Little Red’s problem is not that she has happened upon bad luck, it is that she has bad wiring. The villainy of wolf is propped up by the foolishness of girl.

“T he prey controls the predator,” a biologist who worked in government wolf management once told me. It was a well-known maxim in the field, that you could not study one without the other. This meant one thing in an ecosystem such as Yellowstone national park, but his logic could be applied to stories about other species too.

Within minutes of arriving back at my dorm, I called campus security and reported the masked men. The next day, an officer called me to confirm their identity on camera footage.

Their headquarters was behind the little white house where I had just attended my first student newspaper meeting, and I kept my head low as I walked the driveway, trying not to feel like a snitch. A friendly man with a baritone voice ushered me on to the edge of a plastic office chair, where I watched a stream of silent video that showed the men keying into one of the dorms, jostling one another in the foyer like herded cows.

“That’s them,” I said. The officer ran a hand through his hair, shaking his head. “Creepy as heck with their faces and hands covered like that.” I nodded. What else was there to say?

These were the faces I would think of, years later, when reading about the ancient warrior men who, masqueraded as wolves, did things they would never do as men. The officer told me these were first-year soccer players who had been initiated. That is code for drunk. Hazed. Security staff had already spoken with the guys: they were very sorry about their inebriated “prank”.

“They meant no harm,” he said. That did not make me feel safer, but it did make me feel foolish: like I should have been in on the joke. When he mentioned some names, I recognized one as someone who sat behind me in microeconomics, a guy who had already smiled and retrieved a pencil that I dropped on the floor. He wore the sweatshirt of his boarding school and had the blunt, forgettable attractiveness of a Ken Doll.

Then the officer told me the soccer players did not know whom they had scared, but they wanted to apologize face-to-face. I thought about it. I wanted to see how the men wore sorry across their lips.

But some shard of my teenage self did not want to interfere with the equilibrium of that afternoon economics class, or anything else. I said I didn’t need a personal apology. On one level, it seemed only fair. They had had their masks, and now I could have mine. I wanted to let them think I could be any woman on campus. That I could be anywhere, watching them. That at any moment I may step toward them, collapse the space, open my mouth. That the hunted could play hunter.

Mostly, though, I did not want to be known for my tattletale fear.

In her book Complaint! , Sara Ahmed notes that while a complaint is often necessitated by a crisis, it often becomes part of the crisis too.

At some point after leaving campus security, I got a call from a dean, who apologized for what had happened and mandated that I see a campus mental health counselor. I began to wonder if, in the college’s eyes, it was I, and not the boys, who needed fixing.

Later that day, I called my mother. We were close, so I told her almost everything. Still, with a country of new distance between us, I wanted to frame things in a way that wouldn’t worry her. I mentioned what had happened with the soccer players, but I spent more time making an anecdote of my visit to security headquarters, with its burnt coffee smell and its wall of little screens. She laughed when I laughed, and then apologized.

“I’m so sorry that happened,” she said. We both knew that what this really meant was I wish I could protect you from everything. We were silent for a second, then I said, “It’s OK,” which we both knew meant, I know you can’t.

Evenings were different after that night. Even once I learned the group had meant no harm, I called the campus shuttle to ride a few blocks, or I left the library whenever a friend left or I did homework in my dorm. Logically, I understood nothing about the state of campus safety had changed. The only thing that had changed was my capacity to understand life at the brink of terror. That, it seems, was enough. It was a waiting room I dreaded returning to.

Every day, men did far worse things than the soccer players did to me; I had been, for so many years, luckier than so many. But that night on the quad was the first brick to smash the glass, shattering the window between my lived experiences and my anxieties of what the world could be. It was the first time I accepted that the stranger coming toward me down the street may not just nod or ignore me; that he might be wearing a mask when he blocked my path.

It was, in this way, a night for growing up.

I cannot remember what happened to the soccer players, or if they received any punishment. I am not sure what the charges would have been, because I am still not sure how to narrate that night. Should I let myself see the masked men as unwilling perpetrators, pressured into a drunken initiation ceremony by older men they felt they had to impress?

Other days I wondered if I should try harder to erase the whole night from my mind. Not because it was the right thing to do, but because it may make nights easier.

The word “victim” has its roots in the Latin victima, meaning sacrificial animal. Could I be a victim if the boys had not meant harm? I did not feel like one, not exactly. I felt like a girl who had left home and learned a lesson.

I had this in common with the boys. They who had just left home too, they who, like me, were learning their thresholds. What we could get away with. What could break us.

As the months passed, I wondered if that night stood out for them at all. In the college’s eyes, they were just sheep. Sheep in wolves’ clothing.

Though I knew the story of Little Red Riding Hood as a child, it did not make a big impression on me. My interest was held by stories about those who defeated the odds, not those who were defeated.

That’s why I was surprised to realize the further I got from girlhood, the more I thought of Little Red. At first I believed it was because the story carried all the lessons I needed to ditch. “Wolves are trapped in folkloric narrative that defines them just as firmly as women, and, like women, they are feared and reviled for their potentially predatory power,” writes South African fairytale scholar Jessica Tiffin.

If I just untangled Little Red’s story, I thought, maybe I could free us from it – free the women, free the wolves. I could be the huntsman, smirking with my axe. I see now this was wishful thinking.

In a fairytale of regressive lessons, it was not the lies in the story that tugged me back. It was its bulb of truth. That fear, some fear, was maybe useful after all.

Wolfish – Wolf, Self, and the Stories We Tell About Fear by Erica Berry is published in the UK on 2 March by Canongate Books (£16.99) and by Flatiron Books in the US.

