Vanderbilt University 申请人，在写作时的相关经典真题解析
1. Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.
【类别】相关经历型
【关键词】background, story, identity
【题目翻译】对于某些学生而言，经历的一些故事对他们的个性来说非常重要，重要到如果他们不呈现出这些故事，整个申请就是不完整的。如果你是这样的学生，那么请跟我们分享你的故事。
【题目分析】一方面来说这是一个比较开放的文题——讲述一个关于你自己的故事。关键词是背景、故事、个性。首先，background更多地是指你的成长背景，由大到小，包括社会、国家、生活的城市、学校、班级，或者是家庭;其次，故事就是在这些背景下，你的经历、见闻，大到不平凡的比赛获奖，小到平凡的生活琐事;最后也是最重要的，你选择的这些故事必须是最能体现你个性的，最具有代表性的。因此这也是一个被关键词限定的比较不开放的文题。在选择故事和行文方式的时候都要考虑到以上各种因素。
【范文】
“April is the cruellest month”, not because I was as sensitive as T. S. Eliot, but the April of two years ago was when I began my weight-reducing plan and had to say goodbye to most of my favourite foods.
I had been a member of swim team in school since Grade four, large amount of practices kept calories I took in from being stored as fat. However, after I left the swim team and stopped intense training, my uncontrolled eating desire led to a chubby me and then a big fat.
As a girl in adolescence, I actually did worry about my fat problem, especially when I saw other girls who wore beautiful dresses, walked gracefully with breeze brushing past. How I wish I could be as slim and slender as them! But as soon as hunger attacked me, I would throw away all the fantasies and embrace tasty foods right away. Obviously, I need something stronger to push me into the track of losing weight, so when the doctor told me that obesity was affecting my health, I knew it was time to take an action, for my health and a more beautiful me.
After an intense family discussion, my original and lazy proposal of not eat anything at all to make everything fast was surely to be crossed. We worked out the simplest and easiest plan—eat, but less, exercise more. I only had to cut my suppers and take exercises instead, but it would be a long lasting process, honestly, I was not sure if I could keep to the plan to the last at that time.
At first, it was really tough to bear hunger and focus on moving at the same time. My nose became more sensitive at the smell of food than before, and if I were a cartoon character at that time, my mouth water would have formed a wild sea. Besides the cutting suppers, I also had to keep miles away from my favourite McDonald’s. My parents also found me a job, teaching a friend of theirs how to swim every weekend, to promote my amount of exercise in a different way; meanwhile I was challenged by largely stimulated appetite after swim.
I remembered once I could not help stopping at the food stands on my way home after finishing swimming class, staring at the fried chicken steaks, fried rice, barbecue and other delicious snacks. The smell and the sound of oil frying chickens eroded my will. I wondered between the bus stop and food stands with hands already reaching into pocket for money, when I seized all my money in hand and took a look around so that I could make up my mind to break the “no snack” rules, I saw girls in pretty dresses talking and smiling to their companies under the warm spring night sky, while I was in loose sporty suit, struggled and looked like an idiot. “Just go home and say goodbye to those poisons!” I shouted to myself.
Struggles like this would happen a couple of times every month, but I found a way to destroy those evil desires: hanging my dream dress on the wall in my room, to remind me, no matter how hard the process would be, the beautiful result was worth waiting.
Now I am not the old me anymore. I have fulfilled my plan and managed to put myself in that gorgeous dress. I can walk like a bird, not an elephant. And do you think I have stopped my plan? No, it has already been part of my life, only not that strict and tight as before, because I know that it can only be me myself who is responsible for my future and I cannot destroy what I have got from the past times—my strong will power and a healthy beautiful body.(648 words )
【范文解析】
文章通过写自己减肥的经历表现自己在这个过程中如何锻炼并增强意志力与自制力。文中刻画了一些细节，比如在面对诱惑时内心的挣扎，如何体现在自己的行为上，最后又是因为什么说服自己掉头走开。这些细节不仅以小见大地丰富和生动了故事情节，而且保持了上下文的逻辑完整性。另外，在讲故事时，对于背景的简单介绍和后事的概述也让故事保持了完整性，并且衍生出自己经过这个事件之后的感受和收获，暗示并强调了自己想通过这个故事表现出的内容。
在选好了题材和表现手法之后，行文的重点就是保持文章的逻辑完整，内容上最好能生动有趣，这样更能给读者留下深刻印象。
2. Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure. How did it affect you, and what lessons did you learn?
