Extracurricular activities/skills – putting your best self forward

An important part of writing university essays or even when starting to think about which university to apply to, is being aware of what YOU have to offer. Think of it as a contract: the university wants you to fulfil the role of a student, to advance the university’s reputation in some way. No university wants to have only “rich brats”: if not for the reputation, the rich brats go elsewhere. So keep in mind that however little money you have, your skill matters. This article is about how to be more aware of your skills and how to talk about them.

First of all, skills can occur in different spheres of your life. Do not make the mistake of dismissing those which are non-academic! The true skills that you acquire are cross-disciplinary. An easy example is making a budget: if you actually understand the principles behind, then the financial aspect of your education and career become easier for you. A student that shows awareness of financial dilemma both in terms of studies and in terms of career choice in her university essays has shown that she has put much more thought in what she wants, than a student who just talks about how she won her swimming competition and wants to be a future swimmer.

List-taking helps. Methods that I have tried includes filling in a weekly planner to see what activities I do without thinking twice about them (spending time with family and friends for instance). You can also just come up with a blank excel sheet and start jotting down your activities that you think gave you skills which are important to you. What is more important is for you to notice the less-apparent activities. I personally notice that I devote a lot of time talking to my brothers and explaining concepts to them: it is a strength of mine that I am able to simplify very complex concepts to students that are 5,10 years younger than me. Specifically, I introduced electric circuits to my brother when he was 9 and he was able to build whole circuits by himself with resistors, switches, motors, lamps, and so on. My other brother, I guided him towards programming to develop his analytical skills at age 13 or 14 and towards philosophy at age 15. If I had known how valuable that skill is, I would have prioritised it in my university essays. Do not make the mistake of undermining the small things.

Ask the people around you what they think you like doing and what they think you are good at. You will notice that people think of you differently than you do; what you may take for granted, they tend to be more aware of. Do NOT try to justify what they say: accept it completely and ask yourself how you developed that skill. At the very least, think about whether other people would say the same thing. Now, list down these skills. Is there more to them than what other people perceive? How did you develop them? What impact does it have on your life with others? What impact do YOU want it to have on others? If it impacted your surroundings enough that they noticed, chances are that you can repeat this impact in your university life. Capitalize on it.

These are just two methods that I find useful. The general principle is this: “look inwards and look outwards”. Find the methods that allow you to look at yourself and discover yourself deeper, and also the methods that become manifest to others. There is a correlation between the two, but the best you can do is to make use of both. Nobody is perfect, you always need someone or something to remind you of what you yourself cannot yourself see!

A brief guide to the US university system and application

15 sec summary of post

intro- aimed for who, what you expect to learn
in choronological order

  • Education system
  • Curriculum structure
  • Flexibility
  • Financial aid
  • Application requirements
  • Applying

Conclusion

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For those of you thinking of applying to the US, read on. This article is meant to explain a traditional US university (or college*) curriculum and application. After reading it, you should have a global idea of the structure, pros and cons of applying to the US. Keep in mind, however, that a US degree is highly customizable and what you get out of it is what you make of it.

*For convenience sake, I will be using the term ‘university’ throughout the first half of the article. You will find more details on the difference between university and college in the paragraph about applying

The first thing you want is to have a broad idea of the US education system. Unlike other countries — UK, Australia, even Canada for the most part —, US universities proud themselves on their liberal arts education. What does this mean? A typical curriculum will consist of courses across diverse departments, ranging from natural sciences, literary, economics and humanities. In addition, most universities will not require you to declare your main field of study (or major) up until your second (sophomore) or sometimes third year (junior). This leaves you free to investigate your interests, hence the ‘liberal’ system. An important feature to remember is that a typical well-balanced degree ought to take you 4 years to complete. It may be more or less (unlikely to be less) depending on your course load.

Your actual curriculum will be more complex than that though. To simplify things, imagine that you have 3 distinct parts: a core, a major and electives. The core is a compulsory set of courses from different departments, which aims at improving your reading, writing, numeracy, public speaking, …, anything related to general professional skills.

