My Cornell Engineering Application Essay

With a tremendous shove, the oversized paper airplane sailed from my grasp and out the second-story window. Half a roll of tape, extreme childhood enthusiasm, and far more sheets of printing paper than my parents cared to part with had all coalesced into a magnificent, unwieldy, floppy monstrosity. A huge smile filled my face as I watched my contraption finally glide unsteadily across the lawn. 

Over a decade later, that curiosity for things that soar has only grown. By fortifying my lifelong fascination with aircraft and spacecraft with the physics and mathematics knowledge to begin comprehending their workings, my academics have fostered a true passion for the mechanics of flight. Thus, I found Cornell’s aerospace engineering minor instantly captivating.

Ordinarily, this specialization comes at the cost of other educational opportunities. In most schools, studying aerospace necessitates a narrowed focus, not a broadened one. Cornell Engineering deeply appeals to me through its exact opposite approach. Far from treating my passion as a limiting factor, Sibley instead offers it as an extension of an already-comprehensive mechanical engineering major. Similarly, Cornell’s university nature intrigues me far more than the structure of tech institutes, as it would provide boundless access to outstanding liberal arts classes and electives alongside my technical studies. By letting students investigate their preoccupations without restricting their overall academics, Cornell Engineering creates a perfect environment for the exploratory, interdisciplinary type of community I crave.

This atmosphere of encouraging personal interests alongside larger goals manifests perfectly in Cornell Engineering’s astounding array of project teams. Not only do groups like Cornell Mars Rover let students apply their specific skills and passions to real-world problems, but generate a powerful convergence of disparate engineering majors in the process.