The Summary of "Trauma Essay" by Tina Yong

The tittle about the rise of the “Trauma Essay” in college Applications by Tina Yong in TED Talks (TED.com) There's a story of mine that I've told about a million different times, and it goes a little something like this. I believe that these are not only bad metrics by which to evaluate applicants, but also incredibly harmful to the storyteller themselves and risks reinforcing existing inequities in higher education. Aya Waller-Bey, a former admissions officer from Georgetown University, said in a "Forbes" article that, "Within months on the job, I saw how the personal statements of Black and other racially minoritized students differed from those of white applicants. That kind of emotional labor can be taxing for anybody, but perhaps especially so for these young applicants who haven't had enough time on this world to process the terrible things that have happened to them. I mean, imagine if you walked into your therapy appointment and your therapist tells you that they're not going to respond to anything you tell them except with a rejection or acceptance email sent months later. And asking students to prove how they turn their pain into progress ignores this truth and falls prey to the toxic positivity narrative that everything happens for a reason, ignoring the very valid resentment and anger that many victims still feel. And if we're writing about our trauma to prove to an admissions officer that we are worthy of a decent education, then it becomes necessary to sanitize our pain, to make it marketable and strategic, to scrub away all the suffering, so all that's left is what will fit into the narrow margins of what is palatable. The protagonist also overcomes whatever struggle they're facing by the end of the 500 word count, instilling the reader with a sense of optimism that despite our deeply unequal society, it is possible to rise through the ranks and overcome all the “-isms.” This, of course, is not the reality of our world today. And for me, this looked like settling for the familiar story of the stinky lunch, one that's been told so many times that it's devoid of any real meaning, instead of talking about the ongoing social and political disenfranchisement of immigrants, the permanent loss of cultural identity that I suffered, or the sense of disbelonging that still haunts me every time I make a grammar mistake or someone mispronounces my name. But in failing to resolutely clear up these speculations and myths about whether trauma essays are rewarded or discouraged, universities are indirectly enabling the rise of the trauma essay and all of its harmful implications. If it's really true that they don't want to reward trauma storytelling just for the sake of it, then they should be more forthcoming about this expectation. As the unofficial gatekeepers to the secrets of getting into your dream college, they should wield their power responsibly and not pressure students to talk about traumatic experiences that they're not yet ready to talk about. Lastly -- and this one's for anyone who's actually applying to a postsecondary institution sometime soon -- remember that you are more than the bad things that happened to you. Instead of being written as a one-dimensional, trauma-turned-triumph trauma drama, I would have been able to tell a story that actually reflects who I am today and acknowledge the fact that my journey is ongoing and it doesn't begin or end with my racial identity.