嘉文博译-写作中心原创写作案例

Each of our applicants is unique. Describe how your background, values and non-work-related activities will enhance the experiences of other Kellogg students.

Unlike most other children in Chinese families, my values were mainly formed through the guidance of my grandfather. My grandparents raised me from the time that I was a very small child. In their younger days, my grandfather had served as a surgeon in a German-run hospital and my grandmother had been a nurse at a missionary hospital. These experiences exposed them to many advanced Western ideas at a much earlier time than most Chinese people. For example, they accepted the idea that education was the most important factor for success, even for girls. Most Chinese rejected this idea at the time. My grandfather ran a clinic in Shanghai where he became famous due to his superb medical skills. On a trip to Yunnan province for his medical practice, he noticed the extreme backwardness of the medical conditions there. Many patients died unnecessarily due to the acute shortage of doctors and medicine in the province. My grandfather was extremely moved by this situation and without any hesitation sold his medical practice in Shanghai, moving his family to Yunnan together with some of his friends. He founded the Yunnan Paramedics School, which later became the renowned Yunnan Medical College. I still have memories of how my grandfather gave up such a lucrative medical practice to help the poor people of Yunnan province and how busy my grandfather was at the school then. He influenced me by showing me that only by creating something that benefits others and society as a whole can we realize our greatest satisfaction.

During my university years on vacation, by chance I found myself in Wuding, Yunnan province with several friends of mine, taking pictures of the picturesque landscapes. Wuding was a village in a remote mountainous area where everyone lived in poverty. Many of the children were so poor that they had almost no clothes to wear and never went to school. The simplicity of the local people was charming, but their total lack of education was startling. It struck me that these people needed help and that I could be the one to help them. Upon returning to my university, I displayed my photos from Wuding in the campus publicity show window as a special column. Together with some of the fellow students in my department, I delivered a report to the Youth League committee of the university to try to gain support to help these impoverished children. After much discussion, it was finally decided to organize a volunteer teacher corps. We would volunteer to give as much education as possible to the children during our vacation time.

I then contacted the appropriate departments in the Yunnan provincial government and soon, our vacation teaching program was put in to effect. My schoolmates from different departments stayed in this very poor mountainous village and began our teaching career. Because our vacation was short, we were not able to impart much knowledge to the children. But they did get to know something of the outside world and the importance of knowledge. Thanks to the great reputation of Peking University, the influence of our program in that village as well as that of Project Hope, an education project in full swing in China at the time, many poor children received an education. One year after our visit, the small village that we visited established its first primary school.

China is still a very poor country with many of its people living in dire poverty. But as China’s economic reforms continue, our people are also maturing. I personally have experienced the drastic changes caused by the social and economic changes in China and I can share those experiences with my classmates both inside and outside of the classroom. My dream is to contribute as much as possible to society, just like my grandfather. That is one reason that I want to further my education. To fully contribute, I must learn more to be able to give more.