• Life and style

Most viewed

Testimonials

Application Nation

Free Guides

Admissions Revolution

Work With Sara

[email protected]

How to Take the Fear Out of Writing Your College Essay

One of the most feared and intimidating parts of the application process is the college essay. I can understand why students have trepidation leading up to writing their personal statement. For selective and highly selective colleges, the essay matters. It often defines how the student is perceived by the admissions officer reading their application, and can impact the admissions decision. No pressure, right?

Before beginning the writing process, students wonder how on earth they are going to get across their very best self in 650 words or less. If you're worried and don't know how to get started, here are five tips to calm your nerves:

• You have ALL SUMMER to write your college essay. While there is a small percentage of students ready to write their college essay during junior year of high school, most students need more time. The best essays that I read are almost uniformly written by students during the summer between junior and senior year. Being away from the demands of the school year creates a safe space to take stock and consider the person you are. Most students gain a lot of perspective and maturity once the school year is complete, and this is reflected in a more self-aware essay.
• Pick your topic first and then look at the essay prompts in the Common Application (or another application). Almost anything a student writes about themselves for the main college essay will fit one of the prompts.
• Consider things that not everyone knows about you , or if they do, you don't usually discuss them. What moment, experience, quotation, family saying, daily routine, characteristic, challenge, or lifestyle represents you (and only you) so purely and authentically? The answer will come to you when you consider the person you are because of the life you have lived.
• You don't have to be perfect or come from a perfect family to write an extraordinary essay. In fact, imperfections or complex situations lead to powerful essays about resiliency, understanding, and acceptance.
• The work involved in writing the college essay can truly pay off. It can be the difference between getting admitted and getting denied. You get out of it what you put into it.

"Don't let the #college essay scare you! Here are five tips to calm your nerves" TWEET THIS 

Writing the main college essay can be very empowering, especially when the student sees themselves through a different and positive light. The hardest part is getting started, so keep these five tips in mind to begin!

For all the latest news and more:

About Sara Harberson

Sara Harberson is the founder of Application Nation™, which provides personalized advice to college applicants and their families. In her book, SOUNDBITE: The Admissions Secret that Gets You Into College and Beyond, Sara reveals the secrets of her signature college admissions tool, the "Soundbite," and shares tried-and-tested exercises that have helped thousands of students gain admission to their school of choice. She is the former associate dean of admissions at the University of Pennsylvania and the former dean of admissions and financial aid at Franklin & Marshall College. Sara’s philosophy is that every kid applying to college deserves the best advice.

College Admissions , College Essays

Related Articles

One-On-One Counseling

Speaking Engagements

© 2017 Sara Harberson, all rights reserved. Privacy Policy . Site developed by THINK creative group. 

Biden condemns violence as U.S. campus protests over Israel-Hamas war see widespread arrests

At least 200 arrested at ucla as u.s. president says 'dissent' on campus should be tolerated, not lawlessness.

Social Sharing

The latest:

• U.S. President Joe Biden says campus protests won't change admin's handling of Gaza war
• Biden doesn't want states to deploy National Guard troops to deal with encampments
• Police arrest 200 protesters at UCLA, adding to more than 2,000 arrests nationwide so far
• Prosecutors say New York police officer fired gun inside Columbia University building during raid 

U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday rejected calls from student protesters to change his approach to the war in Gaza while insisting that "order must prevail" as college campuses across the country face a wave of violence, outrage and fear.

"Dissent is essential for democracy," Biden said at the White House. "But dissent must never lead to disorder."

Biden's comments came hours after police in Los Angeles removed barricades early Thursday morning at a pro-Palestinian demonstrators' encampment on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). The law enforcement effort came after officers spent hours threatening arrests over loudspeakers if people did not disperse.

At least 200 people were arrested at UCLA on Thursday, bringing the nationwide total of arrests to more than 2,000 at dozens of college campuses since police cleared an encampment at Columbia University in mid-April, according to a tally by The Associated Press.

Demonstrations — and arrests — have occurred in almost every corner of the nation. But in the last 24 hours, they've drawn the most attention at the UCLA where chaotic scenes played out early Thursday as officers in riot gear surged against a crowd of demonstrators.

• This week, Cross Country Checkup wants to know: Are protests an effective way to change minds? How are you resolving disputes in your own life around the Israel-Hamas conflict? Fill out the details on  this form  and have your say.

As police helicopters hovered overhead, the sound of flash-bangs, which produce a bright light and a loud noise to disorient and stun people, pierced the air. Protesters chanted "where were you last night?" as the officers approached.

At least 200 people were arrested at UCLA, said Sgt. Alejandro Rubio of the California Highway Patrol, citing data from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

Biden, speaking from the White House, said there was "no place" on campus for antisemitism or Islamophobia.

"People have the right to get an education, the right to get a degree, the right to walk across the campus safely without the fear of being attacked," he said.

'Peaceful protest' is protected in U.S. — but intimidation and violence can't be tolerated, Biden says

He largely sidestepped protesters' demands, which have included ending U.S. support for Israeli military operations. Asked after his remarks whether the demonstrations would prompt him to consider changing course, Biden responded with a simple "no."

Biden also said that he did not want the National Guard to be deployed to campuses. 

The Biden administration has forcefully defended Israel's right to root out the militant group Hamas after the Oct. 7 attacks, but has increasingly expressed concern about the civilian death toll within Gaza and the provision of humanitarian aid within the territory.

Tent encampments of protesters calling on universities to stop doing business with Israel or companies they say support the war in Gaza have spread across campuses in the U.S., with several also arising in Canada . The ensuing police crackdowns echoed actions decades ago against a much larger protest movement opposing the Vietnam War.

Police response at UCLA criticized

The tense standoff at UCLA came one night after violence instigated by pro-Israel counter-protesters erupted in the same Royce Quad area. The law enforcement presence and continued warnings stood in contrast to the scene that unfolded the night before, when counter-demonstrators attacked the pro-Palestinian encampment, throwing traffic cones, releasing pepper spray and tearing down barriers.

