Exclusive Insider Interview: USC admit from Zambia

SocratesPost: Applying for colleges while studying as a senior in high school is a lot of work. How did you manage doing that while keeping up with your schoolwork?

Krishna at USC: Honestly, I did have issues in the beginning. I did have a little bit of time management problems, so that’s why I started pretty early in August. I braced myself and started really early. I made sure to get the bulk of the stuff done by November ish. And in December, it was time for reading everything again and refining whatever I had done.

SocratesPost: In the beginning, it sounds like you had some difficulties with time management. How did you learn strategies to manage your time better?

Krishna at USC: Honestly, I don’t know if I did. I sort of prioritized things in my head and had an idea in my mind of how much of the writing is left and how much work I had to do. I set little goals in my mind of what to do today and what to do tomorrow.

SocratesPost: Alright. So come decision time, what was the first admission decision that you received? And what’s the story behind that?

Krishna at USC: It was an email that I got after I took an exam. It was pretty stressful that day. And there was an email. I got a notification saying, “Here is your admission decision.” And that one was Columbia. I, unfortunately, did not get in, but I was fine with that. I just realized it probably wasn’t meant to be because I probably wasn’t up to standards.

But I can’t really say I was sad or very disappointed. I think I took it pretty well and I moved on because I knew there was a lot more now to come.

SocratesPost: Great. What was your first acceptance? And tell me the story behind that.

Krishna at USC: My first acceptance was Case Western Reserve University because I applied early action to them. The reason I applied was that I got a fee waiver in an email, and it seemed like a pretty good school. So I was like, “you know, why not?” And I applied.

And a few months later, I got an email from them saying, “you have incomplete documents.” And I was pretty shocked. But it turns out, what I had to do is submit my SAT score online. And they said that they would get back to me decision time. But they got back to me in like two days. And I was pretty excited about that. Because that was my first acceptance and it got my hopes up.

SocratesPost: When you say you got your hopes up, do you mean it helped you feel more positive and more optimistic about the other applications?

Krishna at USC: Yeah, because I felt that maybe good things could happen.

SocratesPost: Okay, so tell me about the acceptance that you were the most excited for and why were you the most excited about that one?

Krishna at USC: Definitely USC, which is the school that I chose to attend, because two of my friends from my old school also applied.We were sort of hoping that we would all get in together and the three of us did end up getting in. So I was pretty excited about that. I mean, I did end up taking a gap year. But now that I know that there’s two of my good friends over there, I was pretty excited. I just like the idea of California and the nice weather because up until the end, I was deciding between USC and McGill in Montreal. They have a really nice engineering program, but the negative 30 degrees winter for three months scared me away. And at the end of the day, I chose USC because I thought I’d be happier.

SocratesPost: That’s great. Did you apply for mechanical engineering at every school? Or were there some that you just went for general engineering or other sorts of engineering?

Krishna at USC: I applied for mechanical engineering at every school.

SocratesPost: Great. How long after your USC acceptance did you decide to commit? It sounds like you were really excited for that one.

Krishna at USC: Actually, a month later, because I was pretty excited about McGill. Two of my friends got in there. I was in a dilemma, because I can’t choose between friends — that’s a pretty horrible thing to do. And at the end of the day, I just did what I thought to be best for me.

SocratesPost: What do you think got you into USC?

SocratesPost: I’m understanding that you felt like there were maybe two personas that you were giving off in your application. There’s the stats, where you’re pretty much in line and on par with their expectation. And then there’s also the separate persona that is a little bit different from what someone might consider a typical engineer.

SocratesPost: Great point. It’s really helpful to have a secondary or kind of additional peek into who you are as a human as opposed to just your academic interests. Why was college apps a rough process for you?

SocratesPost: If you have to say that there is one resource that helped you the most, not the internet, but something more specific — it could be a person or it could just be website — what do you think that would be? And what would your college application process have been like if you hadn’t had that?

SocratesPost: And when you look back at your process, do you feel like you would have wanted to redo anything?

SocratesPost: Got it. What were some of your extracurricular activities?

SocratesPost: Which one you think was the most impactful to you?

SocratesPost: I like that. I want to be respectful of your time, so I just want to ask you two more questions. What’s a common misunderstanding people have about applying to college?

SocratesPost: How are people forming these expectations?

SocratesPost: Krishna, to wrap up, what’s your best piece of advice for someone who’s about to start the application process?