By Marla Britton
New York State sees all four seasons, each with its own unique beauty. Few people realize that the Office of Admissions at the University of Rochester also has four seasons: reading, open campus, visitors, and travel, and just like Mother Nature’s, our seasons each bring a beauty and uniqueness to Rochester.
Open campus is our spring. This is the time of year when accepted students visit campus and explore our classrooms, buildings, and student life.
Visitor season is our summer, when we welcome large groups of families and students to campus for presentations and campus tours.
Travel season comes in fall, when admissions counselors visit high schools and community-based organizations throughout the United States and abroad, too.
And winter—well, that’s our reading season, our time of year to cozy up next to our computers and read applications from prospective students. We read all day and every day. We read every word, from the recommendation letters and the transcripts to the applications and the essays. My favorite part of reading season is the essays, because that’s the piece of the application where students can write about anything they want, and it’s an opportunity for me to get to know each student a little better. To any student who, while struggling to decide what to write about, has wondered if their words will even be read and make a difference, my answer is yes, it has made a difference to me!
This year, I have learned about MOOP. I think it is safe to say that I would probably not have known what MOOP is if it were not for an essay I read. MOOP is an acronym for Materials Out Of Place and when you are hiking, camping, orienteering, etc., it is important to take care of your MOOP (i.e., pick up after yourself!).
I have also learned about the transformations people have experienced while immersing themselves in a volunteer activity, a missionary excursion, or a hospital shadowing opportunity.
I laughed out loud when a student responded to FDR’s famous line, “We have nothing to fear but fear itself,” by saying he probably never went through the college application process.
I felt great happiness for the student who wrote about his determination to master a math class he had failed in his junior year—he retook it at his local community college during the summer and got an A.
I have read essays through my tears as applicants shared stories of the death of their loved ones, and I have cheered them on as they wrote of their struggle with illness, isolation, peer pressure, and poverty.
And how would a student ever know that the risk she took writing a particular essay about finding dimes after the death of a beloved uncle would land on my desk? When she wrote that the reader might not “get” the story and the impact of the dimes, and how they helped her and her family through their trauma…how would she know that I find dimes, too? How would she know that I knew exactly what she meant and that her essay gave me goose bumps?
She took a risk. They all took a risk. They all decided that it was worth it for them to write about a piece of themselves that was genuine. They all took their time and chose each word carefully and placed it perfectly. And it was worth it. It mattered. It made a difference. I feel like I got to know them a little better because they shared something with me that was important to them.
I have favorite parts of every season, both Mother Nature’s and the Office of Admissions’. My absolute favorite part of reading season is reading your personal essays. Thank you for sharing your stories with me and letting me get to know you.
Marla Britton
Assistant Director for College and Community Programs