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Show HN: UChicago admissions asked me to find Waldo. I did.
- brianchu 14y agoVery cool, and something that probably will impress admissions officers, though I think it's generally not a good idea to publicly publish admissions essays until after the deadline.
- superuser2 14y agoI applied early action before publishing, and the deadline will pass in a few minutes.
- kenko 14y agoWaitaminute, Supplement to the Common Application? Oh, Chicago, how you have strayed!
- carterschonwald 14y agoi'm sure many enterprising young applicants used the same essay for both the common and (un)common apps.
- Evbn 14y agoParent was lamenting Chicago's decline into "common" status.
- prakashk 14y agoAs a parent of a kid who is currently undergoing this "torture" of the admissions process [1], I beg to differ. The Common Application is definitely one of the ways the pain is alleviated. I wouldn't want to imagine the times when every college/university had their own application format. Every institution that uses the Common App also has their own supplement and I have seen them very varied in complexity: from simple one-page form with no additional essays to much more involved ones with three essays. The supplement is now the place where the institution can show how "special" they are and how rigorous their admissions process is. I wish all colleges went the Common App route. [1] I didn't go to college in the United States, so I didn't really have any idea how complex this process is until now.
- mvzink 14y agoThere was a trend of renewed lamentations over the "de-weirding" of UChicago following the Common App switch, but they seem to have fallen off after 4 years...
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- m0th87 14y agoOP is likely in high school, give him/her a break. Better than anything I produced at that age.
- superuser2 14y agoIt really isn't novel, and it's certainly not elegant. This is an admissions essay, not a masters thesis. I'm not asking for a degree; I'm asking to be recognized as having potential.
- purewater 14y agoFYI, you made typo on "Boltzmann" in the essay. Edit: looks like you already submitted the essay. Oh well. Good luck :)
- superuser2 14y agoYep, thanks. Nothing I can do about it now :(. Actually caught that one while editing, but "fixed" it incorrectly. The public version is correct now, though.
- gtani 14y agoBest o luck. I tried something similar with Stanford, submitting some APL code and a detailed explanation... didn't work that well. I love the U of C, great school but not necessarily an easy place to go to school. The CS people are one of the few bastions of SML among CS depts.
- haldean 14y agoFYI: your essay is giving me an access denied error: <Error> <Code>AccessDenied</Code> <Message>Access Denied</Message> <RequestId>A5B17F2AF38ADC02</RequestId> <HostId> 3nvDN913QSL0zKSFhKcMZfhtVLAER4DU45ZNNP3K+cbtuNWze9IKOwDpovxl0Foz </HostId> </Error>
- superuser2 14y agoFixed, thanks.
- Pwnguinz 14y agoNot fixed for me. And presumably for anyone else, either.
- superuser2 14y agoWould you mind trying again? I did "Grantee: Everyone" but forget to check the Open/Download box in the S3 console. Looks like it's working now, but famous last words, etc.
- trb 14y agoIt works for me, so it's publicly accessible now.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- joezhou 14y agoGood job! Wish I'd thought of this when I was applying for college
- johndbritton 14y agoIf you don't get a full ride at school I'd recommend that you go straight into industry. It seems that you've already got enough skill to get hired, and once you do that you'll get paid to learn on the job.
- rayiner 14y agoI'd recommend taking this advice with a grain of salt. OP is clearly talented, and a U of C degree will pay huge dividends down the line. There are lots of great jobs closed to people without a top-notch degree on their resume. Though balancing debt for college is always something that should be kept in mind.
- jjm 14y agoBump for the _balls_ to do this AND for opening it up for everyone to review (usually good preconditions for a good foss developer).
- modernise 14y agoCorrection: I have.
- marcuswestin 14y agoI'm a UoC comp sci alumnus working at silicon valley startups since graduation in '08. Though a fantastic place in many ways, it's not one to encourage actually building stuff. If you're a hacker who loves to see code run and solve real world problems you may be frustrated at the UoC. I was :) on the other hand, if you go through with their BS degree in CS then you will have learnt a lot of fascinating theory. Best of luck my friend! And ping me at marcuswestin@gmail.com to say hi or if you have any questions. Cheers :)
- superuser2 14y agoI "prospied" last weekend and the professor I met at Hack Night said that the systems side of the department has a stronger focus in that area, though he may be in the minority there. The theory side is interesting as well, though I don't want to get too far away from reality. Thanks so much! This is why I love HN. I will definitely be in touch.
