Rice University Personal Statement

I am beyond proud to say that I attend one of the most prestigious universities in the United States. In high school, when I was hearing about how my fellow high-achieving high school classmates were getting rejected from Stanford and all of the Ivy League schools and the other top research universities and liberal arts colleges, I felt like I exhibited intrinsic characteristics that made me better than them. Because I was accepted into one of the country’s top universities, I felt as if I was simply smarter and more hardworking than they were. When I engaged in downward social comparison and compared my group (the superior “I-am-going-to-attend-a-top-college” group) to my peers (members of the inferior “I-am-going-to-attend-a-state-school”

By association, my self-esteem improved; I felt good about myself. As I strutted down the hallways of my high school, I felt a newfound sense of confidence knowing that I was capable of achieving a feat that my fellow classmates were not. I strongly desired to be known as “that girl going to THE Rice University” because I was now a member of a prestigious, high status group; I was going to attend a highly-selective university whose name could open the ears of other high-achievers and the doors of infinite opportunity. The reaction I received when the people that I looked up to, such as the teachers of my AP courses, learned that I was going to attend Rice University further reinforced this. I was met with astonishment and warm embraces; my peers who were planning to enroll in state universities were met with a simplistic, monotone

Although I would be attending one of the most academically-rigorous and resourceful universities in the nation, I would not be attending a school like Stanford or MIT or Harvard or Princeton, whose acceptance rates lie below ten percent and whose admittance I had craved and would have given an arm and a leg and a kidney for. I felt as if I was just not good enough to attend any of these schools; my so-called spectacular accomplishments were just average, and I was neither intelligent enough nor hardworking enough to be able to become a student at one of these institutions of higher learning. I simply did not have the mental endurance or stamina to attend a university like Stanford. While I knew I was good (I would be attending Rice, after all), I knew that there were people who were simply better than I was. And this hurt. My sleepless nights and countless social sacrifices during high school were apparently all for nothing. I would attempt to boost my self-esteem by focusing on the supposed negative aspects of this group. These students, unlike the students who were