Police moving in on UCLA pro-Palestinian encampment

At least 15 protesters suffered injuries, and the tepid response by authorities — no arrests were made — drew criticism from political leaders as well as Muslim students and advocacy groups.

"The community needs to feel the police are protecting them, not enabling others to harm them," Rebecca Husaini, chief of staff for the Muslim Public Affairs Council, said in a news conference on the Los Angeles campus Wednesday.

• Student protesters at McGill encampment determined to stay after judge rejects injunction
• Analysis A look at where McGill's money goes — and why protesters say it's a problem

Speakers at the news conference disputed the university's account that 15 people were injured and one hospitalized, saying the number of people taken to the hospital was higher.

UCLA Chancellor Gene Block said in a statement that "a group of instigators" perpetrated the previous night's attack, but he did not provide details about the crowd or why the administration and school police did not act sooner.

"However one feels about the encampment, this attack on our students, faculty and community members was utterly unacceptable," he said. "It has shaken our campus to its core."

Block promised a review of the night's events. The head of the University of California system, Michael Drake, ordered an "independent review of the university's planning, its actions and the response by law enforcement."

New York police officer fired gun during Columbia raid

The chaotic scenes at UCLA came after New York police burst into a building occupied by anti-war protesters at Columbia University on Tuesday night, breaking up a demonstration that had paralyzed the school.

On Thursday, a spokesperson for New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg's office confirmed a police officer who was involved in clearing protesters from a Columbia University administration building earlier this week fired his gun inside the hall.

No one was injured, according to spokesperson Doug Cohen, who said there were other officers, but no students, in the immediate vicinity.

He said Bragg's office is reviewing the incident.

He did not provide additional details on the incident, which was first reported by news outlet The City.

The New York Police Department did not immediately respond to The Associated Press' request for comment.

The gunfire came as police officers stormed Hamilton Hall Tuesday evening, where pro-Palestinian and anti-war protesters had been barricaded inside for more than 20 hours.

• Trump, Republicans try to equate campus protests to Jan. 6 riot, Charlottesville rally

Video showed officers with zip ties and riot shields streaming through a second-floor window.

Police had said protesters inside presented no substantial resistance.

More than 100 protesters were taken into custody during Columbia's crackdown Tuesday.

Police enter Columbia University and arrest protesters

The nationwide campus demonstrations began at Columbia on April 17 to protest the humanitarian situation in Gaza, resulting from the Israeli military response to a deadly attack on Oct. 7 launched by Hamas and other militants.

About 1,200 people were killed on Oct. 7, including several Canadians , while some 250 people were taken hostage, according to Israeli government tallies. Since then, more than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip, according to the Health Ministry there.

Israel and its supporters have branded the university protests antisemitic, while Israel's critics say it uses those allegations to silence opposition.

Although some protesters have been caught on camera making antisemitic remarks or violent threats, organizers of the protests, some of whom are Jewish, say it is a peaceful movement aimed at defending Palestinian rights and protesting the war.

At Brown University in Rhode Island, administrators agreed to consider a vote to divest from Israel in October —apparently the first U.S. college to agree to such a demand.

U.S. campuses see clashes, arrests as Canadian encampments grow

With files from CBC News

Related Stories

• Protests over Israel's war in Gaza roil some U.S. campuses
• Justice minister says protest at his home over Israel-Hamas war crossed a line
• Protesters demand UW divest from companies involved in Israel-Hamas war
• Pro-Palestinian protest camps emerge at 2 more B.C. universities
• Small group gathers near University of Waterloo in solidarity with U.S students protesting Israel-Gaza war

• Skip to main content
• Keyboard shortcuts for audio player

Many in Gen Z ditch colleges for trade schools. Meet the 'toolbelt generation'

Windsor Johnston

Sy Kirby dreaded the thought of going to college after graduating from high school. He says a four-year degree just wasn't in the cards for him or his bank account.

"I was facing a lot of pressure for a guy that knew for a fact that he wasn't going to college," Kirby says. "I knew I wasn't going to sit in a classroom, especially since I knew I wasn't going to pay for it."

Instead, at the age of 19, Kirby took a job at a local water department in southern Arkansas. He said the position helped him to develop the skills that helped him start his own construction company.

Sy Kirby, who runs his own construction company, says a four-year degree just wasn't in the cards for him or his bank account. Will Anderson hide caption

Sy Kirby, who runs his own construction company, says a four-year degree just wasn't in the cards for him or his bank account.

Now at age 32, Kirby finds himself mentoring many of his employees, who also opted to learn a skilled trade rather than shelling out tens of thousands of dollars to pursue a degree that they wouldn't use after graduating.

Kirby says blue-collar work is lucrative and allows him to "call the shots" in his life. But, he says the job also comes with a downside, mainly because of the stigma attached to the industry.

"I think there's a big problem with moms and dads coming home from quote-unquote 'dirty' jobs. Coming home with dirty clothes and sweating. You had a hard day's work and sometimes that's looked down upon," he says.

High-paying jobs that don't need a college degree? Thousands of them sit empty

Kirby is among the growing number of young people who have chosen to swap college for vocational schools that offer paid, on-the-job training.

Skilled trades make a comeback

Lisa Countryman-Quiroz is the CEO of JVS, or Jewish Vocational Service, a nonprofit in San Francisco that provides career training for unemployed workers to find jobs, including in skilled trades. She says that over the years there has been a shift — with skilled trade making a comeback, especially among members of Generation Z.

"Folks have really prioritized a college education as a path to the middle class and a path to a cushy office job." But, Countryman-Quiroz says, "over the last 10 to 15 years, we are seeing a trend among young people opting out of universities. Just the crushing debt of college is becoming a barrier in and of itself."