- mvzink 14y agoNow I regret missing hack night last week! I hope you got to meet some of our outstanding crew. Sounds like you talked to Borja. I had the good fortune to meet him when I visited and probably wouldn't have even bothered with a 4 year college if I hadn't. Here's hoping your essay does the trick! Shoot me an email if you want to discuss UChicago: mvz@mvz.so
- bwaldrep 14y agoUofC fourth-year CS major here. While the department is still heavily focused on theory, over the last three years it has greatly improved its offerings as far as practical hacking goes. In the last two years alone several new systems faculty have been hired and the student hacker rso has grown dramatically. http://hack.uchicago.edu http://hack.uchicago.edu
- wdr1 14y ago> If you're a hacker who loves to see code run and solve real world problems you may be frustrated at the UoC I graduated from the U of C in '97. Did the startup thing for a while, then went on to Yahoo & Google. In my early career, I used to lament the fact that the U of C hadn't taught me various "practical" things. I was shocked the first time I heard a coworker mentioned they had a class on just a programming language. Eventually, I grew to appreciate that those "practical" things both change & are relatively easy to learn on your own. Whereas an academic environment is a much easier place to learn things like theory. Not to say they need to be mutually exclusive, just to say there is value in the emphasis on theory. All that said, and as much as I love the U of C, I'd tell a high school kid interest in Comp Sci to go to Stanford, U of I, or CMU.
- iopuy 14y agoQuestion, can essays contain pictures and diagrams? This seems like one of those pitfalls like using profanity to stress your awesomeness in a job application cover letter while everything else tells you not to.
- superuser2 14y agoIt was explicitly allowed by a question last year, though this year's supplement is silent on that issue. So maybe not, and I wouldn't pull that at an institution with a different culture, but all 6 questions are curveballs and clearly designed to encourage creativity. I don't think they'll mind.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- tymekpavel 14y agoThis is very impressive. However, I think the essay was poorly written. The point of the essay is not just to highlight your talents, but also to present yourself in a coherent manner. I feel like you focused a lot on the coding aspect and half-cooked the writing, which happens all too often in this industry. Nevertheless, good job on the project; you got an early start on a bright future.
- superuser2 14y agoTrue, it wasn't a great piece of writing. I was going for clarity and the ability to communicate technical ideas to nontechnical people rather than style. The other two essays in the application are much more personable and higher-quality prose.
- spamizbad 14y agoI disagree. I'd estimate his writing skills are in the 95%+ percentile for 17/18 year olds. In the last 5-7 years, the English curriculum in US schools has changed significantly in an effort to improve NCLB reading scores. One part of the curriculum that had to get trimmed down was writing composition. These days, unless you were home schooled or attended grades 9-12 at a quality private school, you probably won't be taught how to write a proper essay until college.
- brianchu 14y agoKeep in mind that the University of Chicago is considered roughly a top 10 university (tied for 4th, if US News is to be trusted, which of course it should not). The 25th percentile of admitted students is at the 95th percentile of SAT scores. Rest assured, 80%+ of people who are admitted into the University of Chicago know how to write a decent essay (the other 20% allowing for athletes and development cases). That being said, I don't find anything wrong with his writing, especially since he is writing a short technical explanation rather than a reflective memoir.
- travisp 14y ago>the other 20% allowing for athletes and development cases Chicago is not known for letting people in because they are athletes... >80%+ of people who are admitted into the University of Chicago know how to write a decent essay Actually, as an '06 U of C grad, I was a little bit shocked at how poorly the majority of the first years wrote. I say this without praising my own writing abilities as necessarily better. If the students represent some of the best in the country (they probably do), it doesn't say anything positive about writing eduction in the country.
- memset 14y agoThis is neat! Best of luck to you! Here is a thought: one of your goals with this essay is to write it as a "counselor-friendly essay". Do you feel like it is as friendly as it could be? I think there is tremendous value in being able to explain technical concepts to non-technical people, and a skill that is worth practicing. Iterate on this essay! Or write more of them! How would you "tell a story" while conveying this information? Is that even possible? Or even worthwhile? Tinker with it. The one thing I really liked about your essay was the end: "To reliably solve this sort of problem, I’m told, I’d want to [use fancy computer science terminology]. So, UChicago, shall we revisit this question in CMSC 35400 (Machine Learning) or CMSC 35500 (Computer Vision)?" It ties this back to your own personal goals and how they mesh with the university. Great stuff.
