Katie Miller recently graduated from Walter Johnson High School in Bethesda, Md., where she was captain of the tennis team, leader of the spoken-word poetry club and edited her school literary magazine. She loves music and writing and is very relieved to be finished with the painful process of applying to colleges. Here, she reflects on what she learned along the way. — Susan Svrluga
At my lowest moment during the college application process, I closed the blinds in my room and buried my head in despair.
My email was filling up with rejections from schools that I had worked so hard to impress with my applications. Even worse, my phone was buzzing with texts and Facebook posts from friends who were getting good news from their first choice schools — some of which had turned me away.
Two months later, I feel much better. I ended up with a fistful of rejections, but ultimately had two great options: the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Maryland. The school I chose didn’t start near the top of my list.
But then, nothing about this insanely unpredictable process went as I expected.