More than half of Gen Zers say it's possible to get a well-paying job with only a high school diploma, provided one acquires other skills. That's according to a survey by New America, a Washington Think Tank that focuses on a range of public policy issues, including technology, education and the economy.

The driver of the big rig one lane over might soon be one of these teenagers

The high cost of college prompts a change in career paths.

In addition, the Education Data Initiative says the average cost of college in the United States has more than doubled in the 21st century.

With that price tag increasing, many Gen Zers say they've been left with no choice but to leave the college path. Many say living with their parents until they can pay off their college debt isn't an option.

The Indicator from Planet Money

Do i need a four-year degree.

Nitzan Pelman is founder of Climb Hire, a company that helps low-income and overlooked people break into new careers. She says many young people say graduating from college with a six-figure debt is a non-starter.

"It's not a secret that the cost of college has gone up so dramatically in the last decade that it's really cost prohibitive at this point," she says.

Pelman says pursuing skilled trades can also help "level the playing field," especially for young people from less-privileged backgrounds and for people of color.

Construction boom helps fuel job gains in March

"We don't see a lot of Black men in construction, but more Latino men in construction and you don't see many women in construction. Social capital is a really big gatekeeper and a door-opener for accessing high-quality jobs and helping people break into certain industries," she says.

In 2021, President Biden signed a $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill. Since then, he's been traveling the country promoting the law, which he says will open up thousands of new jobs in trades.

Comparing college costs to the amount a student expects to earn after graduation

"you can expect to get your hands dirty and that's ok".

The high cost of college isn't the only factor driving many young people toward skilled trades. With the use of artificial intelligence on the rise, many Gen Zers see manual labor as less vulnerable to the emerging technology than white-collar alternatives. They also say vocational schools are a straight path to well-paying jobs.

Pelman says increasing salaries and new technologies in fields such as welding, plumbing and machine tooling are giving trade professions a face-lift, making them more appealing to the younger crowd.

"There are a lot of vocational jobs out there that are pretty attractive — HVAC repair and installation, electricians, solar panel installer — there's so much demand for wind turbine installers who, in many cases, make more than $100,000 a year — so there's a lot of demand for manual labor," she stresses.

Diego Aguilar works at a trade center at East Bay Municipal Utility District in Oakland, Calif. Marla Aufmuth/JVS hide caption

Diego Aguilar works at a trade center at East Bay Municipal Utility District in Oakland, Calif.

That was the case for 25-year-old Diego Aguilar, who says a traditional desk job was out of the question for him. Aguilar now works full time at a trade center at East Bay Municipal Utility District in Oakland, Calif., after going through the JVS training program.

"When I went into a trade program I learned how much money I could make performing a very specific kind of work. You need mechanics, you need machinists, you need carpenters, operators you need painters. You can expect to get your hands dirty and that's OK," Aguilar says.

Jobs Friday: Why apprenticeships could make a comeback

Data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center shows the number of students enrolled in vocational-focused community colleges increased 16% from 2022 to 2023.

As for Kirby, he says his mission is to keep raising awareness about what he calls the "toolbelt generation."

"Where they can walk out of the school of hard knocks, pick an industry, work your 10 years, take your punches, take your licks and hopefully you're bringing jobs and careers back to the community," he says.

When asked if he regrets his decision to go into skilled trades, Kirby chuckles. "Not for a second," he says.

• Share full article

For more audio journalism and storytelling, download New York Times Audio , a new iOS app available for news subscribers.

A Plan to Remake the Middle East

While talks for a cease-fire between israel and hamas continue, another set of negotiations is happening behind the scenes..

This transcript was created using speech recognition software. While it has been reviewed by human transcribers, it may contain errors. Please review the episode audio before quoting from this transcript and email [email protected] with any questions.

From New York Times, I’m Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily.

[MUSIC CONTINUES]

Today, if and when Israel and Hamas reach a deal for a ceasefire fire, the United States will immediately turn to a different set of negotiations over a grand diplomatic bargain that it believes could rebuild Gaza and remake the Middle East. My colleague Michael Crowley has been reporting on that plan and explains why those involved in it believe they have so little time left to get it done.

It’s Wednesday, May 8.

Michael, I want to start with what feels like a pretty dizzying set of developments in this conflict over the past few days. Just walk us through them?

Well, over the weekend, there was an intense round of negotiations in an effort, backed by the United States, to reach a ceasefire in the Gaza war.

The latest ceasefire proposal would reportedly see as many as 33 Israeli hostages released in exchange for potentially hundreds of Palestinian prisoners.

US officials were very eager to get this deal.

Pressure for a ceasefire has been building ahead of a threatened Israeli assault on Rafah.

Because Israel has been threatening a military offensive in the Southern Palestinian city of Rafah, where a huge number of people are crowded.

Fleeing the violence to the North. And now they’re packed into Rafah. Exposed and vulnerable, they need to be protected.

And the US says it would be a humanitarian catastrophe on top of the emergency that’s already underway.

Breaking news this hour — very important breaking news. An official Hamas source has told The BBC that it does accept a proposal for a ceasefire deal in Gaza.

And for a few hours on Monday, it looked like there might have been a major breakthrough when Hamas put out a statement saying that it had accepted a negotiating proposal.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the ceasefire proposal does not meet his country’s requirements. But Netanyahu says he will send a delegation of mediators to continue those talks. Now, the terms —

But those hopes were dashed pretty quickly when the Israelis took a look at what Hamas was saying and said that it was not a proposal that they had agreed to. It had been modified.

And overnight —

Israeli troops stormed into Rafah. Video showing tanks crashing over a sign at the entrance of the city.

— the Israelis launched a partial invasion of Rafah.

It says Hamas used the area to launch a deadly attack on Israeli troops over the weekend.

And they have now secured a border crossing at the Southern end of Gaza and are conducting targeted strikes. This is not yet the full scale invasion that President Biden has adamantly warned Israel against undertaking, but it is an escalation by Israel.

