OFFICIAL TASP APPLICATION ESSAYS

4. Describe your hopes and plans for your future education and career. What experiences

motivated or influenced these hopes and plans? If you feel indecisive about your goals,

explain the reasons for your indecision.

It seems that everywhere I turn, no matter on what continent I find myself on, I am

followed by one simple question. At any time I have to be equipped to answer the adults making

casual conversation around the coffee table, looking expectantly into my face, asking me, “So,

what are your plans for the future?”

            When I’m faced with this situation, I am first assaulted by a surge of words in the back of

my throat. Images and scenes rush into my head, and my mind scrambles to pull all of this

together, to form a clear picture. 

            A little boy at the children’s school for low-income families in the Oakland area pulls on

my glasses. The principal of the school speaks clearly, sitting at the head of the table, telling us

that some of the children are put on watch for the police while their parents conduct illicit drug

deals. I sit next to a two year old, trying to get her to eat, knowing that she might not have

anything besides MacDonald’s at home.

  A homeless woman, who has lived on the streets for 17 years, holds my hand and tells me

her life story, wanting someone to simply listen to her. She tells me how hard she’s worked, and

the discrimination she’s faced, and asks me why the world is so unfair. I do not have an answer.

  A kindergarten aged girl skips up the steps of the SRO (Single Residence Occupancy) in

San Francisco, following her mom, who is heaving a laundry basket in front of her. As I climb

down the steps I pass by one of the rooms, where a lonely woman sits. A smell wafts towards me

that makes me want to vomit. It is the smell of sickness.

On the way to the subway in Germany, I see a boy around nine holding a bag of

groceries, leading his younger sister and brother home. His sister’s hair needs to be combed, and

their clothes look like they should be washed. It’s hard for a nine year old to be the parent.

            My mind reminds me of the kindergarten for children with disabilities, and again I’m

giving hugs, wanting to shield these precious children from the harsh realities of life.

I am holding the book, “Not For Sale”, in my hands, anger boiling in my stomach as I

read about the realities of human trafficking. A prostitute dressed in a sack cloth and five inch

heels on the side of the street in the Tenderloin District of San Francisco sells her body, and I

wish I could offer her a different life.

A lady in a wheelchair struggles to push herself up a ramp, and people pass by, paying

her no attention. I, myself, walk two steps by before interrupting my sentence mid-word and

turning around, firmly grabbing the handles and pushing the lady into the soup kitchen she points

towards. She cannot speak, and looks at me with glazed eyes, but I smile to her and wish her a

good day before re-joining my group. I cannot explain my thoughts during that moment. I just

know I did what was right.

            Mountains stand high above my small, five foot frame, and I am filled with awesome

wonder of God. I whisper a prayer, realizing how small I am in this big world filled with pain

and inequality.

            Yet amongst all of this inequality, I see hope. I see the smiles on the children’s’ faces,

running back and forth on the playground, oblivious to suffering, and the “God bless you” and

toothless smile of the man on the side of the street, holding a clear plastic bag with a tooth brush,

socks, and a Cliff bar. Despite my overwhelming anger at reading “Not for Sale” I also see that

good is being done, and women and children are being saved from the sex trade. In all these

situations, I see hope.

            My dream is to be a part of that hope. The world is obviously full with inequality, and I

firmly believe that there are many opportunities to help bridge the gap between people that are

not being explored. No matter how idealistic or cliché it may sound, I want to be a part of this

bigger picture of helping to make the world a better place.

            Being faced by wondering adults, however, is different then when I am dreaming of my

future in the privacy of my mind. Here I do not need a short, concise answer that does not sound

too cliché or idealistic.

From my third story window, when you turn off the lights late at night, you can see the

stars. Staring into the night sky, I have always felt the overwhelming desire to whisper my

prayers and dreams. Raising my hands, palm upwards towards the sky, I talk with my best friend,

Jesus. This is where I let all the pictures in my mind run wild, and I dream big, unabashed of

how crazy I might sound.

