My background

I was just an ordinary guy from Armenia and went to regular school in Yerevan without any IB, A-level programs, AP, or other courses. After secondary school, I went to a regular college (high school): European College in Armenia, where I just went deep in management and economics. During all those years of studying in school and college, I was involved in many volunteering and extracurricular activities. I was also attending TUMO, which is an open center for creative technologies. Initially, I didn’t intend to apply to an international program, and I was doing all this stuff because I enjoyed it.

Extracurriculars

I did many extracurriculars, but I wouldn’t say that any of them are very impressive. I would say that compared to people, whom I know their extracurriculars were more, but when comparing with my classmates in college, I did lots of extracurriculars, but all I did was because I loved it. For instance, I wouldn’t go to chemistry club because there is one and I want to fill my extracurriculars.

One extracurricular that I applied to UWC was RISE, which is an international program for teenagers who have big ideas and will get supported for a lifetime. RISE was a very important experience for me, and I am very grateful that one of the three extracurriculars was RISE. I was a finalist of 23 co-works but not a winner. It was the first big experience and the start of my extracurriculars. It changes my way of thinking. I developed a program for composing, which was left as a project and hasn’t been developed fully. I could say that RISE changed my life even without being a winner.

The second certificate that I attached was one from the drama club at my school, and the third one was from the Climate Science Olympiad as a finalist.

It was important for me not to mention the three most powerful competitions, but three different things to show that I was not only in school but everywhere.

I also did a sneaky thing by mentioning it in the notes. So, I am an alumnus of the Competitive College Club organized by Education USA Armenia, and I mentioned that “As an Education USA CCC student, I am leaving my advisor’s email; you can contact her if there is any problem with contacting me.”.

Essays

There were two big essay topics, but I chose one with the title “Who is your role model and why?”. I wrote about my best girlfriend. I started by saying that when choosing a role model, many people choose celebrities or other famous people who they heard about. I wrote stories about how we were sitting with our laptops during hard application periods when she was applying for university and I was applying for UWC, how we were getting tea and going to any academic or volunteering place. I want to mention the following sentences: “There were dark nights when the spirit of doubt and fear was lingering around us. These nights my

best friend's encouraging light supported me in all of my beginnings. She was thrilled about my successes and

motivated me to move forward during my downfalls.

In the last sentences, I also mentioned that she was a shoulder that I could cry on, and she would never become my old friend. Her success was that she got accepted to CITY College of Greece, and we met during CCC (Competitive College Club).

CCC is the theme that I can speak about infinitely because most important people from my life I met there.

Application structure

This is a good example that will break lots of stereotypes. As soon as applications opened, I filled out all 7 available sections, since it was quick to fill out that information since those sections asked about my personal information, parent’s signature, contacts, etc.

But if we are speaking about the most important sections, like volunteering, essays, and certificates, it took me 2 months to represent because it was very voluminous. For instance, a 50-word essay took me about 3 hours because I love speaking and writing a lot, and when you love to tell big stories, it is becoming hard to compress all in 50 words. I wasn’t structuring because I am impulsive, and one day I can do one thing and the next day another thing.

And one more interesting fact: during the day of the deadline, while I was in a meeting with my girlfriend, I remembered that I still had to write 2 essays, and those essays were the longest. I started writing quickly, and it turns out that quickly written essays are even better than the essays that I thought long about; in my case, I am sending my application 2 hours before the deadline. I do not recommend doing what I did because 1 hour before the deadline the lights in our house turned off.

Plans at school

In UWC there is one thing called CAS: creativity, activity, and service, and you have to fulfill the minimum requirement for at least one criterion of 50 hours a year. Even if there wasn’t CAS, I would still plan to do activities because I am not a person who can sit still without doing anything. Suffice it to say I am planning to do such activities at both UWC College and out of school.

After Graduation

After graduating from UWC, I plan to study at a university in the USA. My parents are saying to consider Europe, and others are saying to consider other destinations, but my heart is attached to the US education system because I know it better than Armenia's, and I imagine myself in a US university. It can sound cocky, but I even imagine myself in top universities because in my environment there are many people who are studying at top universities, and I think I will succeed in it.

Tips for Future Applicants

It would sound very cliché, but I would surely recommend being yourself, and for me, it is the best advice, because when you get into a new character, your speech definitely can be impressive, but your movements will shine in your eyes, the fire inside of you and your smile will become fake, and all will extinguish, and it will feel like that person is not you. And because of that, speak about what you want to say and be the person you want to be.

UWC exam and interview

Taking the UWC exam is very similar to the SAT. I was afraid of the exam, and during the test, there were moments when I wanted to close my laptop, and I thought that that was not for me. But eventually, I didn’t close my laptop and finished the exam with 20 questions for math and 20 questions for logic, so for each question, there was 1 minute, and as a person who thinks a lot, I was in total panic mode. Initially, in the past 13 minutes, I had answered 6 questions, and I understood that I needed to speed up. I am speeding up, starting not to overthink and answer as long as I have solved the question. There were questions that I didn’t answer, and others that I answered randomly, but I presented my knowledge in a given period. During the exam, I would say, you need to show that you have critical thinking. And one more important thing: do not be afraid of the exam.

American Councils

I am an alumnus of the CCC program of EducationUSA. I love the fact that, being an alumnus, I still keep in contact with the program and its members. When I joined the American Councils, I had the purpose of meeting with other members and integrating into the community to get further education in the USA. I didn’t know that that program would completely change my life and transform me into an older self. If I had to be told about myself before CCC, I would say that I wasn’t confident. CCC helped me to meet with people, to visit places, to do interviews, to get new skills, and to do volunteering, and I understood that I started to love Armenia in a very patriotic way, and I understood that I had been in the wrong environment before CCC. And now I want to study in the USA and do many more things that I could have done with the Armenian education system. The questions, like going to study at Harvard, I had thought that I couldn’t even collect my documents for university and send them, and I thought that was not real to get accepted to Top Universities. I understood that that system is available for everyone; you just need to understand the process. I also improved many skills of mine, such as public speaking, debating, essay writing, and doing interviews—all this not only for universities but also for self-improvement. I was also a mentor for the Pre-CCC program.

In the CCC group, there were 57 students, selected from 700+ applicants. Some people didn’t want to attend the classes, but I was one kind that wanted even more. I support American Councils however I can, because it supported me during my journey.

Outside the CCC program, I coordinated people whom I was from the USA. I also participated in many other programs, like meeting with host families and giving them presents, going to meetings with them, introducing them to Armenia, assisting with administrative and logistic tasks, representing the office of American Councils in expos, and other things. I also presented the Office of American Councils on TV.

RISE Contest

The RISE contest was a very important experience for me, starting from understanding how to build projects to recording good videos. During the application period, it changed me because I love project management. I learned how to come up with ideas, what problems you can solve, and how you can solve them; also, do research, do planning, do designs, etc. I became a finalist and participated in a founded program about leadership, which improved my leadership skills, and after getting that knowledge, I wrote my blog post for American Councils. RISE gave me a lot of knowledge and a big community, and I also did an internship as a Community Engagement and Event Management Assistant, organizing a very big international online event.

Maqoor & Saturn

Maqoor is an environmental company that I joined because of my friends because they were co-founders of the program. The program also improved me as a project manager because the work was about big finances, big people, and big ideas. Knowing that I was responsible for 10 national/international teams, where each team had 15 people, it was a big responsibility.

Saturn’s idea was to unite alumni of many US and international projects where they could share their knowledge and experience.