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How to Write Brown’s Perspective Essay

This article was written based on the information and opinions presented by Shane Niesen and Vinay Bhaskara i n a CollegeVine livestream. You can watch the full livestream for more info.

What’s Covered:

Why this prompt is important, avoiding admission officers’ biases, why someone else should read your essay.

The second Brown University supplemental essay asks students to respond to the following prompt:

Brown’s culture fosters a community in which students challenge the ideas of others and have their ideas challenged in return, promoting a deeper and clearer understanding of the complex issues confronting society. This active engagement in dialogue is as present outside the classroom as it is in academic spaces. Tell us about a time you were challenged by a perspective that differed from your own. How did you respond? (200-250 words) 

In this article, we discuss why this prompt is so important, how to be aware of a reader’s bias, and why having someone else proofread your essay is essential. 

Brown’s second essay is all about being challenged by a perspective different from your own. One of the trickiest parts about this essay is to avoid focusing on presenting the two perspectives and the battle between them. This is not the point of the prompt. Brown admissions officers want to read about your perspective and your thought process when challenged. 

The goal of this prompt is to demonstrate how you think about the world, address challenges, and approach conflict. There is no avoiding conflict in life—over the past few years, for example, our society has experienced a great deal of friction due to opposing perspectives—so do your best to share your thought process around conflict. Dive into how you approach being confronted with differing opinions. 

There are a few questions that you can home in on for this prompt. You can write about your perspective, who challenged you, how it felt being challenged, and if that changed your perspective. This doesn’t mean you have to write about the exact time and place when your mind changed—maybe you felt even stronger about your beliefs after being challenged. The point is that you want to demonstrate that this confrontation had some sort of impact on you. 

Don’t be afraid to step away from the broader issues in our society or politics. Try to focus on a personal situation for this prompt. This will not only make you stand out from the crowd, but it will also help you avoid the biases of the admissions officers. Of course, admissions officers are aware that they will read the essays of students who share different perspectives than their own, but by writing about a personal conflict or issue, you’re more likely to avoid this issue entirely. 

Appealing to the admissions officers is a crucial part of your essay. You want the reader to like you or at least empathize with your perspective. This is why you should check yourself and your opinions while writing. You can do this by sharing your essay with someone else and asking for feedback. If that person tells you that they didn’t like how you talked about your opinion, that’s a sign that the admission officers won’t like it either. 

Ask your reader for feedback on the structure and content of your essay. A big mistake that students make is spending too much time narrating the problem rather than reflecting on the story. Your essay will ideally contain deeply personal topics, so most of it should focus on your emotions and headspace.

Related CollegeVine Blog Posts

• What Is a Perspective Essay?

KRISTINA BARROSO

25 jun 2018.

Unless you happen to love writing, and it comes naturally to you, you probably aren’t a big fan of writing essays. If you're like most people, though, you likely do enjoy telling others what you think. Even if you don’t like to write, a perspective essay can be fun because you get to express yourself in ways that most other types of essays don’t allow. Whether you are completing an English class assignment, preparing for the essay component of a standardized test like the ACT or submitting a piece for possible publication in a media outlet, knowing how to write a quality perspective essay is a useful addition to your repertoire of skills.

Explore this article

• How to Choose a Topic for a Perspective Essay
• Perspective Essay Format

1 What Is a Perspective Essay?

A perspective essay is an opportunity to voice your thoughts and opinions on a given topic. The primary purpose of a perspective essay is to express your views and then provide adequate support for those views using concrete examples. Support and analysis of your opinions is what sets a perspective essay apart from randomly spouting your thoughts on things without bothering to back them up.

2 How to Choose a Topic for a Perspective Essay

If you have many strong opinions, it may be difficult to decide what you want to write about. The best rule of thumb when it comes to choosing a topic for a perspective essay is to select one that you genuinely care about. Something you are passionate about will be far easier to write and will likely lead to a better piece than a topic you aren’t all that interested in. Consider writing about current events that intrigue you or a controversial issue that you have strong feelings about. No matter what topic you ultimately choose, be sure to take a clear position on it. A perspective essay is not the place to be neutral. Pick a side and support it with a healthy mixture of opinion and facts.