So while all that drama might suggest that these talks are in big trouble, these talks are very much still alive and ongoing and there is still a possibility of a ceasefire deal.

And the reason that’s so important is not just to stop the fighting in Gaza and relieve the suffering there, but a ceasefire also opens the door to a grand diplomatic bargain, one that involves Israel and its Arab neighbors and the Palestinians, and would have very far-reaching implications.

And what is that grand bargain. Describe what you’re talking about?

Well, it’s incredibly ambitious. It would reshape Israel’s relationship with its Arab neighbors, principally Saudi Arabia. But it’s important to understand that this is a vision that has actually been around since well before October 7. This was a diplomatic project that President Biden had been investing in and negotiating actually in a very real and tangible way long before the Hamas attacks and the Gaza war.

And President Biden was looking to build on something that President Trump had done, which was a series of agreements that the Trump administration struck in which Israel and some of its Arab neighbors agreed to have normal diplomatic relations for the first time.

Right, they’re called the Abraham Accords.

That’s right. And, you know, Biden doesn’t like a lot of things, most things that Trump did. But he actually likes this, because the idea is that they contribute to stability and economic integration in the Middle East, the US likes Israel having friends and likes having a tight-knit alliance against Iran.

President Biden agrees with the Saudis and with the Israelis, that Iran is really the top threat to everybody here. So, how can you build on this? How can you expand it? Well, the next and biggest step would be normalizing relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

And the Saudis have made clear that they want to do this and that they’re ready to do this. They weren’t ready to do it in the Trump years. But Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, has made clear he wants to do it now.

So this kind of triangular deal began to take shape before October 7, in which the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia would enter this three way agreement in which everyone would get something that they wanted.

And just walk through what each side gets in this pre-October 7th version of these negotiations?

So for Israel, you get normalized ties with its most important Arab neighbor and really the country that sets the tone for the whole Muslim world, which is Saudi Arabia of course. It makes Israel feel safer and more secure. Again, it helps to build this alliance against Iran, which Israel considers its greatest threat, and it comes with benefits like economic ties and travel and tourism. And Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been very open, at least before October 7th, that this was his highest diplomatic and foreign policy priority.

For the Saudis, the rationale is similar when it comes to Israel. They think that it will bring stability. They like having a more explicitly close ally against Iran. There are economic and cultural benefits. Saudi Arabia is opening itself up in general, encouraging more tourism.

But I think that what’s most important to the Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, is what he can get from the United States. And what he has been asking for are a couple of essential things. One is a security agreement whose details have always been a little bit vague, but I think essentially come down to reliable arms supplies from the United States that are not going to be cut off or paused on a whim, as he felt happened when President Biden stopped arms deliveries in 2021 because of how Saudi was conducting its war in Yemen. The Saudis were furious about that.

Saudi Arabia also wants to start a domestic nuclear power program. They are planning for a very long-term future, possibly a post-oil future. And they need help getting a nuclear program off the ground.

And they want that from the US?

And they want that from the US.

Now, those are big asks from the us. But from the perspective of President Biden, there are some really enticing things about this possible agreement. One is that it will hopefully produce more stability in the region. Again, the US likes having a tight-knit alliance against Iran.

The US also wants to have a strong relationship with Saudi Arabia. You know, despite the anger at Mohammed bin Salman over the murder of the Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi, the Biden administration recognizes that given the Saudis control over global oil production and their strategic importance in the Middle East, they need to have a good relationship with them. And the administration has been worried about the influence of China in the region and with the Saudis in particular.

So this is an opportunity for the US to draw the Saudis closer. Whatever our moral qualms might be about bin Salman and the Saudi government, this is an opportunity to bring the Saudis closer, which is something the Biden administration sees as a strategic benefit.

All three of these countries — big, disparate countries that normally don’t see eye-to-eye, this was a win-win-win on a military, economic, and strategic front.

That’s right. But there was one important actor in the region that did not see itself as winning, and that was the Palestinians.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

First, it’s important to understand that the Palestinians have always expected that the Arab countries in the Middle East would insist that Israel recognize a Palestinian state before those countries were willing to essentially make total peace and have normal relations with Israel.

So when the Abraham Accords happened in the Trump administration, the Palestinians felt like they’d been thrown under the bus because the Abraham Accords gave them virtually nothing. But the Palestinians did still hold out hope that Saudi Arabia would be their savior. And for years, Saudi Arabia has said that Israel must give the Palestinians a state if there’s going to be a normal relationship between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Now the Palestinians see the Saudis in discussions with the US and Israel about a normalization agreement, and there appears to be very little on offer for the Palestinians. And they are feeling like they’re going to be left out in the cold here.

Right. And in the minds of the Palestinians, having already been essentially sold out by all their other Arab neighbors, the prospect that Saudi Arabia, of all countries, the most important Muslim Arab country in the region, would sell them out, had to be extremely painful.

It was a nightmare scenario for them. And in the minds of many analysts and US officials, this was a factor, one of many, in Hamas’s decision to stage the October 7th attacks.

Hamas, like other Palestinian leaders, was seeing the prospect that the Middle East was moving on and essentially, in their view, giving up on the Palestinian cause, and that Israel would be able to have friendly, normal relations with Arab countries around the region, and that it could continue with hardline policies toward the Palestinians and a refusal, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said publicly, to accept a Palestinian state.

Right. So Michael, once Hamas carries out the October 7th attacks in an effort to destroy a status quo that it thinks is leaving them less and less relevant, more and more hopeless, including potentially this prospect that Saudi Arabia is going to normalize relations with Israel, what happens to these pre-October 7th negotiations between the US, Saudi Arabia, and Israel?

Well, I think there was a snap assumption that these talks were dead and buried. That they couldn’t possibly survive a cataclysm like this.

