College essays that made a difference - Princeton Review 2010

Joseph A. Rago
The applicants

In high school, Joe was an editor of his high school newspaper and president of the Honor Society; he was also involved in independent scientific research.

Stats

SAT: 1470 (780 Critical Reading, 690 Math)

SAT Subject Test(s): 680 Math Level 1, 690 Math Level 2, 700 Chemistry

High School GPA: 3.90

High School: Falmouth High School, Falmouth, MA

Hometown: Falmouth, MA

Gender: Male

Race: Caucasian

Applied To

Brown University (early action)

Dartmouth College

Princeton University

Yale University

Essay

Joseph used the following essay in each of his applications.

Write on a topic of your choice.

At the last minute, I was snatched from the clutches a southern upbringing.

When I was quite young, my family moved from a small town in Northern Virginia to Falmouth, Massachusetts, a small town on Cape Cod. While it is impossible to empirically test my hypothesis, I have come to believe that this relocation has been one of the major influences in my life. College-bound students often write of the significant people or the important events in their life that have been formative in their intellectual development. In the same vein as these other factors, the flinty character of Cape Cod has shaped my personal growth and evolution.

Jutting thirty-five miles into the Atlantic, many parts of Cape Cod were isolated for years from mainland America. But this rustic area is the same one where some of the first Americans persevered in an uncertain world for the sake of principle. And though their Puritan faith is no longer the Cape’s dominant religion, its ethic of common sense and hard work, its demands for a life of independence and clarity, and its aesthetic of simplicity and harmony have genuinely affected the character of Cape Codders.

These attributes have sustained the region both through times of confidence and times of urgency. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, the golden whaling industry, the foundation for success, began to falter and decline. The Cape surrendered the easy reliability of prosperity and lapsed into a recession. But within a few years, a Cape Cod resident developed a method for extracting salt from seawater on a massive scale. By mid-century, the region was exporting 35,000 bushels of salt annually, and the economy rebounded. The Cape is a land where necessity is met by resourcefulness. Whether it is harvesting cranberries or netting cod, people have always ably used their intellect and ingenuity to earn their livelihood.

Now, things have changed. The Cape does not depend on whaling or salt, but largely on tourism. Sightseers, like the barbarian horde descending on the Roman empire, overrun Cape Cod each summer. The popular image of the place, nursed by a bustling vacation industry, is the one found by these wayfarers: catered, served, and enjoyed. But the Cape less traveled is where the deeper truths, with an explorer’s inspiration, can be discovered. It is where the scotch pines murmur and the soil unfurls a chorale linking residents to all things past and present. It is where the thundering ocean communicates possibility and optimism. It is where lonely, crumbling stone walls, denoting a faded hierarchy, stretch off into the woods obscured beyond sight. In the isolation, the qualities of reverence and veneration for community and continuity are conveyed. The Cape has rooted residents to the past, advocating a respect for history and an admiration for natural beauty.

Cape Cod is rapidly succumbing to the incessant pounding of the Atlantic Ocean. One foot of ephemeral coastline is washed away each year; on the outermost shore, the sacrifice is three times that. Although these changes are swift in geological time, they pale in comparison to the changes induced by human development. We look at a world that has taken far longer than a single lifetime to create, an environment whose fragile and ineffable beauty is swiftly evaporating. The pace of geologic changes, measurable in human time scales, reminds us that all life is fleeting. Yet if this realization is elegiac, it is also rousing. The Cape tells us to live life fully — to let no moment pass by unappreciated, to enjoy what we have, and to find the august world delightful to live in.

There is a fine line between ego and egotism. And all areas of the country can find some kind of pride in their distinctive cultural flavors and tales of history. But I am thankful that the lessons I have culled from my community have come from Cape Cod. The wisdom found there will stay with me throughout the course of my life.

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