Margot is on her way to studying engineering at a top university, where she’ll learn how to make video games for social good.
Summary
Problem: Despite Margot’s strong grades and extracurricular activities, she didn’t know how to begin tackling her college essays. Armed with passion, drive, and a variety of experiences, Margot had a lot to write about, but she didn’t know which topics to choose and how to discuss them.
Solution: Margot enrolled in our college application boot camp. We extensively brainstormed ideas with her, allowing her to extrapolate prior personal experiences, connect those experiences to her ambitions, and compose strong essays. Margot also learned how to write using self-exposition and frame her lessons learned and personal themes as the true subject of the essays.
Result: Despite the usual college application anxiety, Margot wrote an incredible college application and essays. She earned acceptances to top schools, including Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and NYU.
Lessons Learned: Our boot camp eases anxiety and helps students get comfortable during an intense time. We not only teach and guide students, but are also there for them every step of the way.
The Full Story
Margot’s mother, Anissa, contacted Transizion in the fall of 2017 after learning about the boot camp through a friend.
She wanted to help address Margot’s anxiety about the college application process.
- Margot wasn’t just a smart kid with a good head on her shoulders – she knew how to write a strong explanatory essay that detailed her experiences in computer programming and volunteering overseas.
We knew Margot could succeed.
High school students have intriguing perspectives and experiences, so the goal is to expose them to questions and brainstorming exercises that relate to values, personal themes, and ambitions.
- We specialize in engaging students with clear college essay concepts that they can also use for any writing project. We teach writing values, not just rules.
There are plenty of students with good grades and extracurricular activities, but what matters is how each student translates this experience to stand out from everyone else.
- Admissions committees look for students who are greater than the sum of his or her parts.
- During the boot camp, we heard incredible stories about Margot’s life and the lessons she learned from her struggles.
We taught her how to attack multiple essay prompts, divulge the right amount of personal information, and describe herself as interesting and unique.
The key was to use her experiences in volunteering and passion for computer science as a conduit to explain her values and goals.
For example, Margot spent a summer as a developer for the organization Girls Who Code.
- During the program, she created an app that connected restaurants, coffee shops, and bakeries to food pantries so that they could donate their excess food.
This experience helped Margot realize she wanted to use her coding skills for social good.
- We encouraged her to explain this in her college essays as she wanted to study in an excellent computer science program to learn the best skills.
As we discussed her goals and ambitions, Margot talked at length about a service trip to Guatemala City, during which she worked with women entrepreneurs providing for their families.
Here, we arrived at the core of Margot’s passion – using her computer science skills to build infrastructure for international communities.
- Developing her computer science skills in college would enable her to study abroad and use her fluency in Spanish to develop infrastructure projects for villages in Central and South America.
Our boot camp exercises revealed this portion of Margot’s life.
- Step-by-step, she learned to break down her experiences and write about them with precision and clarity.
Margot used our guidance to apply to some of the top schools in the country – and it paid off! She received acceptances to top schools including Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and NYU.
Margot plans to further enhance her coding skills to build video games for social good.
She wants to return to Guatemala and build internet infrastructure for communities there.
She’s well on her way to owning her own video game company one day and becoming a power player in her industry.
Remember us when you make it big, Margot!