But then something surprising happened. It became clear that all the parties were still determined to pull-off the normalization.

And most surprisingly of all, perhaps, was the continued eagerness of Saudi Arabia, which publicly was professing outrage over the Israeli response to the Hamas attacks, but privately was still very much engaged in these conversations and trying to move them forward.

And in fact, what has happened is that the scope of this effort has grown substantially. October 7th didn’t kill these talks. It actually made them bigger, more complicated, and some people would argue, more important than ever.

We’ll be right back.

Michael, walk us through what exactly happens to these three-way negotiations after October 7th that ends up making them, as you just said, more complicated and more important than ever?

Well, it’s more important than ever because of the incredible need in Gaza. And it’s going to take a deal like this and the approval of Saudi Arabia to unlock the kind of massive reconstruction project required to essentially rebuild Gaza from the rubble. Saudi Arabia and its Arab friends are also going to be instrumental in figuring out how Gaza is governed, and they might even provide troops to help secure it. None of those things are going to happen without a deal like this.

Fascinating.

But this is all much more complicated now because the price for a deal like this has gone up.

And by price, you mean?

What Israel would have to give up. [MUSIC PLAYING]

From Saudi Arabia’s perspective, you have an Arab population that is furious at Israel. It now feels like a really hard time to do a normalization deal with the Israelis. It was never going to be easy, but this is about as bad a time to do it as there has been in a generation at least. And I think that President Biden and the people around him understand that the status quo between Israel and the Palestinians is intolerable and it is going to lead to chaos and violence indefinitely.

So now you have two of the three parties to this agreement, the Saudis and the Americans, basically asking a new price after October 7th, and saying to the Israelis, if we’re going to do this deal, it has to not only do something for the Palestinians, it has to do something really big. You have to commit to the creation of a Palestinian state. Now, I’ll be specific and say that what you hear the Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, say is that the agreement has to include an irreversible time-bound path to a Palestinian state.

We don’t know exactly what that looks like, but it’s some kind of a firm commitment, the likes of which the world and certainly the Israelis have not made before.

Something that was very much not present in the pre-October 7th vision of this negotiation. So much so that, as we just talked about, the Palestinians were left feeling completely out in the cold and furious at it.

That’s right. There was no sign that people were thinking that ambitiously about the Palestinians in this deal before October 7th. And the Palestinians certainly felt like they weren’t going to get much out of it. And that has completely changed now.

So, Michael, once this big new dimension after October 7th, which is the insistence by Saudi Arabia and the US that there be a Palestinian state or a path to a Palestinian state, what is the reaction specifically from Israel, which is, of course, the third major party to this entire conversation?

Well, Israel, or at least its political leadership, hates it. You know, this is just an extremely tough sell in Israel. It would have been a tough sell before October 7th. It’s even harder now.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is completely unrepentantly open in saying that there’s not going to be a Palestinian state on his watch. He won’t accept it. He says that it’s a strategic risk to his country. He says that it would, in effect, reward Hamas.

His argument is that terrorism has forced a conversation about statehood onto the table that wasn’t there before October 7th. Sure, it’s always in the background. It’s a perennial issue in global affairs, but it was not something certainly that the US and Israel’s Arab neighbors were actively pushing. Netanyahu also has — you know, he governs with the support of very right-wing members of a political coalition that he has cobbled together. And that coalition is quite likely to fall apart if he does embrace a Palestinian state or a path to a Palestinian state.

Now, he might be able to cobble together some sort of alternative, but it creates a political crisis for him.

And finally, you know, I think in any conversation about Israel, it’s worth bearing in mind something you hear from senior US officials these days, which is that although there is often finger pointing at Netanyahu and a desire to blame Netanyahu as this obstructionist who won’t agree to deals, what they say is Netanyahu is largely reflecting his population and the political establishment of his country, not just the right-wingers in his coalition who are clearly extremist.

But actually the prevailing views of the Israeli public. And the Israeli public and their political leaders across the spectrum right now with few exceptions, are not interested in talking about a Palestinian state when there are still dozens and dozens of Israeli hostages in tunnels beneath Gaza.

So it very much looks like this giant agreement that once seemed doable before October 7th might be more important to everyone involved than ever, given that it’s a plan for rebuilding Gaza and potentially preventing future October 7th’s from happening, but because of this higher price that Israel would have to pay, which is the acceptance of a Palestinian state, it seems from everything you’re saying, that this is more and more out of reach than ever before and hard to imagine happening in the immediate future. So if the people negotiating it are being honest, Michael, are they ready to acknowledge that it doesn’t look like this is going to happen?

Well, not quite yet. As time goes by, they certainly say it’s getting harder and harder, but they’re still trying, and they still think there’s a chance. But both the Saudis and the Biden administration understand that there’s very little time left to do this.

Well, what do you mean there’s very little time left? It would seem like time might benefit this negotiation in that it might give Israel distance from October 7th to think potentially differently about a Palestinian state?

Potentially. But Saudi Arabia wants to get this deal done in the Biden administration because Mohammed bin Salman has concluded this has to be done under a Democratic president.

Because Democrats in Congress are going to be very reluctant to approve a security agreement between the United States and Saudi Arabia.

It’s important to understand that if there is a security agreement, that’s something Congress is going to have to approve. And you’re just not going to get enough Democrats in Congress to support a deal with Saudi Arabia, who a lot of Democrats don’t like to begin with, because they see them as human rights abusers.

But if a Democratic president is asking them to do it, they’re much more likely to go along.

Right. So Saudi Arabia fears that if Biden loses and Trump is president, that those same Democrats would balk at this deal in a way that they wouldn’t if it were being negotiated under President Biden?