My body warming itself on my radiator, my windows wide open, all the lights off, I

dream of taking a year to work with the low-income areas in the United States and to travel into

developing communities around the world. Over the course of a year, I want to have my heart

broken, I want to explore languages and cultures, and I want to see God. The goal would be to

research the questions I have. Why does poverty still exist in a world filled with brilliant

economists, doctors, and teachers? How can malaria be eradicated? How can obesity be

combated? Where is the solution to malnutrition? What is the answer to the fight against human

trafficking? Big questions do not scare me. Rather, they lure me into wanting to search for

answers.

            Then, I plan to attend college, where I can begin to quell my desire to learn about the

world. By studying economics and global health, I’ll be equipped with the tools to search for

answers to my questions and work in a field where I can help the world. I want to study

languages and incorporate travel into my education to further my love for people, new places,

and adventure.

            After university education, my hopes and dreams are fuzzier. I do not know what

opportunities will open up, but I do know that I would like to take a few years to travel and work

with non-profits in developing countries. My dreams include researching why things are the way

they are, but also, more importantly, what can be done to help make the world better. The World

Health Organization, UNESCO, or WorldVision are all organizations I would consider working

for. I could also see myself researching development in the American health care system or the

eradication of homelessness--which is why I want to study economics.

My hopes and dreams stem from the experiences I’ve had working with and seeing

inequality and problems in our modern day society, as well as my open discussions and

conversations with my parents and my host mom, who encouraged me to think for myself and to

pursue knowledge for the love of knowledge. My hopes include a family, something that my

own unbelievably wonderful family has influenced me to appreciate and love. I believe that it is

incredibly important to invest in future generations, and hope to instill love for books, learning,

and a desire to help the world for the better in my own children.

In this way, I hope to leave a legacy. My life goal is to be a vessel of God’s love, and I

hope that through my actions, the world will get a glimpse at the boundless love he has for them.

I can summarize my desire to help the world, to study economics and global health, and

to work in the non-profit sector, into a short paragraph, delivered whenever approached by the

ever present questions. Adults will smile and nod, satisfied with a thought-out answer, but I have

not even given them a glimpse of the great dreams, plans, and desires.

No, these dreams will continue to be whispered into the night sky and written into my

journal, carried deep within heart.

There, in the dark, I close my eyes, and let peace flow over my body. “May your will be

done,” I breathe, and close my window, before snuggling into slumber, only to dream some

more.

  

3. TASPs are small, educational communities that rely greatly on individual members’

maturity. Write an essay discussing a conflict you have faced and attempted to resolve that

led you to new insights about yourself and/or other people.

If the teenage years are infamous for anything, it is for the conflicts they drag into the

lives of everyone around said teenager. Of course there is conflict in all stages of life, but the

conflicts of growing up are served with an appetizer of peer pressure, a side-dish of rebellion,

and the main dish of figuring out who exactly you are. These conflicts, of teens with themselves,

their parents, and their peers, are a rite of passage across the globe, and parents of all languages

and cultures shake their heads and commiserate once their first child turns thirteen.

Even our family dog seems to know that being a teenager comes with a required amount

of pain and suffering. At two years old, which is equivalent to the dreaded thirteenth year of a

human’s life, even well trained dogs will relapse to old, rebellious ways, questioning their

position in the pack. Alba’s incessant barking and growling, along with a couple of episodes of

stealing lasagna off of the kitchen counter (something she knows is so not ok) are just signs of

this exact process, something my host dad confirmed when he told us it was her birthday today.

Happy Birthday, Alba, and thank you for being a pain.

Despite how painful the process, however, I must concede that these past four years of

my admittedly short life have been pivotal (how could they not be?) in teaching myself about,

well, myself, as well as about life in general. Dealing with conflicts has taught me how to

communicate more effectively and has given me a much deeper respect for my parents as well as

broader view of the world – which, incidentally, does not revolve around me.