【类别】相关经历型
【关键词】failure, affect, lessons
【题目翻译】描述你经历挫折的一次事件或一段时间。它是怎样对你产生影响的?你从中得到什么教训?
【题目分析】这是一个指向性很明确的题目——描述一次受到挫折的经历，从中受到的影响，学到了什么。对于申请者来说，受到的挫折无非是学习成绩的不理想、家庭矛盾、与同学之间的关系，还有外部环境带来的一些问题，比如转学之后新的环境所引发的一系列矛盾。
在选材和行文过程中，需要注意的是，受到的影响可以是身体上的，也可以是心理上的，而得到的教训是精华部分——这个教训或许给你以后的人生提供了长远性的指导，也可能是你人生的转折点，也可能只是某一次以小见大的错误。被失败打击是很正常的事情，但是如何从失败中吸取经验教训，如何化失败为动力，则是情商和智商的重要体现，是你的个人能力和个性特征的部分反映。
另外，得到的教训和经验往往跟受到挫败的原因有直接关系，所以这也是选材时应该考虑的重要因素。
【范文】
During one winter vacation, I got a phone call from the sister of my friend’s. She asked with a worrying voice if I knew where my friend was, “she got mad at our little jokes about her new hairstyle and ran away from home”.
Listening to what she said, I felt a strong sense of familiarity, same story but happened on different person. Yes, I used to be that short-tempered and could easily hurt people who were close to me when things did not follow my will.
When I was just stepped in middle school, the closest friend I had got was my deskmate. Contrary to my quiet and serious look, she was outgoing and talkative, very popular in school. At first, we got along with each other quite well, and thanks to her, I made new friends with many other schoolmates. However, with time went on, I started to throw my manner away and lose temper at her because of some incredibly childish reasons, from “she failed to buy me the right food as I asked” to “I was cut in line”—everything that made me unhappy would trigger my dreadful silence towards her. Most of the time, she could just ignore my silence and keep talking to me to cheer me up, and I would soon recover from negative mood, acting like nothing happened.
Obviously, this kind of friendship was too “healthy” to last long. Once, we were on our way to cafeteria with another friend who I told that I would get mad at whoever crossed my line, including my closest friends. To prove my cool and special character, I rolled my eyes towards my deskmate with no reason and out of a sudden, when she was too noisy talking about gossips, her face flashed unhappy at that time, but I was thinking that she would have been accustomed to my action mode, and would never take my irrational acts seriously. However, this time, she went away without a notice. What’s worse, I did not feel my wrongness but being pissed off by her leaving. I looked awful that day and did not response to anyone who tried to talk to me.
As a result, I was isolated. It looked like that everything had got back to the original point where I got into middle school—did everything alone with no one’s help and company. But after I had tasted the sweet of friendship, how could I get over all the loneliness and hardships all by myself?
“Haven’t you realized your moody and self-centred trouble?” That was her answer when I could not bear my isolated situation anymore and came to her to make up our friendship.
Finally, I got to realize what exactly my problem was. Her words inspired me like a wakeup call. At that night, I thought about her words many times, with pictures that how I treated her with unfriendly tone or unpleasant faces; I was even reminded of my improper manner of dealing with my family. I hurt so many people that cared for me. They treated me with patience and tolerance, and I just took it all for granted. I ignored the truth that love should be mutual and in most circumstances, how you treat other people decided the way they would treat you.
I decided to change my bad manner, learn empathy, switch from “I and my friend” to “my friend and I”. I posted a letter on my personal homepage and wrote one to my parents, reflecting on my immatureness and mistakes while expressing my deep regrets. As I harboured humbleness and care, everything became flow; even the negative feelings were less to hit me. My new life began.
Now that my friend seemed to suffer from the same problem as I did before. A wakeup call was definitely needed to save her from self-torture. (647 words)
【范文解析】
本文选择的一次挫折是因为自己的古怪性格而被同学孤立的事件。文章花了较大篇幅在背景故事和被孤立之后的部分，对于孤立的故事本身并没有太多着墨，因为挫折本身在这里并不是最重要的，重要的是故事的逻辑性和作者如何从这次孤立事件中学到一生都受用的东西。
全文并没有直接从介绍自己的挫折开篇，而是用另一个故事引入，自然地回忆自己过去的经历、收获和不幸。
需要铭记，这是一次讲故事的过程，讲述生活是如何启发了你的过程，而不是介绍挫折的过程。