套路:卖惨
申请人:Luke Kenworthy
录取院校:7所常青藤-Harvard, Princeton, Brown, Cornell, Columbia, Dartmouth, and the University of Pennsylvania (wait-listed by Yale).
主题套路
我最惨
卖惨一直是藤校招生考官的心头好。可是,现在光是被爸爸妈妈离婚给幼小心灵造成伤害这种普通惨的故事,已经远远不能打动阅卷老师的心了。主角必须得要妈妈小时候被外公外婆忽视和虐待、长大后在婚姻中不拘常规常理、离婚后迅速交个男朋友、然后再被男朋友殴打住院。拥有这样的经历的男女主角才足够彰显复杂又深刻的心理活动以及这些经历如何把他塑造成为了一个优秀的学生干部,而不是一个小混子,或者自卑的失败者。
结构套路
头尾呼应
文章开头他在哭,激发起阅卷官的同情心和好奇心:“他好可怜啊!” “他肿么啦?”
"The soft thumping of my dad's heart provided a small degree of solace as I cried with my head on his chest. I was in fifth grade. He had just told me that my mom, having been attacked by her boyfriend, was in the hospital."
紧接着,作者回忆起了自己八岁的时候母亲是如何在家里和一帮十几岁的小伙子狂饮烂醉,如何酒醉后因为掐住父亲的脖子而入狱,如何在父亲拿到单独抚养权之后,一年都见不到她一面。
“I thought I had closure, that I was ready to move on. Yet, hot tears still ran down my cheek as I imagined her swollen face and the bruises on her arms.”
结尾,千帆过后,多么痛的领悟!他从孤独灰暗走向辉煌,回顾开头提到的那次痛苦经历:
"As I listened to my dad's heartbeat that night, my mind filled with anger and sorrow. However, in hindsight, I am thankful for the lessons I learned from my mother; the pain I felt was a necessary step in the process of becoming the person I am today, someone who is unafraid to express himself."
人生暗黑经历促使男主检视自己凄惨童年的根源:“我妈妈遇人不淑酗酒无度,难道我的人生就得跟她的一样吗?” 痛定思痛,写下了本文的金句:
"For the first time, I began to understand an idea that has since granted me freedom: I cannot walk in my mom's shoes, and thus, no one else can truly walk in mine.”
自己熬鸡汤自己服下,男主不再在意别人的眼光,一举成为了一个优秀的人。此处列举出自己的一系列优点和成就。
“Even then, it wasn't the role itself that I found meaningful, but the way I could use it to help others. The basis of my friendships shifted from validation seeking to mutual, genuine respect.”
套路:寻找自我
申请人:Zachary, Aaron, Nigel, and Nick Wade
录取院校:Each of them to both Yale and Harvard.
在我们对其申请书剖析之前,必须要交代一下他们华丽的背景:
Aaron
Nick
Zach
Nigel
Computer Science and Cognitive Science
International Relations and Arabic
Chemical Engineering
Neuroscience
Harvard
Yale
Cornell
Brown
U Penn
Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Columbia
Brown
U Penn
(Wharton)
Harvard
Yale
Cornell
Harvard
Yale
Brown
结构套路
先声夺人
四个人写同样的题材,要在几万份八股文里出众,靠的就是四个风格不同的开头:
Nick -
"Wade. Wade. Wade. Wade," shouted my football coach as he called roll at breakneck speed.
“Here," we sounded in unison.
Aaron -
"Yes, Nigel?" the teacher said. I lowered my hand and glanced back at Nigel's vacant desk. He had stayed home sick that day. Realizing her mistake, the teacher laughed sheepishly. "You all look so alike," she said. "There's no way I'll ever be able to tell you apart."
Nigle -
0.00000125%
The chance that my mother would give birth to quadruplets.
100%
The chance that this woman striding towards me and my brothers was about to make me feel like the black sheep.
结构套路
头尾呼应
首尾呼应的经典结构套路,此文自然也有出现。首尾呼应例句:
开头-
"in our house, snake is snack"
结尾-
"There are friendly snakes in the cupboard and snacks in the tank"
写法套路
先抑后扬
嗯,你猜对了,先抑后扬的套路也是不能少的。先抑后扬例句:
先抑-
"I rejected the English that had never seemed broken before..."