My long sixteen years on planet Earth have been marked with a good amount of

disagreements, arguments, and conflicts which I have attempted to resolve. However, it has

proved that the conflict that led to the greatest personal growth was one whose resolution I never

would have foreseen.

At the onset of high school, I had the knowledge that the world was not about myself, but

lacked the practical belief of that knowledge. Knowing something is true is not the same as

accepting this truth. I am not saying I was completely egocentric, because I had embraced my

faith in Christianity and fully believed in Jesus as my savior, and the practical application of

service, but I am saying that often, when I came home to my family, I dumped my stress,

frustration, and pent up negative energy on the people who love me the most.

During my sophomore year, my father had been without a job for over ten months, and

my parents had frugally moved us to a smaller house and adjusted our lifestyle according to our

means. Looking back now, I am filled with wonder at how shrewdly and wisely my parents dealt

with the economic crisis, and how much personal strength they had despite the difficulties.

I, I sadly must admit, was just another difficulty. Wanting to get away from the family

stress, and searching for my own identity, I stuffed my schedule full with three advanced

placement classes, participated in a sport, a show, piano lessons, a job (tutoring math and

science), and youth group, and then turned around and spewed my pent up frustration and stress

back on the family, starting a nasty never-ending cycle of conflicts.

It was easy to forget everything and just smile when outside of the house, but back at

home, things were completely different. When patience snapped and arguments began, you could

be sure to find me at the end, locked into my basement room (which my father took to referring

to as “The Cave”), thrown across my bed, brimming with tears and hot angry words, a long with

a good measure of juvenile pounding of my pillows. Somewhere during the last hours I had

probably told everyone that I hated them and never wanted to see them again, and that the agony

of my life was all their fault. I was exhausted, my eyes were puffy, and all I wanted to do was

curl up in a ball and sleep for a very long time. Hateful words had been uttered on both fronts,

things that should never have been said in the first place, and definitely should not be repeated a

second time.

My overwhelmed calendar, my coping mechanism, proved to be exceedingly

counterproductive, and lead to even more conflict than had been present before. Arguments

would begin quite simply: I would moan, “Mom, I’m so stressed,” and bang my head on the

kitchen table, missing my four-inch AP biology textbook by a hair.

This would be followed by my mother’s gentle (and sometimes not-so-gentle) prod of,

“Well, Honey, I think you might have too much on your plate,” to which I would roll my eyes. I

knew what was coming: the you-have-too-much-on-your-plate speech. I would listen for a few

minutes, and slowly zone out (I had mastered this art), until my mom interrupted herself, saying,

“Are you even listening to me?”

“Of course, Mom,” I would assert, slowly becoming annoyed. It would not take long for

someone to utter a caustic remark, our body language shutting each other off. From here, things

would escalate, until we could not even hear our own voices amongst the pointing fingers of

“You” messages.

You have too much on your plate.

You don’t understand me!

You don’t spend enough time with the family!

You always argue with Dad!

You, you, you!

These messages, sent with fierce tones and angry looks, were only effective in rousing

more anger and solved nothing. My teenage hormones would hit about an hour in, and I would

start crying for no real reason, heightening the tension.

To be honest, I hated to argue, so I attempted to deal with the conflict the only way I felt I

could, by spending even less time at home than before. This tactic was just adding to the overall

discord, however, and aggravated the situation.

I wish I could say I suddenly pulled a mature stunt and solved this conflict by realizing

how right my parents were, but I will have to disappoint and say that it took a rather drastic

measure to help me see things through clearer lenses. Last August, I boarded a plane to

Germany, and put about 5,300 miles between myself and my family. The point of leaving for a

year was not to solve any of the conflict between my family and myself, but my time away

helped me in growing up, until I could admit that I was wrong.

