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December 31, 2005
Back on Track
So, I'm feeling great. I took my GMAT yesterday, and did better than I expected. I didn't reach Harvard or Stanford medians, but I'm happy with my score.
I've rewritten 6 of my 7 Harvard essays, and they have come out much better than the first or even the second drafts--which I lost due to computer error if you're just now tuning in.
I've yet to start on my Stanford essays, so that needs to happen TOMORROW. I've been feeling kind of antsy because communication with my recommenders has been pretty erratic, and I fear that they won't get my recs in on time. I think I'd do much better by worrying about what I have control over, however.
My friends and I are going out to our friend Zack's house for New Year's. I'm glad I won't be downtown with the crazy crowds and risking my life coming home at 4 am with all the drunk drivers. Hopefully, we can even sneak and crack a few firecrackers while we're out there--since it is a rural area. Well... this is Texas, and I certainly don't want to start any wildfires, so maybe we'll just stick to cocktails and karaoke.
I'm feeling better about my applications than I was a few days ago. Now's it's a matter of time of writing great essays ad getting all these applications in on time.
Posted by kaneisha at 01:06 AM | Comments (1)
December 29, 2005
Night Before the GMAT
Happy Holidays, ya'll!
I had a great Christmas, and my plan of officially celebrating Kwanzaa didn't really happen, but I do know that today's principle is Ujima, Collective Work and Responsibility, so let's all work together and send me positive energy, because tomorrow I take the dreaded GMAT.
Now, I've always thought of myself as a great standardized test taker, but the GMAT has been my Achille's hill. Can you believe that today I took a 3-hour online practice test and I made the EXACT SAME SCORE as I did on my diagnostic test four months ago!? Now that just don't make sense--after four months of studying. I guess I really should have taken a class.
No use crying about it now. I'll go in there, take the test, come out and keep on working on those apps.
I cannot imagine how hectic and overwhelming it must be to apply to 5-10 schools. I am drowning with just Harvard and Stanford.
I am so lucky that I have a year already planned out. I'd be chewing off my fingernails out of anxiety if I didn't already know I had something lined up for next year.
Sometimes I think it will be embarrassing if I get dinged by both Harvard and Stanford--in front of my hordes of blog readers, right?--but then I remember how young I am, how I'll get really valuable feedback, and how everything works itself out somehow.
One exciting thing is that I found out that I'm a semifinalist for the TV and Radio Broadcasting internship in NYC I applied for. I have to submit another app by Jan. 16 to see if I become a finalist. I feel confident--and excited!
One major setback in my application process is that I wrote all seven of my Harvard essays in one document and LOST THEM ALL. Yes, I did. I'm still getting used to my laptop, and I guess I didn't understand how the whole sleep/hibernation/shutdown situation works added with my impatience with Microsoft Word's autorecovery system, so I probably just told it, "No I don't need it!" and lost my essays.
I was really devastated at first and then I figured that maybe my THIRD drafts would be spectacular. Let's hope I at least get them written.
Whew! I have a long way to go. I think it will be great once I get there.
Posted by kaneisha at 03:32 AM | Comments (1)
December 16, 2005
December's Halfway Over!
So I have one class left to finish all my work for, and then I'm done with school for the semester. Whew! I'm looking forward to having a much lighter academic load next semester--not that my classes were super-hard this semester. I just did a lot of procrastinating which caught up with me in this last month. But it's all coming to a close now, and it's going fairly well.
One of my very best friends in the world Jonathan Jimenez (aka J.J.) is here in California visiting me, and we've yet to really break out of Claremont and start exploring LA. I've been working to finish up my classes, and he seems pretty content with relaxing, watching Sex in the City and getting over jet lag. I've got lots planned for us for Saturday, Sunday, and Monday though.
So I've finished a rough draft for all my essays for Harvard (all in one long crazy night!) and I'm even starting to receive some really helpful feedback as well. I also redid my entire resume, focusing on showing them tangible results of my efforts rather than simply narrating what my job was, and it seems to be much more useful than my previous resume.
