USC personal statement - Essay Example

USC personal ment According to Newton's First Law of Motion, an object in motion tends to stay in motion in the same direction unless an external force acts upon it. This theory can be applied to illustrate my real life experience. Before I came to the United States, I lived in Hong Kong. There I studied in the high school, getting my compulsory high school education. At those times, attending school was nothing more than my daily routine. I did not pay any attention to what was going on in the classroom.

Sometimes I even slept during the lectures, or entertained myself playing with my classmates. Now I see that I was lazy and immature, I didn't have any educational and professional goals. I just did not understand the main purposes of attending school. As a result I did not manage to pass the public high school exam, and thus could not advance to the upper level. This fact was one of the main motivations for my parents to move to the U.S, as they wanted me and my siblings have a better academic environment, to get decent education.

Since then, my parents' dedication and the new environment of learning have changed the direction of my life dramatically. The first thing I understood after moving to the U.S was the extent, to which my parents loved me, and cared about me, and the extent to which their decisions influenced me. Before I moved to the USA, I always thought that my parent did not care about me. They were always busy with their work. When we moved to the United States, all the misunderstandings were finally dispelled; I realized that my parents sacrificed a lot for me.

Since they wanted me to get good education, and built a decent career, they decided to immigrate to the United States, even though they knew it would be very difficult for them to adapt to the new environment because of their poor English, their age etc. Besides, by immigrating to the United States, they also took a big risk investing huge capitals to develop a new business in an unfamiliar place, giving up business opportunities in Hong Kong. In addition, my mother needed to stay in Hong Kong all alone to manage her company.

After I analyzed these factors, I understood how much they sacrificed to provide us better learning opportunities, and career perspectives. Therefore, I did not want to disappoint them; it became motivating force for me that helped to constantly improve my academic skills and personal qualities. The process of adapting to the new environment in the United States was another external force that influenced me positively. Adapting to a new environment was not easy for me. When I lived in Hong Kong I did not pay attention to my English, and afterwards it became the biggest obstacle for me to adapt to the American culture.

When moved here, I failed the English placement test in Mt. San Antonio College, which was the requirement to enroll in this school. Therefore, I joined a learning institution called CPELI in Cal Poly Pomona State University. CPELI was an ESL program that specialized to help the English learners not only to improve their English skill, but also to establish social ties with other classmates. Through that program I made a lot of new friends from different countries. I saw the amount of effort they put to improve their English, and I found out that almost all of them shared the goal to enter prestigious colleges.

When I compared myself with them, I understood that we had a huge gap in skills and aspiration. In order not to fall behind, I put in a lot of effort to catch up with them. During that period, besides attending school, I spend most of my time in library and did a lot of extra reading. I also decided I wanted to enter a good university, like University of Southern California. By the time I graduated from the program; my English had improved a lot, and I even passed the placement test in the MT.

San Antonio College. I was happy that I joined CPELI. It was an important step that helped me build up my confidence to adapt to the new environment, and also, which is even more important, helped me set my academic goals. Now I understand how valuable for me was the opportunity of changing my settlement Lots of other people do not have such an opportunity, so I have to value what I have, and let the people who are around me, especially my parents, know that I would not disappoint them, and would do well in my education.

I hope that University of Southern California will give me the opportunity to achieve my academic goals.