Filling up my schedule and losing myself in busyness had been my way to escape my

family’s issues, but taking a year away from the hectic mess helped me to see how much I

admire my parents. This change in attitude was, however, not immediate, and when I first arrived

in Germany, I actually started out trying to follow the same pattern, filling up my schedule with

every possibly activity.

Slowly, over these past five months, something changed within me, however, and I began

to see that I had been building my identity on outward achievements. “Who am I?” is a question

every human being wrestles with, and my answer up to this point had been found amongst the

myriad of extracurricular activities, scholarships, and hobbies. As I wrestled with a new family, a

new school, and a new language, the lesson of “It not about me” was truly becoming something I

could tangibly grasp. My identity was being reworked, and this time, I was basing it on God.

This change is attitude lead me onto a road of letting go and being truly content. I have

rediscovered my love for learning by starting to read again, and have begun to invest in things I

truly love, like my host family. Being in a new family forced me to be disciplined, and taught me

to deal with stress in constructive ways (such as running or journaling). Serving more and

complaining less, I now look out for the other members of my family. Who would have guessed

what my parents were saying all along was valuable? (Please, this is purely rhetorical.) Now I

see what an incredible feat my parents pulled, by holding our family together and giving us

stable lives in an unstable economy.

I’m not saying I am all grown up or know everything there is to know, because that

would be immaturity in itself, but I am saying that through a conscious choice of pursuing my

dreams of studying in Germany, I grew up and changed my attitude. I chose a path that would

force me to mature, and this growth, in turn, has affected the way I interact with my family, as

well as the respect I have for my parents, and has solved a conflict I needed to deal with, but did

not know how to.

2. Discuss a specific problem or topic in a field that interests you. You may address

political, philosophical, social, literary, aesthetic, or other questions. Your essay should

represent your own views and thoughts; it should not be a research paper.

Slavery. When most people see or hear this word, the first images that come to mind are

those of a skinny man with a beard and a top hat named Abe Lincoln, or the famous movie

“Gettysburg”, or the Underground Railroad. Slavery is supposed to be a thing of the past, dealt

with and conquered in the 19th century. Little is the general public aware, however, of how big of

an issue slavery still is.

Modern-day slavery, more commonly known as “Human trafficking”, is defined as the

exploitation of any person for commercial sex or forced labor. According to the U.S. Department

of State “Trafficking in Persons Report 2010”, human trafficking is a $32 billion industry, with

around 12.3 million adults and children as victims of some kind of human trafficking around the

world.

The fact that people are used as slaves anywhere in the world should make every person

who calls themselves an American indignant, but in the face of the multitude of wars, genocides,

and famines, slavery might seem like just another world issue to be reported from somewhere

thousands of miles away to the comfort of our living room TV screens. This makes everything

just a little more bearable, and alleviates the guilt of the modern consumer.

The problem is that human trafficking is not just happening in Cambodia or Indonesia, or

some other faraway, poor Asian country. It happens right down the street, and most people are

blind to what is going on. Slavery is a daily occurrence in the United States, which has been

classified by the Department of State as a source, transit, and destination country for human

trafficking. The organization Humantrafficking.org estimates that somewhere between 14,500

and 17,000 slavery victims are trafficked every year into the U.S. alone.

Every citizen of the United States should react to this news with passion and outrage. The

basic rights of human beings, on which the belief of our entire country is based, are being

violated. Our “Land of the Free” turns out to actually be the “Land of the Not-So-Free” for over

1,000,000 people, according to the CIA.

In his book, Not for Sale, David Batstone describes human trafficking on all the

continents of the world, including North America. Human trafficking is shown in the form of

mail-order brides, servants in the homes of rich Americans, and children forced into prostitution.

Stories of whole families being forced into working fourteen hours a day for generations, to pay

off inflated debts, spread themselves across the pages. Young women wanting to start life afresh

in a new country are often duped by “brokers”, promising a job with good pay, who steal their

passports and sell them to their customers. Children are being sold by parents, unable to support

their families, to salesmen who deal exclusively with the sale of human beings.

