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How my Common App Essay helped me get in Vanderbilt University
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* SCROLL DOWN TO READ TOBY'S ESSAY
* TEXT HARLAN: 321-345-9070
* BEFORE COLLEGE TV: HOSTED BY HARLAN COHEN | @HarlanCohen
#VanderbiltUniversity #Vandy #Aoplication #Essay #CommonApp #PersonalStatement #Admission #College #FirstGen
Toby's Common App Essay (shared with permission)
Toby Irenshtain
I open the brown double doors on 18th Avenue, a time machine to my past. My aunt, nine months older than I, quickly pulls me into her room, throwing a new blouse and pair of tights my way. “Toby, you know you can’t show your collarbone. Put this on before my mother yells at you.” I thought my outfit was conservative enough, but clothes from years ago never seem to fit the same.
We walk to the kitchen, where Grandma embraces my arrival with a hug and a thousand questions. She asks how my family is, how my holidays were, and what qualities I’m looking for in a husband. I answer the first two, bending the truth so that she likes what she hears, then laugh in an attempt to dodge the third, knowing it holds underlying tension and absolutely no humor. My aunt already has her eligible bachelors; it is senior year, and her engagement will come within months. Mine is supposed to as well. Instead, I am the first in my entire extended family to apply to college.
I am also the first to watch TV, attend a co-ed school, and learn about Darwinism. Where I come from, the ultra-orthodox community of Hasidic Jews limits such opportunities. They follow traditions originating thousands of years ago, such as arranged marriages, dress codes, and extreme gender divides. Thought to be extinct, they still live within the borders of this community. The group lives this way by isolating itself from modern culture and secular education; for example, my family has never heard of Newton, Cinderella, or Picasso.
My parents decided to leave this strict society, sparing me a forced arranged marriage and inviting me to explore the world. Rather than learn hairstyling and sewing, I study calculus and computer programming. I create poetry and photography, perform flying trapeze, and style high-profile customers at an upscale boutique. These secular activities, hobbies, and passions of mine, could have never existed, much less have flourished, in the world of my past. The identity that I have created outside of this world is completely removed from the person that I was destined to become at birth.
In this tight-knit and religious circle, leaving usually entails being shamed and shunned. However, the close relationship that I maintain with my family - mostly due to my ability to feign ignorance and adapt to the religious way of life when I visit - creates a unique circumstance. I can time travel between the world of my past and present by donning a long black skirt and pretending not to know who Justin Bieber is.
I am thankful for the ability to have left without leaving; while rejecting the religious requirements, I simultaneously and almost subconsciously have internalized the positive values that this religious group is based on. The importance that I place on charity, honesty, and family, for example, most likely stem from this background.
As I apply to college, an act frowned upon by my religious family, I do so based on their traditional values. In fact, my desire to work with children most likely developed as a result of the maternal expectations of women within the Hasidic society, where motherhood and teaching are considered of utmost importance. My degree within this field will be the most ironic juxtaposition of my two realities and a personal approach to holding both worlds within me.
As I embark on the path towards college, walking away from the religious boundaries of my past, I know that this road is entirely my own. I understand, with each step forward, that my experience with these contrasting realities has helped me create my own identity, a unique mix of religious values and secular opportunities. I walk on my road, placing each brick as I go, constructing a time machine towards progress, simultaneously ingrained in the customs that my family has upheld for centuries.
Follow Toby on Instagram @toby.i
* TEXT HARLAN: 321-345-9070
* BEFORE COLLEGE TV: HOSTED BY HARLAN COHEN | @HarlanCohen
#VanderbiltUniversity #Vandy #Aoplication #Essay #CommonApp #PersonalStatement #Admission #College #FirstGen
Toby's Common App Essay (shared with permission)
Toby Irenshtain
I open the brown double doors on 18th Avenue, a time machine to my past. My aunt, nine months older than I, quickly pulls me into her room, throwing a new blouse and pair of tights my way. “Toby, you know you can’t show your collarbone. Put this on before my mother yells at you.” I thought my outfit was conservative enough, but clothes from years ago never seem to fit the same.
We walk to the kitchen, where Grandma embraces my arrival with a hug and a thousand questions. She asks how my family is, how my holidays were, and what qualities I’m looking for in a husband. I answer the first two, bending the truth so that she likes what she hears, then laugh in an attempt to dodge the third, knowing it holds underlying tension and absolutely no humor. My aunt already has her eligible bachelors; it is senior year, and her engagement will come within months. Mine is supposed to as well. Instead, I am the first in my entire extended family to apply to college.
I am also the first to watch TV, attend a co-ed school, and learn about Darwinism. Where I come from, the ultra-orthodox community of Hasidic Jews limits such opportunities. They follow traditions originating thousands of years ago, such as arranged marriages, dress codes, and extreme gender divides. Thought to be extinct, they still live within the borders of this community. The group lives this way by isolating itself from modern culture and secular education; for example, my family has never heard of Newton, Cinderella, or Picasso.
My parents decided to leave this strict society, sparing me a forced arranged marriage and inviting me to explore the world. Rather than learn hairstyling and sewing, I study calculus and computer programming. I create poetry and photography, perform flying trapeze, and style high-profile customers at an upscale boutique. These secular activities, hobbies, and passions of mine, could have never existed, much less have flourished, in the world of my past. The identity that I have created outside of this world is completely removed from the person that I was destined to become at birth.
In this tight-knit and religious circle, leaving usually entails being shamed and shunned. However, the close relationship that I maintain with my family - mostly due to my ability to feign ignorance and adapt to the religious way of life when I visit - creates a unique circumstance. I can time travel between the world of my past and present by donning a long black skirt and pretending not to know who Justin Bieber is.
I am thankful for the ability to have left without leaving; while rejecting the religious requirements, I simultaneously and almost subconsciously have internalized the positive values that this religious group is based on. The importance that I place on charity, honesty, and family, for example, most likely stem from this background.
As I apply to college, an act frowned upon by my religious family, I do so based on their traditional values. In fact, my desire to work with children most likely developed as a result of the maternal expectations of women within the Hasidic society, where motherhood and teaching are considered of utmost importance. My degree within this field will be the most ironic juxtaposition of my two realities and a personal approach to holding both worlds within me.
As I embark on the path towards college, walking away from the religious boundaries of my past, I know that this road is entirely my own. I understand, with each step forward, that my experience with these contrasting realities has helped me create my own identity, a unique mix of religious values and secular opportunities. I walk on my road, placing each brick as I go, constructing a time machine towards progress, simultaneously ingrained in the customs that my family has upheld for centuries.
Follow Toby on Instagram @toby.i
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