后扬-
"My mother asked me to teach her proper English so old white ladies at Target wouldn’t laugh at her pronunciation.
I stand against ignorance and become a voice for the homeless, the refugees, the ignored. With my words I fight against jeers pelted at an old Asian street performer on a New York subway."
文风套路
Lyrical
当然作为一篇合格的煽情作文这篇文章的优点还是甚多的,首先用 lyrical 的文字给 broken English 营造了一丝东方的神秘感。传统的先抑(艾玛我娘亲英文为毛这么差)后扬(娘儿俩苦练英文,不是为了自己哦,是为了所有英文不好的少数族裔)以及首尾呼应都应用的相当纯熟。Cassandra 作为 a writer, journalist, and one-time rapper,不是列举了一堆表彰,而是把其功力运用在申请书上,值得夸赞。(作为亚裔两娃妈,我想说,她爹妈这些年银子拍得值!)
"In our house, there is beauty in the way we speak to each other. In our house, language is not broken but rather bursting with emotion. We have built a house out of words.
It is a crooked house. It is a little messy. But this is where we have made our home."
点评
爱果然能战胜一切
本文作者对本文进行了再次升华,最后结束在语言是爱的承载这一高大上主题。爱是什么?在现代西方文化里爱就是可以拯救世界的终极武器,不管是哈利波特战胜伏地魔还是美女野兽里面野兽的起死回生,都离不开这个爱字。所以该文最后回归到爱这个主题,让这一个俗得不能再俗的老梗再次焕发了青春,一举夺取了数位 AO 的欢心,实在是一篇不可多得的套路佳作。
就这样他大大咧咧的就插入了 -
“The streaming floodlights on the open road give me a sense of lonely curiosity, reminiscent of the opening lines of Wieniawski's first violin concerto. I come up with adaptations of the melody in my head, experimenting with an atonality similar to Stravinsky's.”
路灯下孤独的平面跑者马上成了立体的有思想有抱负有品味的奔跑在人生道路上的强者有没有?
内容套路
争议热点
其实,很多的争议在申请书只是博眼球的套路;藤校招生考官会 side with who,早已不言而喻。该作者的巧思在于,他没有口号式宣言自己的立场,而是通过剖析自己来暗示少年的成长。
“Turning west, I see a man and perk up as I try to look more menacing than I really am. But I relinquish. I realize that I did such an act simply because of the color of his skin. I kick myself for reverting to passive racism — something I spent much of the summer trying to overcome.”
虽然自己努力改变小镇出身的偏见,可是身为白人遇到了黑人还是有不由自主的警觉——深挖自己与生俱来的白人劣根性,多好的孩子,摸头。
“Beyond the rainbow flags lining downtown, I see the Catholic cathedral I attend every Sunday outside of the summer. The juxtaposition brings back memories of trying to come to terms with my own beliefs.”
乖乖的天主教家庭出身大男孩又思考了,信仰是什么?人生的意义何在?有颜值有肌肉,还有思想。多好的孩子,继续摸头。
“The conservatism on my mom's side of the family often clashes with the more liberal views of my dad's family.”
老师看到没有?小镇出身,不见得思想保守迂腐喔!从小就从父母那里接受了平衡的而不是偏激的世界观,不保守也不见得自由,谁也不得罪。
结构套路
结尾升华
结尾,又见升华啊:
“Longs runs are often seen as a runner battling the distance rather than time. But for me, long runs are a journey — both physically and mentally.”
长距离跑不仅仅是体力和耐力的磨练,还有思想的升华。Journey 这个 buzz word 也是被用烂了。
(小编有话说:longs runs?尊重原稿从网上复制,但 OCD 小编必须指出错误。)
点评
什么都说了又什么都没说,一网打尽阅卷人
如果有阅卷老师是黑的或者白的,懂音乐的,不懂音乐的,社会责任感强的,城市出身的,乡村长大的,有宗教信仰和没有宗教信仰的,政治保守的和激进的,统统一网打尽。哦对了百密一疏,只差一类,小子运气好,阅卷老师显然没有经过马拉松训练,8迈就算 long run 了?!表示捂脸以及不屑。
Martin Altenburg, a 17-year-old from Fargo, North Dakota, achieved the impressive feat of gaining acceptance into every Ivy League college.
