college essay

Prompt - Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

Essay - Most people today use their computers and the internet for communication, entertainment, education, or work. I use them to shape the world of my dreams, one step at a time. The web isn’t just a resource or tool to me; it’s a universe of possibilities and a haven for learning anything I desire. I’ve spent most of my life in the California Bay Area and (city), India, which are both home to thousands of tech companies. Where I grew up, along with my early access to technology, shaped my life and who I am today.

My parents allowed me to use the family laptop at a very young age. They showed me the ropes and gave me a glimpse of what a computer could do. Eventually, they set a few ground rules and let me use the computer unsupervised. As a 6-year-old, I couldn’t do much more than fiddle with the default Windows apps, but I soon figured out how to use the browser to google and watch the PBS Kids episodes I’d missed on TV. The laptop intrigued me, and I'd often watch my dad work on it. Seeing my interest, he introduced me to Scratch, a block-based coding platform for kids. I used the internet to learn all that I could about it, and slowly wrapped my head around "thinking in code." At the age of 11, I taught myself web development, and from there, nothing could stop me from making my ideas come to life. I’d build games, mini-utilities—anything my heart desired. I loved programming not because of the code but because of how it let me express myself and build solutions to real problems. To me, the rush from the actual problem-solving process was just a nice bonus.

This leads me to the pandemic, where my friends and I often used to play the sandbox-game Minecraft. The game was having a huge resurgence in 2020, and that encouraged us to build an online network in the game just for players like us. I used all the programming and computer skills I’d learnt by then to fully utilize the game's infinite customizability with custom-coded plugins and modifications, which let me build a truly novel gameplay experience. This was also my first experience where my work directly impacted other people. For the first time in my life, I felt like my niche computer skills actually had value, and this made me fall in love with the idea of running a tech/internet company. All of this led to the founding of (company), a hosting company aimed at giving users around the world access to performant hardware kitted out with the latest-and-greatest software, enabling people to host their projects at a nominal cost. I loved every aspect of working on it, including managing a development team, working with sponsors, planning advertising strategies and of course the raw programming too. The happiness I got from actually making a global impact was immeasurable, and all I could often think about was ways to further improve our service that could make our customers even happier. I spent 12+ hours every day on the project at its peak, but I have no regrets.

I learnt a lot from these experiences, about people, and about the world. All it took was a teenager, an idea, some JavaScript, and an old laptop to reach thousands of people. The sea of information on the internet could let me learn and achieve anything I wanted, whether related to computer science, business, or my other hobbies like math, engineering, filmmaking, or music, and I have it to thank for everything I've been able to achieve. Technology is rapidly evolving, for the better, and for the worse, and as I move on from high school, I want to be at the forefront of building a future where it’s used to benefit people’s lives in all the ways it possibly can.