College
has always been such a stressful issue ever since I was very, very young. Both
my brothers are much older than I am and just watching them go through the
stressful process of college made me just as stressed. Ever since I was young,
I’ve always wanted to achieve great academic and scholarly success, so I always
aimed high.. even if they were unrealistic. My dream college when I was five
years old was always University of California: Los Angeles. I loved the campus
and the atmosphere, but more than everything, I loved the reputation that came
with such a prestigious school.
By the time I entered high school, I
pretty much viewed school as a sets of tests that qualified you for college.
High school was nothing more than a way to get you into college. The only thing
worse than school was the SATs… the thing that so many juniors dread. My
parents had spent more than $2,500 on preparing me for the SATs through SAT
prep classes. Now that I think about it, those classes will not help you unless you are willing to put in the effort to learn.
Even with all that money, I never got the scores that I would have liked, but I
was the only one to blame since I hated those classes and I hated studying.
When the summer of senior year came
around, I just played and played and played instead of starting on college apps
since this was the first summer I didn’t have SAT classes since 8th
grade. But when mid-September came, I suffered such an unbearable misery. I
basically crammed all my apps and wrote all my essays within a week they were
due. I decided to apply to 6 colleges: SDSU, CSULB, UCLA, UCD, Azusa Pacific
University, and Biola University. I applied early for all my privates and heard
back from all my colleges except UC’s by early February. Thankfully, every
college I had back from, I received a letter of acceptance, but the one that
mattered the most was Biola University, my top school. After thinking about it,
UCLA was such an unrealistic goal for me and realized that I didn’t even want
to go to a UC in the end anyways.
On February 6, 2013, around 8:00pm, I had
stepped out the shower and my dad told me that there’s a small envelope on the
counter from Biola. I immediately felt nervous since I knew what the huge
acceptance packet from Biola looked like. When I saw the printed hand on the
outside of the packet, I immediately knew what it meant: I HAD GOT INTO BIOLA
AND I WAS GOING TO COLLEGE!!!
After all the stress and the hardships
I went through, it was all over. I had got into college and I didn’t have to
stress about it anymore. But a $45,000 tuition is not cheap and now begins the
scholarship application process… it’s a never ending cycle for sure.
Psalm 136: 1
"Praise the LORD. Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.."
