College Entrance Essay: Hasta I. Veeramachaneni

A character development exercise in the voice of the unlikely star of our premium serialized epic urban fantasy technothriller.

This week we’re sharing one of the character development exercises written as background for the novel, this one from the point of view of our main character, the deceptively tough Hasta Veeramachaneni. For more on this project overall, please see “This Year a Serial Takes Root.”

Photograph by LENblR from Bigstock

In 300 words, please tell us what you would expect to gain from your time at our institution, and what you would uniquely bring to it in exchange.

They say that college is where you form the relationships that will last the rest of your life. If that’s true then I expect to walk away from your institution after 4 years with a whole slew of lifelong relationships—a relationship with the world around me, a relationship with empowerment, a relationship with self-respect, a relationship with my writing, and most of all a passionate relationship with learning.

Who knows, maybe I’ll end up with a lifelong friend or two as well. Stranger things have happened! (Though not to me.)

In more concrete terms, I feel as if the me I am now is but a seed that has yet to flower and grow into the magnificent tree I know I can be. What’s needed is to be planted in the right soil, in a garden with similar and complementary flora. What’s needed to flourish is a higher grade of nourishment than high school has to offer, and to bathe in sunlight outside the shadow of my parents’ accomplishments. Acceptance by your institution would, I expect, admit me to this garden I seek.

Critical to my development, I feel, is to bond with a community of strong, supportive, like-minded women. I’m sorely missing such sorority in my high school experience so far, something I look forward keenly to remedying. (I mean “sorority” in the sisterhood sense of the word, though I wouldn’t dismiss the other sense out of hand!) I would expect your institution to provide a welcoming, safe environment where that can take place.

What I can offer in return for all this are diligent study, willing participation in campus civic life, the unique perspective of an Indian-American girl from the North Side of Chicago, and a promise always to be an exemplary representative of my new alma mater.

And who can say? Maybe one day you’ll even receive an anonymous endowment for a large new scholarship fund. (Stranger things...!)

I thank you for your kind consideration.

Hasta I. Veeramachaneni √