3 Perspective Essay Format

Perspective essays typically adhere to the standard format of an introductory paragraph followed by multiple body paragraphs and a conclusion. The introduction should start out with a hook that draws in the reader and a thesis statement that outlines the most important points that the essay will focus on. Each paragraph in the body of the essay should elaborate on, and provide evidence for, each of the points mentioned in the introduction. The conclusion should summarize the essay and restate your thesis in a new way. Since a perspective essay includes your personal experiences, it should be written in the first-person point of view.

• 1 California State University at Northridge; Basics, Format, Tips
• 2 Reference: How to Write a Perspective Essay?
• 3 Study Hub: The Essay Guide: Adopting a Critical Perspective
• 4 Rutgers: Perspectives Application Essay Guidelines

About the Author

Kristina Barroso earned a B.A. in Psychology from Florida International University and works full-time as a classroom teacher in a public school. She teaches middle school English to a wide range of students from struggling readers to advanced and gifted populations. In her spare time, she loves writing articles about education for TheClassroom.com, WorkingMother and other education sites.

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Perspective Essay Example Papers and Sample Topic Ideas

Unless you love writing and it comes naturally to you, you probably won't be delighted when assigned essays on perspective. Most people, though, like telling others what they think. So, if you are one of them, writing such kind of paper can be fun because you have an opportunity to express your thoughts on a particular topic. That's the primary purpose of essays about perspective - to share your views and support them with concrete examples.

For those who don't know how to start their piece of content, we've prepared an ever-widening collection of samples that can serve as a valuable source of information and best writing practices. Skim the papers, and you will learn how to create a piece on perspective and deal with your assignment faster. Besides, feel free to use our examples as templates for your own essays. Just stick to the structure and formatting style.

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Your chance of acceptance, your chancing factors, extracurriculars, tips on writing a perspective essay.

So I have this assignment where I have to write a perspective essay on a controversial issue. Any suggestions to make it more engaging and convincing? It would be great if you guys could share your experiences too!

Writing a perspective essay on a controversial issue can be very interesting and thought-provoking. Here are some tips to make your essay engaging and convincing:

1. Pick a topic that genuinely interests you: Choose a subject that you are passionate about and have a strong opinion on. This will make it easier for you to write and will come across as more authentic to the reader.

2. Do thorough research: Understand both sides of the controversial issue and gather evidence to support your perspective. This will help you have a more informed, well-rounded opinion and will allow you to address counter-arguments effectively.

3. Write a strong thesis statement: Clearly state your perspective in the form of a thesis statement at the beginning of your essay. Ensure it is concise and specific, which will help the reader understand your position.

4. Use a mix of evidence types: Utilize a variety of evidence types - statistics, personal anecdotes, and expert opinions - to strengthen your argument. This will make your essay more engaging and persuasive.

5. Address counter-arguments: Acknowledge the opposing viewpoint and explain why your perspective is more valid or accurate. Be respectful and avoid falling into ad hominem attacks. This approach will make your essay more balanced and credible.

6. Organize your thoughts: Use clear and logical organization in your essay. Divide your essay into an introduction, body paragraphs with well-structured arguments, and a conclusion that wraps up your points and restates your thesis.

7. Be concise and clear: Use short sentences, precise language, and avoid jargon. Clarity in your writing will make it easier for readers to understand and follow your argument.

8. Revise and edit your essay: Revisit your essay multiple times to ensure it is polished, well-written, and free of errors. Be open to feedback from others. Peer reviews and teacher feedback can be invaluable in improving your essay.

As for personal experiences, I once wrote a perspective essay on the merits and drawbacks of standardized testing in education. I chose this topic because I felt passionate about it and had firsthand experience with its impact. By incorporating personal anecdotes, researching extensively, and addressing counter-arguments, I was able to construct a compelling essay that successfully conveyed my viewpoint.

Best of luck with your perspective essay! Remember to stay true to your beliefs while also acknowledging and addressing counter-arguments. This will not only make your essay engaging, but also more persuasive.