In the U.S., runaway teenagers have a high chance of being manipulated by older men

who at first treat them well and lure them into the system, before using them in the cycle of

prostitution. A strip club owner in Los Angeles can call up a human trafficking pimp on Friday

and ask for two women in their early twenties, with blonde hair and a good body and have them

delivered by Monday. This, if nothing else, should make one sick to one’s stomach.

When I tried to talk to classmates about this pressing international problem, I was met

with the shocked expressions. With every person I talked to, I realized how unknown this world

issue was, at least to my peers at school. These were teens attending a well-admired college

preparatory high school, and yet they had no idea of the massive scale of slavery in their own

backyards. Almost every single person I talked to wanted to know why they had not heard of the

issue before, a question I myself had no answer to.

When faced with the stories and realities of human trafficking, it is easy to become

overwhelmed. Even if one feels a desire to make a difference in the field, it is hard to imagine

what one can do. What impact can one person have on a world scale issue? Greg Mortenson’s

“Three Cups of Tea”, which portrays Mortenson’s life, dedicated to building schools in Pakistan

and Afghanistan, answers this question with four simple words. “The Enemy is ignorance.”

Although discussing the problem of the War on Terror and Pakistani-American relations,

Mortenson’s statement provides a clear answer to the fight against evil in any situation.

Education, the eradication of ignorance, is the only answer to fighting evil in the

long term. Well educated citizens can make wise choices, such as buying products approved by

the FairTrade organization, which do not exploit human beings. By also informing us about what

exactly is going on in the world, we can spread the word and participate in the call for legislation

to be passed by the United States government to combat human trafficking. Becoming active,

participating in rallies, signing petitions, making smart consumer choices, and funding

organizations making visible impacts with the abolition movement… there is a world of

possibilities in the fight against human trafficking. This crime against the basic dignities of

humanity can be fought and overcome as people join together as “single drops”, as Mother

Theresa once described individual action, without whom the “ocean” would be less powerful.

Prevention surely is one of the biggest keys in the abolition movement, which can only be

brought about by raising awareness of the issue. Therefore, there should be much larger media

attention and teaching in schools when it comes to human trafficking. Countries where this issue

is the largest should be targeted specifically to educate the people about the dangers, and so by

spreading knowledge, slavery can be abolished, once and for all.

1. Write a critical analysis of a book, poem, play, essay, or other text you have read

outside of school. It will be important for you to formulate an argument about the text

and support it. Your analysis should not be a plot summary or an analysis of literary

devices, although you should feel free to discuss plot and literary devices as they relate

to your broader argument.

Published in 1879, Henrik Ibsen’s, “A Doll’s House”, is often called the first true

feminist play. Highly controversial because of its futuristic views on gender equality, the play

criticized the Victorian picture of marriage and expressed a highly radical view of gender roles

that parallels modern thought on the subject.

The drama follows a classic Norwegian housewife in the 19 th century, Nora Helmer, who

forged a signature to take out a loan for her sick husband, Torvald, who is portrayed as the

classic, 19th century husband. Throughout the drama, Nora grapples with her role in her marriage

and as a woman, as the man from whom she procured the loan, Krogstad, threatens to publicly

announce her forgery, unless she can stop her husband from firing him. Nora is unable to follow

through with Krogstad’s demands, but believes that when her husband finally finds out the truth

that he will take the guilt upon himself. She is willing to take her own life in order to save him

from public shame.

Her husband’s actual response, however, is to castigate his wife, bemoaning his fate of

being at the hands of Krogstad. Torvald tells Nora that their marriage will only be one of social

obligation from that point on and that he is forced to give Krogstad his job back. At this time, a

message comes from Krogstad, who has a change of heart, due to the influence of Nora’s friend,

Christine, telling Torvald that the debt is canceled and that he will not announce the forgery.

