University of California, Davis Application Essays

When we were young, we were all asked what we wanted to be in the future. Some of us said a firefighter, some said an engineer or a lawyer, and the some even said school janitor. However, I only had one goal for my future….

After my first semester of Anatomy and Physiology, I thought that I was a genius in the subject. The class was rigorous, but rightfully so; in those five months I became fluent in obscure topics and conditions. But, on the first day of second semester,…

“Niki Ragone? Is Thomas Ragone your brother?” Before everything happened, this was a compliment. Five years my senior, he was a popular student, and I was proud to be known as his sister. The summer before eighth grade, though, that phrase took on an entirely…

I vividly remember running home from the library and locking myself upstairs to begin the reading. I rifled through the nutrition book with as much excitement as if I had found the Holy Grail. I stayed up all night to read it, to consume it,…

When I was in seventh grade, my biological mother—who was then living in Luxembourg—was involved in a serious car accident and had to be put into a medically induced coma. After somewhat recovering from the physical and mental trauma she experienced from her near-death experience,…

“So, what do you want to do today?” The woman stood in front of me with her clipboard and pen, patiently waiting for my answer. I turned my head to look at my brother-in-law’s door down the hallway. My body ached; I had been savagely…

“Stop interrupting! Before opening your mouth, see if the adults are in the middle of a conversation,” my dad reminded me for the hundredth time. What I couldn’t have articulated at the time was that I was too lazy to ‘watch’, and I couldn’t hear…

One of the most difficult challenges I faced was overcoming the loss of my friendship with Ana—a friend who had crawled into my life in the seventh grade and disappeared in my freshman year. Her disappearance had certainly not been the most spontaneous, for she…

As a French-American, I am symbolically bound to two altogether different cultural spheres via the hyphen. In its relation to me, the hyphen holds more than symbolic value alone. Growing up in America with divorced parents, my mother French and my father American, the preservation…

It’s a summery Monday morning, but instead of sleeping in, I’m outside of a museum, doing a hearty jig in a banana costume. I throw my hands in the air; I sing along to the music; I kick my feet in what I think is…