About CollegeVine’s Expert FAQ

CollegeVine’s Q&A seeks to offer informed perspectives on commonly asked admissions questions. Every answer is refined and validated by our team of admissions experts to ensure it resonates with trusted knowledge in the field.

perspective

What is perspective definition, usage, and literary examples, perspective definition.

Perspective  (purr-SPEK-tihv) is the way a character’s perceptions, values, and opinions affect a story. It is influenced by factors like personality, socioeconomic status, cultural background, education, spirituality, and language. These details all inform a character’s beliefs and attitudes, giving them a distinct way of perceiving the world, which in turn shapes the narrative. In fact, the word  perspective  stems from the Latin  prospectus , which means “view.”

How Perspective Is Used

Perspective relays a scene or concept through the mind of a specific character. A narrator may tell a story using their own perspective or by adopting another character’s. Stories can include a single perspective or several. For example, in Charlotte Brontë’s  Jane Eyre , the story is filtered through the perspective of its eponymous heroine. In Jane Austen’s  Pride and Prejudice , however, the third-person narrator adopts the perspective of several characters. Writers can portray perspective through techniques like  first-person narration ,  omniscient  narration, stream of consciousness, and breaking the fourth wall.

Stories with close or limited  points of view  can still express multiple perspectives, particularly through dialogue. In speaking for themselves, characters can make observations and judgments that contrast with those of the viewpoint character. However, not every perspective is relevant. Writers use context and detail to indicate which ones are most important. Readers are more inclined to trust a character who speaks earnestly than one who speaks haughtily, for example.

Writers can also emphasize perspective by using a distinct writing style.  Room  by Emma Donoghue is told from the perspective of a young boy, and the novel’s rhetorical style reflects his youth and naivete. This technique can be useful when writing an unreliable narrator, as readers are immediately made aware of the speaker’s limitations.

Perspective and Point of View

Perspective is how a story is presented to readers. A character’s background shapes the lens through which they see the world, which influences how they view and recount events in a story. Point of view is simply the rhetorical strategy used to convey that perspective.

There are several types of point of view.

• First person is narrated by a single character who uses the pronouns  I ,  me ,  we , and  us . First-person narration is considered limited because it’s confined to the viewpoint of a single character.
• Second person is narrated as if the reader is a character. It uses the pronouns  you  and  your .
• Third person is narrated from an outside perspective using  he / she ,  his / her ,  they , and  them . This is the most common point of view in fiction.

Why Writers Use Perspective

Perspective is the way writers communicate views and observations in their works. They can share such views overtly through a narrator who clearly speaks their mind, or they can take a subtler approach, filtering a character’s perspective through an omniscient narrator.

Nonfiction writers explicitly express their own perspective through first-person narration, which is common in the memoir genre. However, it’s important to remember that a narrative does not necessary reflect the writer’s own perspective, beliefs, or values.

Because perspective is informed by several parameters, from environment to psychology, it tends to be complex. Just as readers find multidimensional characters more authentic, multidimensional perspectives enrich a story, making it more engaging and realistic. And because no two characters have the same personality or background, each has a unique perspective. That’s why a story can change depending on who is narrating, and some writers use multiple viewpoints to add depth and complexity to their stories.

As mentioned, rhetorical strategy can emphasize perspective. Writers can use these heightened perspectives to stimulate the reader’s empathy and reinforce the narrative’s main theme or argument. Take  Black Beauty ; this novel is narrated by a horse, and its lessons about treating all life with respect resonate more powerfully because of it.

Perspective in Art

Where literary perspective is the lens through which a story is told, artistic perspective is how a three-dimensional subject is represented on a two-dimensional surface, such as a canvas. Artistic perspective uses lines and color to create illusions of depth and space.

Perspective in art falls into two major categories: linear, which relies on parallel lines, horizons, and vanishing points to suggest distance; and aerial (or atmospheric), which uses the fact that distant objects appear blue to suggest distance. Da Vinci’s  The Adoration of the Magi  is an example of linear perspective, while Frans Koppelaar’s  Landscape near Bologna  uses aerial perspective.