Your major, as mentioned before, is your main field of study. This may (or may not) determine your career choice but it will result in you graduating with a degree in that subject. Your electives are every other courses that you choose to partake in. Most students use them to investigate other fields of interest or to add to their studies, another major or a minor. The latter is a lighter version of a major, whereby if your major requires, say 40 courses, for graduation purposes your minor would require only about 20 of those.

One important feature that results from such a liberal system is the flexibility in designing your curriculum. It is fairly easy to switch your major in most universities. You also have a fair amount of leniency on your course load per semester, provided you enroll in enough to be considered a full-time student and do not exceed the limit set by the school. There are many implications in this: you can budget so as to enroll in more courses in one given year over the next (helpful if you have siblings going to university before or after you), you can manage your graduation date to graduate earlier or later and you can plan internships during your studies**. Restrictions may occur depending on the conditions of your study permit***.

**Regarding internships, each university will have different policies

***For more details, contact a local EducationUSA branch. EducationUSA is a subsection of the US government
and is commonly based in US embassies.

As an international student, one of my foremost concerns has been financing my studies. The US, like most other countries, restrict the tuition cost for residents (domestic fee). On the other hand, institutions are free to charge international students a much higher fee. Generally, you pay per semester credit hour**** at the start of each semester or one semester ahead. Private institutions have the highest fees but also generally offer the most generous scholarships and financial aid.

****A semester credit hour (or course/academic credit) is a unit of measure. To give you a brief idea of what this means, a course with 1 semester credit hour would generally consist of a weekly 1 hour lecture class (contact hour) and 2 hours of individual or group assignment.

Scholarships, in turn are divided into sports — you will be training for and representing the school in professional (varsity) sports — and academic or merit-based ones (based on academic promise*****). Financial aid is about your financial position and how much you need to be able to afford university. Generally, only private institutions provide financial aid and they require a separate application for it.

*****This is evaluated using grades but also academic context – whether you challenged yourself and chose an appropriate curriculum, your class rank and so on.

On the subject of applications, you will come across a wide range of terminology. We shall start with application requirements. Most universities will expect you to take the SAT Reasoning Test (registration on CollegeBoard website). A few will require SAT subjects as well. In addition to this, you will most probably need to send teacher and counselor recommendations, your high school (Mauritian Form 4 to Upper 6) transcript (to be sent by your rector/school counsellor)and proof of English proficiency. The latter can be skipped by having your school counsellor send a letter of attestation regarding your attendance in an English-medium school. A summary of your extra-curricular involvement will most often be needed as well. Some universities require a certificate of finance (a legal document whereby you disclose financial resources) with other application documents. The financial aid application is a separate application. Some universities have their own form, but most will accept the CSS Profile (registration on the CollegeBoard website too). International students do not fill the FAFSA, another financial aid application form.

You will be sending the general application before the financial aid application, for the majority of universities. General applications are done either via the university’s website, the CommonApp website or the Coalition Application. These applications tend to be lengthy and may require essays about general topics and/or the university itself. The CommonApp allows you to add your recommenders and counselor by inputting their contact details. They will receive an email and will be able to upload your documents through a portal. Note that recommenders may also be community leaders, peers or any person who knows you thoroughly. Check the university’s website for their preference.

This article should have given you a general idea about US universities and their applications. To find out more about any piece of information, you can run a quick Google search or leave me a message. The most reliable source of information remains the university’s website though, so make sure to research it thoroughly.

Photo credit: Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay, Image by Adam Derewecki from Pixabay

Coping with school

Sometimes, you feel in control of everything. Sometimes, nothing seems to work right. The majority of students do not (cannot) work at the same pace as school teachers. This is a reality that everyone faces at one time or the other, even the very best. Of course, what changes is when they actually experience it. The best only feel it at the very top, which may be at the university undergrad, grad or even professional level.

So how do you cope with a system that does not fit your internal pace?

The answer is quite simple to say but difficult to apply in practice: adapt.

If note taking does not help you learn the content, then figure out what does. Maybe just listening to the teacher is much more effective. If that is so, ask the teacher permission to do audio recording. In class, listen and make sure you understand. At home, listen to the recording again and jot down the notes you will need for revision.