- chris_wot 14y agoI'd say this is counsellor friendly. One of the most impressive things was that he was willing to acknowledge sources - basically he gave credit where it was due. This doesn't take away from his essay, instead it shows that he can use existing ideas in an original way. I hope he gets accepted! I tip my hat to the author.
- dbecker 14y agoThe admissions counselors should be very impressed with what you've done. I know I'm impressed. Of course, someone with your amount of skill and drive will be successful no matter where you go to school.
- imrehg 14y agoCongrats! Related video: Werner Herzog reads "Where's Waldo", it's a really chilling story! http://youtu.be/EvWh6PMi9Ek http://youtu.be/EvWh6PMi9Ek
- hakanito 14y agoGood job! Piece of advice from someone already at uni, you should write your reports in LaTeX. I've been doing it for a couple of years now and I'm amazed how often professors complement the layout, structure and readability. Of course, the actual content matters to... But in fact, for a report written using LaTeX vs. Microsoft Word, in my experience the LaTeX version would certainly receive a higher grade.
- jasonkester 14y agoAwesome. And I feel for this guy, knowing what the next four years is going to be like for him. Sitting in classes listening to an instructor spend a whole week explaining how a "for" loop works to students who for the most part won't be able to successfully write their own "for" loop by the time they graduate (with a 3.5 GPA in CS). I wish there was a degree path in "software" rather than "computer science", since that's what a kid like this needs. Turning algorithms into code is clearly solved for him. But I bet a few years of turning "nothing" into "shipping software" would be a lot more useful (or at least a lot less of a waste of time).
- lewispollard 14y agoI'm in the UK and did a degree in software engineering which was pretty light on comp sci theory, but still had the similar pain of sitting through basic programming structure lectures for almost 2 years before hitting any kind of complicated software problems.
- highace 14y agoI can relate. I'm also from the UK and in the final year of my comp-sci based degree took a module titled 'Web Application Development'. Cool - we're going to be building a web app, I thought. Wrong - it was an introduction to HTML, CSS, and javascript. We didn't even have to make anything, just write snippets. In the final year for fuck's sake. What a waste of £20k.
- lewispollard 14y agoAh, mine wasn't so bad, my second year 'browser based applications' module involved creating open data mashups with jQuery, and a third year module in 'architectures and frameworks' used Groovy on Grails, so we did get into some pretty good modern stuff eventually.
- borplk 14y agoIt is difficult to say this without sounding arrogant but my god did I suffer during my college years because of this. Every class, every project, every assignment I felt damn I already know all this. It also makes team work a torture. I didn't want to ruin other people's experience by being the know it all guy. So I just avoided teamwork as much as I could because pretending that I'm challenged by the question/project got even more depressing. Having to pay thousands of dollars for it makes it even harder (I simply had to do it as I'm not a citizen). I'd think man there's so much more that I could do with this money I'm paying for something I already know. That's not to say I think I know a lot, in fact I think I know very little but just that the college wasn't providing anything new for me (and yes it was one of the top ones). I'm learning more by reading books and posts on the internet, hacker news, etc... and by doing actual work in the industry.
- njs12345 14y agoPlease keep us posted with whether you're successful, superuser2! The essay is fairly transparent but points to an interesting tradeoff between counselor and professor when it comes to the question of whether it is accepted.
- haubey 14y agoSo you wrote the Waldo essay, eh? I wrote the present essay. Good luck to you, and good luck to us all.
- gms 14y agoI wish I was this competent at that age.
- Aldor 14y agoWell now my essay feels inadequate... But seriously though, good job, and best of luck!
- paborden 14y agoWent to U of C ... Interviewed prospective students ... all that. And, frankly: this essay knocks it out of the park. My essay (which, I'm convinced, got me into the school) was similarly off the wall. Remember that the point of a response like this ... in addition to being well-reasoned, thought-out, and written ... is to leave a unique impression in the reader's mind ... one where, after they've read a gazillion apps that day, makes them say "admit the waldo programming kid!"