Exactly. Now, from President Biden’s perspective, politically, think about a president who’s running for re-election, who is presiding right now over chaos in the Middle East, who doesn’t seem to have good answers for the Israeli-Palestinian question, this is an opportunity for President Biden to deliver what could be at least what he would present as a diplomatic masterstroke that does multiple things at once, including creating a new pathway for Israel and the Palestinians to coexist, to break through the logjam, even as he is also improving Israel’s relations with Saudi Arabia.

So Biden and the Crown Prince hope that they can somehow persuade Bibi Netanyahu that in spite of all the reasons that he thinks this is a terrible idea, that this is a bet worth taking on Israel’s and the region’s long-term security and future?

That’s right. Now, no one has explained very clearly exactly how this is going to work, and it’s probably going to require artful diplomacy, possibly even a scenario where the Israelis would agree to something that maybe means one thing to them and means something else to other people. But Biden officials refuse to say that it’s hopeless and they refuse to essentially take Netanyahu’s preliminary no’s for an answer. And they still see some way that they can thread this incredibly narrow needle.

Michael, I’m curious about a constituency that we haven’t been talking about because they’re not at the table in these discussions that we are talking about here. And that would be Hamas. How does Hamas feel about the prospect of such a deal like this ever taking shape. Do they see it as any kind of a victory and vindication for what they did on October 7th?

So it’s hard to know exactly what Hamas’s leadership is thinking. I think they can feel two things. I think they can feel on the one hand, that they have established themselves as the champions of the Palestinian people who struck a blow against Israel and against a diplomatic process that was potentially going to leave the Palestinians out in the cold.

At the same time, Hamas has no interest in the kind of two-state solution that the US is trying to promote. They think Israel should be destroyed. They think the Palestinian state should cover the entire geography of what is now Israel, and they want to lead a state like that. And that’s not something that the US, Saudi Arabia, or anyone else is going to tolerate.

So what Hamas wants is to fight, to be the leader of the Palestinian people, and to destroy Israel. And they’re not interested in any sort of a peace process or statehood process.

It seems very clear from everything you’ve said here that neither Israel nor Hamas is ready to have the conversation about a grand bargain diplomatic program. And I wonder if that inevitably has any bearing on the ceasefire negotiations that are going on right now between the two of them that are supposed to bring this conflict to some sort of an end, even if it’s just temporary?

Because if, as you said, Michael, a ceasefire opens the door to this larger diplomatic solution, and these two players don’t necessarily want that larger diplomatic solution, doesn’t that inevitably impact their enthusiasm for even reaching a ceasefire?

Well, it certainly doesn’t help. You know, this is such a hellish problem. And of course, you first have the question of whether Israel and Hamas can make a deal on these immediate issues, including the hostages, Palestinian prisoners, and what the Israeli military is going to do, how long a ceasefire might last.

But on top of that, you have these much bigger diplomatic questions that are looming over them. And it’s not clear that either side is ready to turn and face those bigger questions.

So while for the Biden administration and for Saudi Arabia, this is a way out of this crisis, these larger diplomatic solutions, it’s not clear that it’s a conversation that the two parties that are actually at war here are prepared to start having.

Well, Michael, thank you very much. We appreciate it.

On Tuesday afternoon, under intense pressure from the US, delegations from Israel and Hamas arrived in Cairo to resume negotiations over a potential ceasefire. But in a statement, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made clear that even with the talks underway, his government would, quote, “continue to wage war against Hamas.”

Here’s what else you need to know today. In a dramatic day of testimony, Stormy Daniels offered explicit details about an alleged sexual encounter with Donald Trump that ultimately led to the hush money payment at the center of his trial. Daniels testified that Trump answered the door in pajamas, that he told her not to worry that he was married, and that he did not use a condom when they had sex.

That prompted lawyers for Trump to seek a mistrial based on what they called prejudicial testimony. But the judge in the case rejected that request. And,

We’ve seen a ferocious surge of anti-Semitism in America and around the world.

In a speech on Tuesday honoring victims of the Holocaust, President Biden condemned what he said was the alarming rise of anti-Semitism in the United States after the October 7th attacks on Israel. And he expressed worry that too many Americans were already forgetting the horrors of that attack.

The Jewish community, I want you to know I see your fear, your hurt, and your pain. Let me reassure you, as your president, you’re not alone. You belong. You always have and you always will.

Today’s episode was produced by Nina Feldman, Clare Toeniskoetter, and Rikki Novetsky. It was edited by Liz O. Baylen, contains original music by Marion Lozano, Elisheba Ittoop, and Dan Powell, and was engineered by Alyssa Moxley. Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly.

That’s it for The Daily. I’m Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.

• May 9, 2024   •   34:42 One Strongman, One Billion Voters, and the Future of India
• May 8, 2024   •   28:28 A Plan to Remake the Middle East
• May 7, 2024   •   27:43 How Changing Ocean Temperatures Could Upend Life on Earth
• May 6, 2024   •   29:23 R.F.K. Jr.’s Battle to Get on the Ballot
• May 3, 2024   •   25:33 The Protesters and the President
• May 2, 2024   •   29:13 Biden Loosens Up on Weed
• May 1, 2024   •   35:16 The New Abortion Fight Before the Supreme Court
• April 30, 2024   •   27:40 The Secret Push That Could Ban TikTok
• April 29, 2024   •   47:53 Trump 2.0: What a Second Trump Presidency Would Bring
• April 26, 2024   •   21:50 Harvey Weinstein Conviction Thrown Out
• April 25, 2024   •   40:33 The Crackdown on Student Protesters
• April 24, 2024   •   32:18 Is $60 Billion Enough to Save Ukraine?