If your school teacher does not cover the learning material well, go for a private tuition teacher. Now, a common mistake is to rush to the “elite” teachers, those who “produce” laureates. One thing you need to keep in mind is that these teachers produce laureates because of the rigor of their tuition and (most usually) fast pace they use. If you can’t keep up at school, there are chances you will not be able to cope with tuition too. Solution: try out several tuition teachers and then settle for the one whose teaching you understand best.

If you feel that you understand the content at school completely, but still have issues with past exam papers and practice questions, then you have two options. The first is to go to your school/tuition teacher and ask them if they would correct your work if you did extra. Then, you would just increase the amount of homework you do (find other textbooks, online sources, older past papers, etc). The second option would be to work past papers alongside the marking scheme. Do questions by questions. Don’t worry about how time you take; you should be instead focusing on understanding the answers in the marking scheme. Do this for several past papers until you feel confident that you understand the answers.

If you understand everything and are good at past papers but have exam stress, then you need to understand one thing. Everybody feels stressed at one point in life. It’s inevitable. What you can do, however, is manage the stress. Maybe try meditation. Maybe play tennis just before your exams (that’s what I did anyway). Do something that will relax you. Most importantly still, believe in yourself. If you have done your revision well and practiced enough, then you will know your level. Believe in yourself.

Navigating the maze of Canadian university applications

15 sec summary of post

intro- contrast with other countries’ university application

  1. The geography of Canada and how it affects applications
  2. Strategy for searching
  3. Scholarship search through external website
  4. Using Excel
  5. Using Excel – extended
  6. Main things to look for on university websites

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A few days ago, I was on a call with a student explaining the Canadian university application system (or rather systems). Truthfully, the amount of information available online is almost negligible compared to the incredible amount of information available for US applications. Why? There is not one Canadian application software for all Canadian universities: most universities use their own application software which you can access through their respective website. (Exception be for a few provinces, the main one being Ontario where students apply through the OUAC). 

For those who already got lost, some geography then. Canada is divided into provinces (think of it as Mauritian districts). Each province has its own system of governance and operates rather autonomously. Quebec more so than the others. This affects applications in 2 main ways: universities in some provinces tend to collaborate internally while others just don’t. That’s how the OUAC happened: Ontario-based universities (Ontario is a province) “teamed up” and agreed to process applications on a single software. However, this is not common in Canada. Most don’t team up and have their own software. 

The solution is NOT to go through every single Canadian university website (an option that appealed to me when applying to the US). No no, that is not worth your effort and time. Rather, you should really define your priorities: scholarship is a common one, and so is degree of interest, and location. You may also have other priorities. These should dictate how you go about the search. For the sake of this guide, I will consider “scholarship” to be the main priority.

Looking for universities through scholarship search

Although the most accurate source of scholarship information is the awarding body, you can use a quick Google search on “scholarships for xx degree in Canada” and find an external website initially. This might be better if you have 0 idea of where to start, since, even if the list of scholarships is outdated, you will still get a sense of where you can get a scholarship.

  1. While checking a few websites, compile in an Excel a list of universities that seem to offer scholarships.
  2. Once you have an initial list (consider having 20+ at this stage), figure out a list of financial considerations that are important to you. These could be tuition costs (course fees), living expenses, amount of scholarship possible, amount of scholarship reasonably obtained, and similar type of information.
  3. Start labelling the columns on Excel with these considerations.
  4. Check out this picture for an idea of how I personally did it (note that the data is outdated by now):

Next is really simple to say but very time-consuming in practice. Go to these universities’ website and start filling in the Excel. You will notice that your list will become shorter: that’s to be expected since some universities may not offer considerable scholarships.

Other considerations when applying

The 3 basic things to look for on a university website are: the program/degree that you are interested in, the admission process, and the financial aspect of going to that university. When you start noticing these things, you will see that you have many more questions. For example, what is a faculty, a department and a major and what are the differences? There, I’ll give you this one as homework. If you don’t figure it out, let me know and I’ll share it with you!

Balancing University Search and an Academic Life

15 sec summary of post

intro- aim in life. what motivated me
in choronological order

  1. form 5, interest forms
  2. lower 6, clear idea of US as destination 3. lower 6, my school subjects
  3. lower 6, exams and tests
  4. lower 6, criteria list for university search 6. upper 6, application procedures
  5. upper 6, refining university list for US
  6. upper 6, school work

concl – offers (rejections too). base for next essay on choosing a uni.