He also gained acceptance into Stanford University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the California Institute of Technology, and the University of Chicago.
The high-school senior had stellar standardized-test scores — a 35 on the ACT — and a demonstrated interest in the sciences, attending a selective program at MIT during the summer of his junior year.
For his Common Application admissions essay, Altenburg, who also competes in cross country, track, and swimming, chose to write about the thoughts that race through his head on a distance run.
He graciously shared his essay with Business Insider. It's reprinted verbatim below.
My favorite time to run is at night.
This particular run in early August brought a break to the humid, muggy weather I left on the East Coast. I used my body as a human psychrometer, knowing that the cold feeling of evaporating sweat signaled much needed dry air.
I cross over the bridge into Minnesota. Out of my three sports, cross country is definitely my worst — but I continue to be hooked on it. Unlike swimming and track, my motivation to run is heavily intrinsic. I live for the long runs I take on by myself. While they rarely happen during our season, we were assigned a long run to complete over our first weekend of cross country. In reality, I was supposed to go six miles, but felt eight gave me more time to explore the home I had just returned to. My mind begins to wander as I once again find my rhythm.
My train of thought while running is similar to the way one thinks in the minutes before sleep — except one has more control over how these thoughts progress and what tangents they move off of. While special relativity would be the "proper" thing to think about, especially at MITES, I revive the violin repertoire I had turned away from for so long and begin playing it in my head. I'm now at the edge of town in between the cornfields. The streaming floodlights on the open road give me a sense of lonely curiosity, reminiscent of the opening lines of Wieniawski's first violin concerto. I come up with adaptations of the melody in my head, experimenting with an atonality similar to Stravinsky's.
I turn south onto a highway heading towards downtown. The dark night sky is broken by the oncoming light pollution. While I've longed for a road trip across the country, the neon lights from Sunset Lanes will have to do for Las Vegas. Turning west, I see a man and perk up as I try to look more menacing than I really am. But I relinquish. I realize that I did such an act simply because of the color of his skin. I kick myself for reverting to passive racism — something I spent much of the summer trying to overcome.
The bridge over Main Avenue leads me back into North Dakota and downtown Fargo. My city is on the eve of its annual pride week — the largest in North Dakota. Beyond the rainbow flags lining downtown, I see the Catholic cathedral I attend every Sunday outside of the summer. The juxtaposition brings back memories of trying to come to terms with my own beliefs. The conservatism on my mom's side of the family often clashes with the more liberal views of my dad's family. Fargo is known for its "nice" attitude, but the discussion of controversial issues is often set aside in favor of maintaining peace. On the surface this can be good, but it makes change a long and cumbersome process, and has caused me to become very independent in finding my own belief system — something especially difficult when these beliefs may have to do with your future identity.
The remaining part of my run is short and uneventful. The fact that the traffic lights have switched to blinking yellow and red means that I have been out later than usual. When I get home, I find that my run took somewhere around an hour — I honestly don't care about time during my distance runs. Longs runs are often seen as a runner battling the distance rather than time. But for me, long runs are a journey — both physically and mentally. Each time I run a route, I understand my surroundings and city more and more, and couldn't be more excited and sad to know that I'm leaving this place in a year's time. 作者: pp_dream 时间: 2017-4-26 05:39
Read Cassandra’s essay in full
In our house, English is not English. Not in the phonetic sense, like short a is for apple, but rather in the pronunciation – in our house, snake is snack. Words do not roll off our tongues correctly – yet I, who was pulled out of class to meet with language specialists, and my mother from Malaysia, who pronounces film as flim, understand each other perfectly.
In our house, there is no difference between cast and cash, which was why at a church retreat, people made fun of me for “cashing out demons.” I did not realize the glaring difference between the two Englishes until my teacher corrected my pronunciations of hammock, ladle, and siphon. Classmates laughed because I pronounce accept as except, success as sussess. I was in the Creative Writing conservatory, and yet words failed me when I needed them most.