Perspective Examples in Literature

1. James Joyce,  A Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man

A Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man  is a semiautobiographical novel. It recounts the childhood of Stephen Dedalus, who experiences an intellectual awakening as he ages. Part 1 begins:

Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo.

Joyce establishes Stephen’s youthful perspective using a few techniques. First, he alludes to childhood fairytales with the opening phrase “Once upon a time.” While this line strikes adults as cliched, it’s often how children signal they’re about to launch into a story. Joyce also adopts juvenile diction and syntax to further emphasize that this is a young, immature storyteller. Compare the excerpt above to this passage from Part 5:

He drained his third cup of watery tea to the dregs and set to chewing the crusts of fried bread that were scattered near him, staring into the dark pool of the jar.

Note how this narration is more complex and sophisticated, a clear signal that Stephen has aged and now has a more mature perspective.

2. William Butler Yeats, “The Second Coming”

Considered an eminent example of modernist poetry, Yeats wrote “The Second Coming” in 1919 to describe the atmosphere in Europe after World War I, which makes the poem a good example of how  context  informs perspective. This is the first stanza:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.

World War I seemed almost apoplectically destructive in its immediate aftermath, and the ramifications of such violence shook the foundations of European society. The interwar period was marked by disillusionment and fractured faith, both in civilization and in religion. The poem reflects this altered perspective through several images of instability and chaos, including the gyre, the falcon, and the crumbling, destabilized center.

Further Resources on Perspective

This NY Book Editors article  explains the difference between perspective and point of view, and provides tips for using perspective to improve your writing.

Orson Scott Card (author of  Ender’s Game ) explains how to develop characters and define their unique perspectives in his book  Character & Viewpoint .

Teachers can peruse this  Scholastic unit plan  for ideas on teaching literary perspective to elementary school students.

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Life is a Matter of Perspective: An Essay by Peter Bennett

Picasso went outside the boundaries to forge a new perspective.

A few years back, I worked in Laguna Hills, a city that rims Interstate 5 and is best known for being the address of Leisure World and home to lots of nondescript mortgage and auto design firms. There wasn’t one thing remarkable about the town or my job.

Then one day, I wandered and wound my way through the canyon on an extended lunch (don’t tell the boss) and discovered the other Laguna, a.k.a. Laguna Beach. Bronze people there were sunning in the sand, playing basketball or beach volleyball, painting on easels, sipping cocktails at Las Brisas, shopping with wide-brimmed hats and cruising that little crescent of sky-high real estate in expensive automobiles. Returning to work, I wondered how worlds just a few miles apart could be so different.

Why would anybody choose to live or work in a cesspool, Laguna Hills, when you can live in the cool pool, Laguna Beach? I mean, if you’re going to be a bum, why would you bed down in the bone-chilling streets of Fargo, North Dakota, instead of the balmy avenues of Santa Monica, Calif.?

These questions are important because your view of life is shaped and conditioned by where you sit. Keep looking through the same dusty lens, and pretty soon, you think that’s the way the whole world looks. You begin to see the world, not as it is, but as you are. What’s the saying? “It’s hard to see the real picture of life when you live inside the frame.”

Here’s what’s really maddening. All you have to do to change perception – to see the world anew — is to step outside the frame in which you live. In my case it was driving through the canyon and coming out the other side.

I’m fascinated, even obsessed with this business of perceptions because they so rule our lives, usually for the worse, not the better. Here are some common innocuous misperceptions.

·       The Canary Islands were not named after birds but wild dogs (canis).

·       Panama hats were woven first in Peru, Colombia and Ecuador from jijapa leaves. Only later did they become Panama hats because some American from the United States saw the new-style hat in Panama, and the name stuck.

·       The Pennsylvania Dutch supposedly living in Pennsylvania were really Germans from the Deutschland. It’s an easy mistake, Dutch/Deutsch, right?

·       The gates to St. Peters, the ones that you must pass through to enter heaven, are actually a dozen gates (Revelation 21:12-21).Who knew?

