This Is My Brain in Love by I. W. Gregorio

Author:I. W. Gregorio [I. W. Gregorio]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Published: 2020-04-14T00:00:00+00:00

This Is My Brain on Personal Statements

JOCELYN

Perry High School has a Rising Stars of Business club that’s basically composed of tools. To the best of my knowledge, it’s an all-white group of six boys and two girls who sit around playing at being grown-ups. They wear ill-fitting business suits to their meetings and tote around giant flip boards so they can brainstorm shit and talk about “economies of scale,” play with imaginary money, and brag about how much they won in the Stock Market Game. I am never going to fit in with that group and don’t want to try.

What my dad wants me to do is the University of Utica Junior Business Program, which allows high school students to take a college course each semester during their junior and senior years. A lot of people get into the program—basically, it seems like if you can pay tuition and string together sentences for an application essay you are in. What interests my dad, of course, is a scholarship program where the person who plans the best business project gets free tuition, not to mention access to a faculty adviser and $5,000 seed money for their proposal.

I know at least one of the people applying, this guy Geoff from my school, who is student council treasurer. He’s apparently trying to start up a solar power assessment company.

As it turns out, Geoff is dating Priya’s friend Sophia, so Priya was able to give me intel. “Basically Sophia tells me that his parents told him to play up the clean energy angle because it’s hot now, not because he’s really interested in it. It’s all just résumé fodder for him; he doesn’t actually want it.”

I’m not sure if that makes it better or worse, to feel like some scrappy underdog battling a faceless group of overachievers. Actually, there’s no question. It makes it worse. I know the people applying for these honors—I pirated the frosted polypropylene report covers that one of them bought for our group project, for God’s sake—and they are not to be underestimated. They probably have recommendation letters from VPs of Fortune 500 companies or something. Who am I supposed to get my recommendation from, my amah?

Just scrolling through the application for the scholarship gives me hives. The program’s general application just requires a transcript, a statement of purpose, and two recommendation letters, one from a teacher and one from another supervisor or counselor. But the scholarship application asks questions like, “Tell us about a leadership position you have volunteered for.” and “What was the most challenging ethical dilemma you’ve ever had and how did you resolve it?” It also calls for a third recommendation, from a colleague or someone else who has witnessed me in a leadership role.

I reluctantly admit that this third letter is going to have to come from Will. He’s the obvious choice, not only because he can string more than five words together in a sentence. I’m already stressing out that my “supervisor” is also my dad, until I realize that I can probably ask my middle school librarian, Mrs.

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