EXCITING: So I was perusing other peoples' blogs the other day, searching for people who had participated in the IRTS Summer Fellows program in NYC and I ran across the webpage of this fabulous person, Dominique Jackson, whose resume showed that she'd been involved with IRTS during her undergrad years. I emailed her asking if she'd be willing to talk to me about her experiences with IRTS and she's been such a source of inspiration to me! She works for VH1 in Production Management, models, emcees, writes, and has her own website. She's a diva.
Anyway, she emailed me the other day with an application for MTV Networks Media Associates Program, and I am SO READY to work there. It's free housing, $500 a week, and the chance to work for the coolest television network there is. What more could I ask for?! The application is due Jan. 20, and I am just too excited to turn it in.
But I'm going to promise myself that I will not even LOOK at it again until my B-school apps are completed and turned in. Wow. January 3 will be here in no time. I better get to writing my statements for Stanford and for the fellowships I'm applying to.
It's really cool that Marquis' is doing the same MBA/MA Ed. Program at Stanford that I'm interested in. I just read about his "History of African American Education" course, and that sounds phenomenal. A class like that is exactly what I need in my life.
Still no word from SEO in NYC. I talked at length with an alum of the program who told me not to be discouraged by not having heard back from them yet, so I'm keeping my hopes up and realizing that I have other opportunities waiting for me.
NYC here I come!
Posted by kaneisha at 06:12 AM | Comments (0)
December 02, 2005
The December Push
So it's December already! I'm really starting to feel the pressure. Finals are due soon in all my classes (Let's not even talk about how behind I feel) in the next two weeks, and I take the GMAT on the 29th.
I've been doing the lessons on my Kaplan GMAT CD, and I've really been improving. Since I'm what they call a "poet" or non-traditional applicant, I have to really wow them with my GMAT score. Although I'm very young, don't have much of a quantitative background, and have no full-time work experience outside of summer internships, I gotta show them that I can roll with the big dawgs. Wow, I sound like a beer commercial during the Super Bowl.
I just turned in another summer internship application. This one is for IRTS Foundation Fellows program, which is an all-expenses paid internship in NYC in Radio and Television Broadcasting. I recently had the revelation that Oprah is my biggest role model and I want to be a multidimensional actor-producer-writer-leader-philanthropist super-power like her. Maybe they'll discover my talent this summer... Or maybe I'll just get have a really cool internship and get to explore NYC. I'll know by December 30, which is beautiful.
It's time for me to prepare the packets for my recommenders for my applications. There's a lot of overlap, so I won't have a lot of distributing to do. However, this essentially means that I need to have most of my essays finished so that they can use them in writing my letters. That's what's scary. My goal is to have the packets ready within a week, so they have about a month to procrastinate and mull over the information.
I'm excited that one of Stanford's recs is to be written by a friend or colleague. My friend Kevin Curry, a Harvard MPP student will be writing mine, and I know that he will write an outstanding rec and really let the people at Stanford GSB know wassup.
I've chosen my classes for my last semester of college. It was pretty anticlimactic, I'd have to say. I'm taking Black Studies Senior Seminar, Daughters of Africa, Painting II, Calc I, Yoga, Voice Lessons, Personal Financial Decision Making, and teaching a class on Hurricane Katrina for my senior thesis project. I know that sounds like hella classes, but those last four are for only one-fourth the credit of a regular class. I'm looking forward to my last semester of college, especially Spring Break, Senior Week, and getting back my grad school decisions.
With my year in Ghana ahead of me, this application process is a win-win situation. If I get in, I'll have my post-Ghana grad school plans beautifully laid out for me. If I don't, I get feedback on my Harvard app, get a whole year to study for the GMAT, and a chance to apply to a wider selection of grad schools. I feel like I have this amazing future ahead of me, and all I have to do is prepare myself so that when great things come, I am ready for them.
I am so blessed.
Posted by kaneisha at 09:31 AM | Comments (0)