Suddenly, understanding flower is flour wasn’t enough. I rejected the English that had never seemed broken before, a language that had raised me and taught me everything I knew. Everybody else’s parents spoke with accents smarting of Ph.D.s and university teaching positions. So why couldn’t mine?
My mother spread her sunbaked hands and said, “This is where I came from,” spinning a tale with the English she had taught herself.
When my mother moved from her village to a town in Malaysia, she had to learn a brand new language in middle school: English. In a time when humiliation was encouraged, my mother was defenseless against the cruel words spewing from the teacher, who criticized her paper in front of the class. When she began to cry, the class president stood up and said, “That’s enough.”
“Be like that class president,” my mother said with tears in her eyes. The class president took her under her wing and patiently mended my mother’s strands of language. “She stood up for the weak and used her words to fight back.”
We were both crying now. My mother asked me to teach her proper English so old white ladies at Target wouldn’t laugh at her pronunciation. It has not been easy. There is a measure of guilt when I sew her letters together. Long vowels, double consonants — I am still learning myself. Sometimes I let the brokenness slide to spare her pride but perhaps I have hurt her more to spare mine.
As my mother’s vocabulary began to grow, I mended my own English. Through performing poetry in front of 3000 at my school’s Season Finale event, interviewing people from all walks of life, and writing stories for the stage, I stand against ignorance and become a voice for the homeless, the refugees, the ignored. With my words I fight against jeers pelted at an old Asian street performer on a New York subway. My mother’s eyes are reflected in underprivileged ESL children who have so many stories to tell but do not know how. I fill them with words as they take needle and thread to make a tapestry.
In our house, there is beauty in the way we speak to each other. In our house, language is not broken but rather bursting with emotion. We have built a house out of words. There are friendly snakes in the cupboard and snacks in the tank. It is a crooked house. It is a little messy. But this is where we have made our home. 作者: pp_dream 时间: 2017-4-26 05:45
Princeton Day School is pleased to post the matriculation list for the Class of 2017. In announcing this news, Director of College Counseling Sarah Graham remarked: “The Class of 2017 represents a group of spirited, unique, and talented individuals who have taken full advantage of the resources available to them at Princeton Day School. As they enter this next chapter of their lives, they will be enrolling at some of the most highly selective schools in the country. There, they will continue to build on the success that they have achieved at PDS as they study a diverse range of disciplines, including engineering, arts and sciences, theater, architecture, and film. This matriculation list represents thoughtful consideration, deep self-reflection, and focused research. We wish our graduating seniors well and know that they are well-prepared to dive into college life and make a difference in their campus communities, just as they have done in ours.”
American University
Bard College (2)
Barnard College
Boston University (3)
Bowdoin College (2)
University of California, Santa Cruz
Case Western Reserve University
University of Chicago (2)
Connecticut College
Cornell University
Dartmouth College (2)
Drexel University
Duke University (2)
Elon University
Fairleigh Dickinson University
Fordham University
Franklin & Marshall College (2)
The George Washington University
Georgetown University
Gettysburg College (2)
Hamilton College
Howard University (2)
Indiana University at Bloomington
Ithaca College (2)
Jacksonville University
Jewish Theological Seminary of America
Johns Hopkins University (2)
Kean University
King's College London
Lafayette College (2)
Lehigh University (2)
Liberty University
McGill University
University of Miami
University of Michigan (2)
Middlebury College (2)
New Jersey Institute of Technology
The College of New Jersey (4)
New York University (3)
Northeastern University
University of Notre Dame
Pennsylvania State University (2)
University of Pennsylvania
Princeton University (4)
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Rhodes College
University of Richmond
Rochester Institute of Technology
University of Rochester
Rutgers University-New Brunswick (2)
Skidmore College
University of Southern California (2)
Stanford University
Stevens Institute of Technology
Susquehanna University
Syracuse University
University of Toronto
Tufts University (2)
Villanova University (2)
Wake Forest University
Washington and Lee University
Washington University in St. Louis
Wesleyan University
University of Wisconsin, Madison
Yale University (3) 作者: pp_dream 时间: 2017-5-29 21:50 标题: ZZ The Lawrenceville School 2017毕业班数据总结