An Introduction: The Ups and Downs of College Applications

College applications, the dreaded two words hanging over every high schooler’s head from the second they walk through the door on the first day of their freshman year to May 1st of their senior year, AKA National Decision Day.

The process of these four years is rough: you have to figure out who you are, what you like, and what you want to do. Throughout all this self-discovery, the pressure around you to keep your GPA high to appeal to colleges, join every single club and activity – and secure a leadership position in each, on top of whatever social or romantic relationships you as a high schooler need to maintain is almost too much to handle. The first three years are a struggle, but the actual application and the rollercoaster of stress and emotions that come with it? That’s brand new territory and it’s a scary process that no one talks too much about.

That’s why I’m here.

My name is Percival (Percy) Singson, and I’m a senior in the class of 2023. I’ve been a member of the Chieftan for 4 years running, and this year I will be applying to college. I was inspired to write this after watching the documentary Try Harder!, which was about San Francisco students in a pressure cooker high school and their application process and emotions. I may be taking AP Calculus, but myself and most applicants in PHS and the country aren’t like them, so I became inspired to write an article similar to the content to Try Harder!, but for the average student, by an average student.

I’m not going to tell you how to make your application better or how to fill out the FAFSA. I’m here to record my journey with the process so that you have the knowledge of the half of the process no one tells you about.

What I record and experience in these coming months, is not going to be the same thing that you will experience. In fact, we could have totally opposite experiences. For starters, my situation is a lot different than most people who will read this. I live in the great state of New Jersey, and I’m proud of that fact, but I’m hopefully leaving it. I’m going to the west coast of the United States, ironically, to be closer to family. I’m also trying to establish myself as a double major, in both art and STEM fields, which are two completely different processes when it comes to admissions. I also am not applying to any Ivy Leagues or any other internationally renowned and notoriously exclusive private schools, so I will not be able to provide an insight regarding interviews, and neither am I applying anywhere early action or early decision. But no matter the differences in our specific applications and processes, there will be common themes and useful bits of advice, because we all need to write the dreaded common app essay and we live in Piscataway- which means we’re all doing the Rutgers Application together.

Until the end of this year, I will be updating you four times- before the bulk of the applications become due, when applications are due, the waiting period between sending in applications and receiving acceptance and/or rejection, and after acceptance/rejection. Each update will start with what I call Percy’s Lessons to be Learned: a bullet-pointed list that quickly summarizes the most important advice and lessons that I’ve learned over each update (for those who don’t have the time to read/listen/view my entire entry). After Percy’s Lessons to be Learned, I’ll start the fun part of each update. Updates are essentially a collage of blog-like status updates that could be anywhere from two sentences, a photo, or a couple seconds of me screaming into the void, to a page long existential crisis or a five minute video of me doing a happy dance, grouped together into the article, which will be called an “episode,” in chronological order.

Now that I’ve got all the groundwork laid out for all you prospective college applicants, I wish you all good luck as you follow me on this process and embark on your own.

I’m Percival Singson, and I’m signing off. Be on the lookout for my next update.

P.S. As each article gets uploaded, the bottom of this article will become a masterlist of links to each episode