My Common Application Personal Essay
I was raised outdoors, with a creative freedom many children don’t have the opportunity to explore. I attended “The Living School”, where my main curriculum was gardening with my schoolmates. I was allowed to create and think in unique ways, and every point of view was accepted. Though this was incredible, at age 8, I decided I needed to begin attending ‘real’ school. This is when I entered a very small all girls’ school.
At my new school, I took art classes with the rest of my grade. These art classes continued through my time there, ending in eighth grade. I knew from an early age that painting, drawing, and sculpture didn’t come easily to me. I struggled in class with shadow and perspective. Outside of class, I began to play with my new phone camera to create photos, and eventually with my first real DSLR camera. I began to take photos constantly. Often, I would gather my friends, put together a wardrobe, and convince my dad to drive us out to remote Texas towns to shoot for hours. I saved up the money I made babysitting and selling handmade greeting cards to buy a new lens. I never struggled with my photography, it came to me more naturally than anything else had in my short life.
At the end of my time at the Girls’ School, I began to feel very isolated. It was a small school, with few people, and little difference in styles and opinions. In my art classes, I felt misunderstood, and misplaced. “Photography is NOT art,” my teacher had told us many times, when I had asked if we could include photos in our submissions to contests, and in our curriculum. “Anyone can take a photo, art requires talent,” she had said.
I struggled with this idea for many years, as I developed my creativity. In my childhood, I had easily been able to create and share my ideas with the world, but as I entered my awkward pre-teen years, I realized I had found my art, my means of communication with the world, and that it was not accepted by those around me. Though I was told by the teacher who was hired to foster creativity that I wasn’t talented, I continued to do what came naturally to me, and brought me so much joy - taking photographs.
As I made a third drastic transition, the one from a very small private school with little diversity, to a large public high school, I knew without a doubt that photography was one of the most important parts of my life, and that it was the way in which I could best express myself. I still questioned whether or not what I did was considered a ‘talent’. In many ways, I felt like the lack of support at the Girls’ School challenged me to do more, to do better, but at the same time, I still kept the thought in the back of my mind that my art was not equal in magnificence to those who painted or created other works of fine art. But as high school continued, I began to meet people who were genuinely moved by my work, or who felt that it communicated something important to them. I got the opportunity to hang my work in shows, to shoot parties and anniversaries. The photos I produced for the people who hired me made them happy. This is when I finally began to fully realize that the challenge of being told that what I created was not enough, had in the end, pushed me to create even better things, to prove to myself that what I did was important. And because of this, I am so grateful to my teacher who didn’t believe in me - because it has taught me that all I need to truly succeed is belief in myself.
At my new school, I took art classes with the rest of my grade. These art classes continued through my time there, ending in eighth grade. I knew from an early age that painting, drawing, and sculpture didn’t come easily to me. I struggled in class with shadow and perspective. Outside of class, I began to play with my new phone camera to create photos, and eventually with my first real DSLR camera. I began to take photos constantly. Often, I would gather my friends, put together a wardrobe, and convince my dad to drive us out to remote Texas towns to shoot for hours. I saved up the money I made babysitting and selling handmade greeting cards to buy a new lens. I never struggled with my photography, it came to me more naturally than anything else had in my short life.
At the end of my time at the Girls’ School, I began to feel very isolated. It was a small school, with few people, and little difference in styles and opinions. In my art classes, I felt misunderstood, and misplaced. “Photography is NOT art,” my teacher had told us many times, when I had asked if we could include photos in our submissions to contests, and in our curriculum. “Anyone can take a photo, art requires talent,” she had said.
I struggled with this idea for many years, as I developed my creativity. In my childhood, I had easily been able to create and share my ideas with the world, but as I entered my awkward pre-teen years, I realized I had found my art, my means of communication with the world, and that it was not accepted by those around me. Though I was told by the teacher who was hired to foster creativity that I wasn’t talented, I continued to do what came naturally to me, and brought me so much joy - taking photographs.
As I made a third drastic transition, the one from a very small private school with little diversity, to a large public high school, I knew without a doubt that photography was one of the most important parts of my life, and that it was the way in which I could best express myself. I still questioned whether or not what I did was considered a ‘talent’. In many ways, I felt like the lack of support at the Girls’ School challenged me to do more, to do better, but at the same time, I still kept the thought in the back of my mind that my art was not equal in magnificence to those who painted or created other works of fine art. But as high school continued, I began to meet people who were genuinely moved by my work, or who felt that it communicated something important to them. I got the opportunity to hang my work in shows, to shoot parties and anniversaries. The photos I produced for the people who hired me made them happy. This is when I finally began to fully realize that the challenge of being told that what I created was not enough, had in the end, pushed me to create even better things, to prove to myself that what I did was important. And because of this, I am so grateful to my teacher who didn’t believe in me - because it has taught me that all I need to truly succeed is belief in myself.