·       The battle of Bunker Hill was actually fought on Breed’s Hill … the list goes on.

The abovementioned misconceptions are harmless, but sometimes not having the right or correct perspective can take can take us down a more perilous road. Demonize someone or some cause, and it’s much easier to behead that person or prosecute a war. It was said that Anne Bolelyn had three breasts and an extra finger. These deformities were probably nothing more than an oversized mole and a double fingernail, but if you’re Henry VIII, and you need to conveniently dispose of your wife, so you can marry again, you turn her into a freak show. It worked.

Changing your view or changing your perspective can change your life for the better. That’s why it’s always important to seek fresh perspectives. Looking through a new lens –or just a clean one  — can put you in a whole new place and put you on a better life path.

Without perspective, you might not understand that even if you win the rat race, you’re still a rat. Instead of asking “Who Moved My Cheese? Ask, “How can I move myself out of here to get a better view of things?”

Put another way, what if you’ve been trying all your life to keep up with the Joneses, and the Joneses turn out to be schmucks? The only way you’ll know for sure is if you see life from another perspective. Do what you have to do, but get out of Dodge or Laguna Hills, if only for a day or a weekend.

If you can’t move yourself right away (It’s not easy. I stayed in Laguna Hills for three years), at least, know where you sit. That way, you’ll better know where you stand (starting to sound like Yogi).

If there’s no money to put gas in the tank, simply close your eyes and let your imagination drive you to your new destination. Fly to the moon like Neil Armstrong. Look back at Earth. How then would you see your role on this planet? Differently, of course, because you’ve literally changed your point of view.

Neil Armstrong

Another technique when you’re stuck too long in the same place is to try to envision life through the eyes of a child. Do you know the story of the little girl who stood in church in awe of the stained glass windows, her face bathed in a rainbow of warm color? “Who are those people in the window,” she asked. “Those are the saints,” the guide replied. That night the little girl told her mom about the amazing windows. “Who are the saints, the mother asked. “They are the people who let the light shine through.”

Once the light starts shining through, prepare yourself for some wonderful new experiences and revelations. Your creativity will blossom, your humor will increase, you’ll be a better “You” in every way. You’ll become more inventive, spiritual, flexible, thoughtful, considerate and interesting. You’ll have a new perspective on things. By flipping just a couple things around or standing old conventions on their head, a new world will open up. Here are some old topics and issues seen with fresh eyes:

Spiritualism: We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.

Humor: I’m well balanced. I have a chip on both shoulders.

Recruiting Talent: A baseball scout told the team manager, “I found the greatest pitcher of all time. He struck out 27 guys, only one guy had a foul tip.” The manager said, “Sign the guy who hit the foul ball.”

Compassion: To an orphan: “You have a striking resemblance to your father, God.”

Yourself: Are you in the way or on the way?

Politics: In 1912, Emmaline Panhurst went to prison 12 times in her fight to gain universal suffrage for women. “We are not here because we are lawbreakers; we are here in our efforts to become lawmakers,” she said.”

Sex: “Being with a woman all night never hurt no professional ballplayer. It’s staying up all night looking for a woman that does him in.”

Art: “Art is a lie that makes us realize the truth.” – Picasso

Prison: “I felt that I could go and have a vacation,” said Martha Stewart describing her attitude on serving five months in prison, an incarceration that forced her to slow down and smell the roses, even if they were behind barbed wire.

Jail: Ralph Waldo Emerson went to visit his fellow transcendentalist, Henry Thoreau in jail. Thoreau was protesting slavery by refusing to pay a poll tax. “Why are you in there?” Emerson asked. “Why are you out there?” Thoreau replied.

Raising Money: Be a professional fun – raiser.

Pessimism: A man asked his rabbi why is it that a slice of bread with butter on it always lands with the buttered side down. The rabbi had never heard this before, so they tried it. The rabbi buttered the bread, dropped it and it landed with the buttered side up. The rabbi pointed to it, and said, “Well?” The man protested, “But rabbi, you buttered the wrong side.” Understand that some sour pusses will never change, so there’s never a need to be angry at them. See what perspective can do.

