Sunday, March 13, 2011

MIT Anna: "I Challenge You"

I know my blog week is over, and I know this isn't related to government or econ, but this is approaching the time of year when people get anxious over their admissions decisions and I find this post by Anna '14 from the MIT Admissions blog to be really good and quite appropriate, and I wanted to share.

[...] But I will venture to challenge every single one of you - those who are admitted, and those who are not - to concentrate on what you wanted out of your MIT experience. Hopefully, it was more than the chance to physically walk down a specific hallway, or take a specific class taught by a specific person. I trust that there were clubs you wanted to join, fields you wanted to explore, dreams you wanted to realize.

Whatever it is you wanted: hold onto it as tightly as you can. The hard part comes after pi day: in deciding what to do with these hopes and plans. I challenge you to bring them with you, wherever you end up: to resist abandoning them because you’ve been accepted and your life is complete, or because you’ve been rejected and your life is over. To make them happen, wherever you go.

You are guaranteed to meet hurdles and obstacles on the way to getting what you want out of college. Not because of where you are, but because of who you are, I challenge you to climb over them, dig through them, beat them down, and not allow yourself to be defined by the school you attend.

She has a good point and she speaks it well. Whether you're accepted or rejected from your top schools in the coming weeks, keep your aspirations with you.

Also of interest is the first comment, by Spencer '14 from U. Illinois:

Fellow commenters, what say you we post those dreams and plans here to make sure they're not forgotten after pi day?

I'll start: To have something of my design land on Mars.

I only wish I had a concrete, well-formed, long-term dream already. But I don't. So my dream for the next four years is to find something. Find a project I can immerse myself in completely, that I can either stick with or take something from that will stay with me for the rest of my life.

What are your hopes and dreams?

5 comments:

Dan Fu said...

That is an excellent hope Anthony, and I hope you do achieve it. My hope as I embark on this wonderful 4-6 year journey is to experience and immerse myself in the social and academic side of college and have fun1

Peter Zhan said...

Excellent and admirable goals, Dan and Anthony. My goal is twofold:

1) to start being able to see the world holistically, unifying and integrating all of the knowledge I have learned throughout my academic life to see the world in a more nuanced and dynamic way, and

2) to be able to use my knowledge to help save a life somewhere, somehow, sometime... either through medical research, volunteer work, or some other method... I believe that saving a life is tantamount to saving a world (or at least someone's world).

Bryce Balbon said...

I don't know how to follow Peter's amazing post, but im going to try anyway by sharing my future goals. I hope to make college one of the greatest experiences, not only through traveling the world, but by putting my mind in a position where it can absorb every valuable aspect that will develop me as a person. Seeing the world is of vital importance, and i hope others can do so one day as well.

Ariana Sacchi said...

This is such an amazing post! I loved it! :)

Alicia said...

I love this post! It's so heart-warming and uplifting... thanks, Anthony! I too, think this is great advice. I especially love the part where she encourages people to not let themselves be defined by the school they attend. We're so attracted to brand-name schools, to get in to ___ just so we can say we went there. But in my opinion, it's completely up to what you make of the time you spend at a school, rather than the name of that school. I just hope that I will make use of my time at college and discover what I want to do with my life. Basically, I just want to explore. I'm so excited to take classes that I love, but also to explore classes that end up being let downs. I want to join clubs and find out what my passions are, and go from there. And, of course, as Dan says, to have fun!
-Alice Bebbington