Hosted by Michael Barbaro

Featuring Michael Crowley

Produced by Nina Feldman ,  Clare Toeniskoetter and Rikki Novetsky

Edited by Liz O. Baylen

Original music by Marion Lozano ,  Elisheba Ittoop and Dan Powell

Engineered by Alyssa Moxley

Listen and follow The Daily Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube

If and when Israel and Hamas reach a deal for a cease-fire, the United States will immediately turn to a different set of negotiations over a grand diplomatic bargain that it believes could rebuild Gaza and remake the Middle East.

Michael Crowley, who covers the State Department and U.S. foreign policy for The Times, explains why those involved in this plan believe they have so little time left to get it done.

On today’s episode

Michael Crowley , a reporter covering the State Department and U.S. foreign policy for The New York Times.

Background reading :

Talks on a cease-fire in the Gaza war are once again at an uncertain stage .

Here’s how the push for a deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia looked before Oct. 7 .

From early in the war, President Biden has said that a lasting resolution requires a “real” Palestinian state .

Here’s what Israeli officials are discussing about postwar Gaza.

There are a lot of ways to listen to The Daily. Here’s how.

We aim to make transcripts available the next workday after an episode’s publication. You can find them at the top of the page.

The Daily is made by Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Dan Powell, Sydney Harper, Mike Benoist, Liz O. Baylen, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Rachelle Bonja, Diana Nguyen, Marion Lozano, Corey Schreppel, Rob Szypko, Elisheba Ittoop, Mooj Zadie, Patricia Willens, Rowan Niemisto, Jody Becker, Rikki Novetsky, John Ketchum, Nina Feldman, Will Reid, Carlos Prieto, Ben Calhoun, Susan Lee, Lexie Diao, Mary Wilson, Alex Stern, Dan Farrell, Sophia Lanman, Shannon Lin, Diane Wong, Devon Taylor, Alyssa Moxley, Summer Thomad, Olivia Natt, Daniel Ramirez and Brendan Klinkenberg.

Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly. Special thanks to Sam Dolnick, Paula Szuchman, Lisa Tobin, Larissa Anderson, Julia Simon, Sofia Milan, Mahima Chablani, Elizabeth Davis-Moorer, Jeffrey Miranda, Renan Borelli, Maddy Masiello, Isabella Anderson and Nina Lassam.

Michael Crowley covers the State Department and U.S. foreign policy for The Times. He has reported from nearly three dozen countries and often travels with the secretary of state. More about Michael Crowley

Advertisement

Dealing With Fear of College

Here's some advice for parents..

Posted August 9, 2021 | Reviewed by Davia Sills

Especially if school hasn’t been your (or your child's) thing, the upcoming school year may feel scary.

The following composite, which is drawn from my clients, describes a parent’s worry about a college-bound child.

A parent's fear

It was pulling teeth just to get him to apply to college. I still remember him saying, “I don’t give a crap about quadratic equations, the causes of the War of 1812, let alone all the male-bashing. I hate school. And truthfully, Mom, I'm no good at school. Why should I be masochistic and opt for more, for college, where the work will be even harder? I'd be scared to go to college. I’d rather do an apprenticeship.”

But my husband and I have graduate degrees, and we felt he should get more education . So we pushed and pushed, and he applied and now has completed his first year at the State University of New York at Oswego, although we’re afraid he’s majoring in partying and minoring in weed. He’s threatened to quit but has agreed to return for his sophomore year.

We’ve tried everything: offered him bribes for good grades, begged him to use the tutoring center, and, although we had to take out loans, we’re paying for the whole thing. But we’re afraid he’ll be one of the 40 percent who doesn’t graduate even if given six years, let alone get a job beyond barista. Help!

Here are my suggestions:

Do you think he’d be better off with some handholding or if you let him sink or swim? An argument for handholding is that maybe you could help him find courses and extracurriculars that are more likely to turn him on, and regarding his fear of college, you can reassure him that you'll always love him no matter what. An argument against is that he may be rebelling, establishing his autonomy, and the more you push, the more he’ll rebel. Which do you think is more likely to work with your child?

He’s at a college in the middle of nowhere. While isolated colleges provide plenty of extracurriculars, many such colleges still are a hotbed of drinking and drugs. While not true, it’s easier for kids to say, “There’s nothing to do in Oswego except drink,” than if they're in New York City. Would he benefit from being at a college closer to home or even—and I’d bet he’ll resist this—spending another year or two living with you and commuting to a nearby college, perhaps a community college, where instruction tends to be more concrete and less rigorous?

Finally, is it possible he’s right that he’d do better in an apprenticeship program? I understand that with you and your husband having a graduate degree, that may be disappointing, but one size doesn’t fit all. Some people are happier and more successful starting life in an apprenticeship program. Perhaps you might invite your child to explore Find an Apprenticeship . That would restore his agency, make him less likely to rebel and to be fearful, and just possibly find an apprenticeship that's a more likely route to success and happiness .

I read this aloud on YouTube.

This series’ other installments are on dealing with the fear of starting a career , of marriage , of topping out early . and of retiring.

Marty Nemko, Ph.D ., is a career and personal coach based in Oakland, California, and the author of 10 books.

• Find a Therapist
• Find a Treatment Center
• Find a Psychiatrist
• Find a Support Group
• Find Online Therapy
• United States
• Brooklyn, NY
• Chicago, IL
• Houston, TX
• Los Angeles, CA
• New York, NY
• Portland, OR
• San Diego, CA
• San Francisco, CA
• Seattle, WA
• Washington, DC
• Asperger's
• Bipolar Disorder
• Chronic Pain
• Eating Disorders
• Passive Aggression
• Personality
• Goal Setting
• Positive Psychology
• Stopping Smoking
• Low Sexual Desire
• Relationships
• Child Development
• Therapy Center NEW
• Diagnosis Dictionary
• Types of Therapy

Understanding what emotional intelligence looks like and the steps needed to improve it could light a path to a more emotionally adept world.

• Emotional Intelligence
• Gaslighting
• Affective Forecasting
• Neuroscience