Negativism: An optimist and a pessimist went goose hunting. The optimist shot down a big goose overhead. His dog leaped out of the boat, ran on top of the water, picked up the goose and ran back all the way on top of the water. The positive farmer said, “What do you think of that? The negative farmer shook his head in disgust. “Just what I thought,” he said, your dog can’t even swim.”

Sales: Instead of saying, “If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.” Try, “I will follow up with you in two weeks, but in the meantime, feel free to call with any questions.”

Tom Friedman

Economy/Education:   “Girls, when I was growing up, parents used to say to me, ‘Tom, finish your dinner; people in China and India are starving.’ My advice to you is: ‘Girls, finish your homework; people in China and India are starving for your jobs.” From Tom Friedman,  author of “The World is Flat.”

History: Resisters in France were called Freedom Fighters. When Sioux warriors defeated U.S. warriors at Little Big Horn, the press called them butchers. When U.S. Cavalry gunned down unarmed men and women and children at Wounded Knee in South Dakota in 1890, the soldiers were called heroes and were honored with more Congressional Medals of Honor than in any previous battle.

Business: Don’t focus on profits; focus on the factors that produce the profits.

I’m not saying you have to be a contrarian, but you do need to ask the contrarian question or see the contrarian view. It will help round out your perspective and help guide you to the truth.

Nor can you always take things at face value. Lucy wasn’t always a loveable redhead. Before she hit it big, she was a blond and chestnut brunette. People and things aren’t always what they seem. The sun may appear to move across the sky each day, but it’s actually the earth that’s moving.

If we don’t continue to seek fresh perspectives, pretty soon we won’t know what’s real. You’ll be like the old man with the limburger cheese attached to his mustache. Everywhere he went he thought the world stunk, when it was he who was the malodorous one.

So brush away the cheese crumbs. Recall the wisdom of Alexander Pope, “All seems infected that the infected spy, all looks yellow the jaundiced eye.”

Griffith J. Griffith

The world doesn’t have to be yellow, it can be clear and bright and beautiful. It just depends on your perspective. Take a new way home tomorrow, walk through a section of campus you’ve never seen before. There’s a whole universe of knowledge and wisdom that needs your attention. See the world with fresh your eyes. I know one who did.

In 1896 Col. Griffith J. Griffith donated most of the 4,100 acres that make up L.A.’s Griffith Park, and later funded the public observatory that was constructed after his death and bears his name today. He had been moved to make his bequest after peering through the telescope at Mt. Wilson, then the most important research observatory in the world. An observatory, after all, is a tool for helping one observe and gain new perspectives.

He said, “If all mankind could look through that telescope, it would change the world.”

One Response to “Life is a Matter of Perspective: An Essay by Peter Bennett”

This essay on “Perspective” is wonderful. If only our teen agers of today could all read and discuss something like this….do you think it would make a difference? So many of them seem so doomed…and how does one help them to understand that a lot of that doomed attitude has to do with their perspective on what life is all about? Perspective, attitude, determination…you name it…

Thanks, Peter. As usual, you’ve hit the nail on the head again.

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Home — Essay Samples — Life — Marriage and Family — Structural-Functionalist Perspective On Marriage And Family

Structural-functionalist Perspective on Marriage and Family

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Published: Mar 25, 2024

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Marriage and Family from a Structural-Functionalist Perspective

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Guest Essay

How the SAT Changed My Life

By Emi Nietfeld

Ms. Nietfeld is the author of the memoir “Acceptance.”

This month, the University of Texas, Austin, joined the wave of selective schools reversing Covid-era test-optional admissions policies, once again requiring applicants to submit ACT or SAT scores.

Many colleges have embraced the test-optional rule under the assumption that it bolsters equity and diversity, since higher scores are correlated with privilege. But it turns out that these policies harmed the teenagers they were supposed to help. Many low-income and minority applicants withheld scores that could have gotten them in, wrongly assuming that their scores were too low, according to an analysis by Dartmouth. More top universities are sure to join the reversal. This is a good thing.