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My aim is to succeed in life, a long-term goal that involves excelling in my academic, professional and social life. All three do not have equal priority though. That is why those who know me well would describe me neither as a die-hard nerd nor as a perpetually partying person. Rather, I strive to maximise future returns. This is what characterized my university search and how I managed my academic life.

My university search began very early on, around my Form 5 (high school sophomore) years. I had a clear vision about the best academic pathway to take to reach success: an engineering formation, which would refine my problem-solving and planning skills while testing my quantitative and analytical abilities. With this academic baggage, I hoped to enter the workforce a well-learned individual. This proved to be the first criteria in my university search. To cater for inter-personal development and professional outreach, I would later add ‘campus life’ and ‘career prospects’ in my list of criteria.

Now determined to make it into the engineering field, I set to investigating my idea of the perfect destination: the United States of America. Using university ranking websites, I started noting down the highest ranked universities and visiting their websites. Some requirements were recurrent: SAT Reasoning Test, English proficiency proof,a high school transcript* and a list of extra-curricular activities. So, I resolved to make these my current priorities.

*At my school, QEC, this includes Form 4 final exams, Mock Form 5, Lower 6 final exams and Mock Upper 6 results

This set the foundation of my Lower 6 (junior) year. I opted for a science curriculum at school, one which allowed me to focus primarily on subjects I would continuously be doing at university level. I chose Mathematics, Chemistry and Physics as my main subjects, and French as subsidiary one**. Most engineering degrees required very high academic standings in scientific subjects; I started targeting grades AAA. Highly aware of the need of a broad understanding of the world in the professional realm, I made it a must to also excel in my General Paper (GP) class. I valued my French classes much less, using it mostly as a way to enhance my skills in passage-reading , essay analysis and synthesis.

**I had several reasons not to choose Biology as subsidiary subject: few engineering degrees (with the exception of biomedical, biochemical and every other bio-engineering) involve courses in biology, I had no strong interest in the subject and I found it needlessly time and energy-consuming to study it for 2 years.

During that year, I sat for my SAT Reasoning and Subject tests, IELTS***, the Australian Mathematics Competition (AMC) and my Lower 6 final exams****. For the latter, I didn’t set aside time to revise. Rather I would prepare my own notes and rapidly refer to them while working past papers. That way I would learn topics on the go. It was very time-efficient and allowed me to concentrate on university search. The other exams required far less preparation; I would work on them alongside school work. All these papers were relatively easy in terms of curriculum content but they harshly tested one’s speed. So, with the exception of the AMC, I set a goal to finish the papers in the prescribed time. Once that was attained, I spaced the time period in between such work, until exams arrived.

***One of the tests used as proof of English proficiency. Other proofs include GCE O level English (select universities only) and TOEFL.

****SAT Reasoning Test May 2016 (1530), SAT Physics (790), SAT Math Lvl 2 (730), IELTS (band 8.5), AMC (99th percentile, Higher Distinction) and Lower 6 final exams (AAAaa and first prize in Physics).

Meanwhile, my university search was progressing. I had a provisional list of universities, consisting of high-ranked ones as well as some less selective ones. My initial criteria had evolved: I broadened the degree requirement to include BSc in Maths as an alternate choice, started researching professional opportunities while studying and degree accreditation and added ‘finance’ as a major criterion. Roughly speaking, I was looking for a medium to large university which offered accredited BEng or BSc in Maths, work-study options and a decent campus life, was affordable and whose graduates had good career prospects. These criteria are very broad and many universities fit into my list (I had easily about 50 universities in there).

By all accounts, Lower 6 was a good year for me. The same cannot be said about Upper 6 (senior). Good time management became critical then. US applications through the CommonApp open around August and I was intent on getting as much as possible done prior to my final A level exams. I distinctly remember asking my teachers for recommendations before my second term, asking for them to be completed before mock exams. As soon as my mock results were out, I asked for my forecast and submitted forms regarding my extra- curricular activities to the school’s administrative office, to be processed by my rector (acting as school counselor).

