Personal Statement

Every person has a creative side, and it can be expressed in many ways: problem solving,
original and innovative thinking, and artistically, to name a few. Describe how you express
your creative side.
What creativity means to me is that you have an idea of what you want or what you want
to create. Creativity is art, coming up with something individually or in a group. I’m in a club
called A.C.C. which stands for Asian Culture Club. It’s a club where we talk about topics of
different states in Asia. And sometimes, in our general meetings, we have games that the
Activity Coordinators create, and one of them is me. Activity Coordinators come up with games
for meeting and bonding nights. We also would have to silence the room when it gets too loud
during our meetings. A creative skill that is important to me is coming up with an idea with a
group because, for me personally, I can’t think of anything by myself. I need a group of people to
discuss with me what we are talking about and also that would give me a light bulb above my
head. The skill of talking to others allows me to socialize with people and to be comfortable. I
used to think that I was not a social person, but after coming up to this one person, they told me
that I was. My creativity helps me to communicate with others and help out with what they need,
giving out some ideas about the topic or activities. I also think that it will help me with the major
that I’ll pick.

What would you say is your greatest talent or skill? How have you developed and
demonstrated that talent over time?

The talents and skill that I have is communication, playing ukulele, singing, and dancing.
Just like in the first prompt, I said that I am a social person and I also go up to people and have a
conversation with them and be comfortable around them. Playing ukulele, singing, and dancing
are my talents, but they are just hobbies that I enjoy in my free time. These talents and skill are
meaningful to me because they make me who I am. I like talking to people that I’m close to, and
I also like making new friends. I have enjoyed singing and dancing since I was little. I love how
they bring people together and just have a fun time doing it. And for the ukulele, I just play
songs that I know and sing along to it. I think socializing is something that I do naturally and for
singing, dancing, and the ukulele, I have been working on it. My singing is not as good, so I have
been working on that. The same goes for dancing. The ukulele, I haven’t been playing it for a
while, but I know a few chords. Only my skill gives me opportunities to inside and outside of the
classrooms. It helps me with speaking out loud when presenting, and just like before, talking to
teachers, and other students. Having these talents and skills again makes me who I am and just
makes me enjoy life itself. I hope that I will be able to share this with more people and hope that
they enjoy the same things as I do. There is another talent I have not mentioned, but I am also a
fast learner. I noticed this talent of mine when I was in my sophomore year of high school. If you
teach me something once or twice, I might remember it and learn it quickly.

Describe how you have taken advantage of a significant educational opportunity or worked
to overcome an educational barrier you have faced.

An opportunity that I took advantage of was enrolling in a Merced College Program in

my junior year of high school and I am still enrolled into it. The program is about helping
students get where they need to be in terms of getting into a community college or university.
The program has been helping me to get where I am now. They also suggested doing this
personal statement before even being assigned in class. I think that this was a good choice to take
otherwise, I would have never known what to do after high school. I would have never known
how to enroll in a university. During my junior year, I always thought that I would need a 4.0
GPA to get into college, but when I talked to a person, who was in the program, they told me that
I didn’t need a 4.0, but needed a 3.0 GPA or above to be in a UC or community college.
Hopefully, there will be students in the future who choose to do this program so that they won’t
be stuck in high school not knowing what to do for their future.

Think about an academic subject that inspires you. Describe how you have furthered this
interest inside and/or outside of the classroom.

An academic subject that inspires me is maybe art. I have been experiencing a lot of
different things in this subject. And I still am trying to find my art style. Inside of school, you
learn the basics like the elements of art (line, shape, value, texture, space, form, color), drawing
eyes, nose, and hands and shading them in, etc. Outside of school, I like to research different
types of art that other people have. For example, in social media, I see an interesting art style and
I try it out. Sometimes I try to see if I can make something up and see if it looks good. I did want
to major something in art, but then I decided to. I felt like art would be a good major for me, but
it’s just a good hobby of mine. Plus I am a decent artist. I’m not professional like most people,
but I do want to do something with my art style in the future. Some things that I have a hard time
with art are the head shape, body parts, and the head and positions. I can’t seem to get them right,
but I’m practicing as much as I can. We should also know that there is also a meaning in the art.
What does this artwork mean to you? Why did you choose this? Where did you get the
inspiration from? I have also been doing digital art for three years. I wanted to see the difference
between paper (or canvas) and computer. I never really knew the point of digital art until I tried it
myself. It was very interesting to find different pictures and find an idea of how to put them
together. I kind of liked the idea of putting different pictures together and making new art out of
it. I also think it is smart to have digital art because it’s fun to experience many different ways of
doing art itself.