I was one of the disadvantaged youths who are often failed by test-optional policies, striving to get into college while in foster care and homeless. We hear a lot about the efforts of these elite schools to attract diverse student bodies and about debates around the best way to assemble a class. What these conversations overlook is the hope these tests offer students who are in difficult situations.

For many of us, standardized tests provided our one shot to prove our potential, despite the obstacles in our lives or the untidy pasts we had. We found solace in the objectivity of a hard number and a process that — unlike many things in our lives — we could control. I will always feel tenderness toward the Scantron sheets that unlocked higher education and a better life.

Growing up, I fantasized about escaping the chaos of my family for the peace of a grassy quad. Both my parents had mental health issues. My adolescence was its own mess. Over two years I took a dozen psychiatric drugs while attending four different high school programs. At 14, I was sent to a locked facility where my education consisted of work sheets and reading aloud in an on-site classroom. In a life skills class, we learned how to get our G.E.D.s. My college dreams began to seem like delusions.

Then one afternoon a staff member handed me a library copy of “Barron’s Guide to the ACT .” I leafed through the onionskin pages and felt a thunderclap of possibility. I couldn’t go to the bathroom without permission, let alone take Advanced Placement Latin or play water polo or do something else that would impress elite colleges. But I could teach myself the years of math I’d missed while switching schools and improve my life in this one specific way.

After nine months in the institution, I entered foster care. I started my sophomore year at yet another high school, only to have my foster parents shuffle my course load at midyear, when they decided Advanced Placement classes were bad for me. In part because of academic instability like this, only 3 percent to 4 percent of former foster youth get a four-year college degree.

Later I bounced between friends’ sofas and the back seat of my rusty Corolla, using my new-to-me SAT prep book as a pillow. I had no idea when I’d next shower, but I could crack open practice problems and dip into a meditative trance. For those moments, everything was still, the terror of my daily life softened by the fantasy that my efforts might land me in a dorm room of my own, with endless hot water and an extra-long twin bed.

Standardized tests allowed me to look forward, even as every other part of college applications focused on the past. The song and dance of personal statements required me to demonstrate all the obstacles I’d overcome while I was still in the middle of them. When shilling my trauma left me gutted and raw, researching answer elimination strategies was a balm. I could focus on equations and readings, like the scholar I wanted to be, rather than the desperate teenager that I was.

Test-optional policies would have confounded me, but in the 2009-10 admissions cycle, I had to submit my scores; my fellow hopefuls and I were all in this together, slogging through multiple-choice questions until our backs ached and our eyes crossed.

The hope these exams instilled in me wasn’t abstract: It manifested in hundreds of glossy brochures. After I took the PSAT in my junior year, universities that had received my score flooded me with letters urging me to apply. For once, I felt wanted. These marketing materials informed me that the top universities offered generous financial aid that would allow me to attend free. I set my sights higher, despite my guidance counselor’s lack of faith.

When I took the actual SAT, I was ashamed of my score. Had submitting it been optional, I most likely wouldn’t have done it, because I suspected my score was lower than the prep-school applicants I was up against (exactly what Dartmouth found in the analysis that led it to reinstate testing requirements). When you grow up the way I did, it’s difficult to believe that you are ever good enough.

When I got into Harvard, it felt like a miracle splitting my life into a before and after. My exam preparation paid off on campus — it was the only reason I knew geometry or grammar — and it motivated me to tackle new, difficult topics. I majored in computer science, having never written a line of code. Though a career as a software engineer seemed far-fetched, I used my SAT study strategies to prepare for technical interviews (in which you’re given one or more problems to solve) that landed me the stable, lucrative Google job that catapulted me out of financial insecurity.

I’m not the only one who feels affection for these tests. At Harvard, I met other students who saw these exams as the one door they could unlock that opened into a new future. I was lucky that the tests offered me hope all along, that I could cling to the promise that one day I could bubble in a test form and find myself transported into a better life — the one I lead today.

Emi Nietfeld is the author of the memoir “ Acceptance .” Previously, she was a software engineer at Google and Facebook.

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