By that time, my list had been significantly narrowed and I started working on university- specific requirements. Two affordable conditional offers (BEng) from academically-rigorous universities in Canada made me cut off the least appealing US universities, leaving me with mostly Ivy Leagues and highly-interesting universities. The largest workload consisted of the university-specific essays. Writing came easily but not the process of self-editing and getting teachers and peers to review the essay.

Juggling between school work and these — mostly — self-descriptive essays proved more challenging than I had anticipated. To maintain my Lower 6 results, I realized that I would need to keep up regular work. My teachers and friends can testify to the huge amount of past papers I worked. For Maths, Chemistry, French and General Paper, I found that working CIE A level past papers were sufficient in ensuring the maximum grade. For Physics though, the subject which would be most present in my university curriculum, I started investigating other examination boards’ past papers, namely OCR, IB and Pre-U. These helped tremendously in a firm understanding of the subject and an ability to apply my knowledge to diverse situations.

This leads to the end of this first article about how I balanced my university search (and prep) and my academic life. It is long and quite explicit but it does not convey the whole breadth of my experience. If there are any aspects that you want more elaborations on, feel free to leave me a message. I will either respond personally or address it in a future article.

Image credit: Image by StockSnap from Pixabay, Image by Larisa Koshkina from Pixabay

Getting Better at Essays (University and Academic)

The secret to writing powerful essays

Disclaimer: this post was originally written in 2017, a year after the author’s HSC. Since then, the author has further developed her essay writing skills. Her last advice, on top of the below, is to check out the book Step-by-Step GP Essays: its content reaches much further than GP and will help with writing essays for university applications too.

I never thought of myself as exceptionally gifted at the art of writing. My academic grades for sure did not reflect it. I sometimes still wonder who the idiot who corrected my General Paper essay was. One thing I can say though, is that I worked hard to improve my writing skills, both for academic purposes and university applications.

I cannot stress this enough: make the most of the resources your teachers offer you. Whether it be school or tuition teachers, those mentors tend to have access to learning materials you would not typically come across on your own. Case in point, my school GP teacher sent me a Cambridge report on length of essays and my tuition one, Example of Candidates’ Response to 2012 GP papers. Your teachers input can often amount to a lot as well. Even if you disagree with their teaching or correction techniques, it almost always helps to know how your essay appears to someone else. In this way, you may be able to identify unclear points and recognize your essays’ strengths.

You should however aim at investigating other learning options too. University websites have been a great help to me, in tailoring my essays to admission committees’ expectations. Off the top of my head, you can use the following resources: University of Reading’s guide to personal statements, an MIT blogger’s guide to essay writing and NYU’s personal statement recommendations (for “Why this uni and why this degree” questions). One important thing to remember is that university essays tend to revolve around you. For you to be able to write convincingly about yourself, you need a fair amount of introspection. You need to be able to assess your strengths and weaknesses and give an objective statement. If you haven’t noticed already, university essays and GP assignments have many similarities.

The best way to improve remains to practice. You should not focus solely on practicing your writing though; brainstorming and presentation are also important aspects to consider. You may present one idea in several different ways, but one may have more impact on the reader than another. Your duty? To recognize the different styles of writing and sharpening your skills so as to most effectively convey your inner voice. I, for one, wrote at least 1 essay per week in my final school year (GP and French). By the end of second term, I would be consistently writing 2 essays and started on my university essays in parallel.

What really tied everything together for me was US application essays. I remember sitting alone in a classroom, writing about “What is square one and can we go back to it?”. When you are stuck with such broad questions, you start digging deep for inspiration. Provided you do not copy off someone else’s work or idea, you will find yourself investigating your passions and screening through your ideas. Many of them might seem uninteresting at first but the more you work at it, the easier ideas will come and the clearer they will be. It is important to understand the long-term fruits of hard work as you will most probably not see immediate improvements.

To conclude, I would like to share a few words of encouragement to all those of you who have read this article with the aim of getting better at essay writing. As students, you ought to take chances with style and presentation of ideas. Do not be scared of failure as it gives valuable lessons as to the “don’t”s of essay writing. With ample experience, writing essays for exams and university applications becomes easy.