Torvald, relieved, immediately forgives his wife, but it is too late. Nora has seen for the first time

how her husband truly views her, and is portrayed by Ibsen as becoming “empowered”. She

claims that her husband never truly loved her, but rather, treated her as a plaything. With her

newfound view of her marriage, her husband, and her role as a woman, Nora ends up leaving her

family in the quest of educating herself about the world, asserting that she is too uneducated to

be a good wife and mother.

Although Henrik Ibsen’s “A Doll’s House” displays thoughts about gender equality and

the treatment of women that went far beyond his time, his solution to the protagonist’s personal

dilemma is not one of an empowered woman, but essentially one of running away and avoiding

the problem, without true belief in her own strength.

The most important part of “A Doll’s House” is the very last scene, where Nora is

portrayed as becoming what Ibsen believes is a liberated woman, but in reality only runs away

from her problems, displaying weakness. “I have existed merely to perform tricks for you,”

(Ibsen, 106) Nora correctly states, telling her husband that he never treated her with the respect

she deserves, and never saw her as a fully equal individual. She asks him if it strikes him as

“strange” (Ibsen, 105) that this is the first time in their entire marriage that they have sat down

together to have a serious discussion, to which her husband asserts that he was only doing what

he saw as right for her. At this point, Nora takes the correct stance of an empowered woman,

saying that Torvald and her father were wrong in treating her the way they did, as a doll rather

than a human being of equal worth. She must, she tells him, go out into the world and become

educated and figure out what she believes. “I must think over things for myself and get to

understand them,” (Ibsen, 109) Nora says, again showing how she has transitions from being the

submitting Victorian wife, to the free, modern woman. Her statements about needing to question

the things she has accepted without doubt are valid, and Ibsen sees that women need to given the

opportunities to explore the world for themselves.

After this point, however, Ibsen begins to go wrong. Nora continues on to say that she

must leave her family, as she has “sacred duties” (Ibsen, 108) to herself, and she must learn to

“stand quite alone” (Ibsen, 107). Although women are equal in value to men, and have a right to

be free individuals, Nora takes the cheap way out and runs away from her family, believing that

the only way to become truly emancipated is to sever all ties to her old life. This irresponsible

abandon of her children and husband does not show an empowered woman, but rather one who

is too weak to deal with the responsibilities she has, even if under her old, Victorian mindset,

allowed herself to take on. Although Ibsen tries to show that women should take equality in their

own hands, he fails to recognize the reality of responsible, adult action. Nora does not seem to

believe that she truly has strength at all, which is shown in her lack of confidence in her ability to

raise her own children. Nora places the children into the hands of their father, who she, few

sentences before, claims is not the “proper man to educate [her] to be the proper wife” (Ibsen,

107).

As an emancipated woman, Nora should educate herself about the world and develop her

own opinions, but should also realize and accept the responsibilities she has to her family. These

responsibilities are not those of the Victorian mindset, but rather that of an emancipated woman,

to care for her children and educate them to become self-sufficient, liberated citizens themselves.

Ibsen’s portrayal of Nora leaving her old life is one that too many woman and men nowadays see

as an option to rid themselves of their problems, and our society sadly accepts this as a legitimate

response in the face of difficulties. Rather than doing the honorable thing, and dealing with

trials, the modern individual is offered the option of pretending that nothing ever happened. This

ends up with great psychological damage to all involved, however, as people try to cut out entire

parts of their identities, partners must learn to be single parents, and children must wrestle with

the feelings of abandonment. Ibsen’s Nora, therefore, is a weak individual, who really has not

grasped the concept of freedom.

It is generally accepted that with great freedom comes great responsibility. What Ibsen’s

Nora wanted was the freedom that came with emancipation, without accepting the responsibility.

Ibsen’s views on equality were therefore unbalanced, failing to see the true situation that the

modern day woman must deal with. Although Ibsen pointed out many of the failures of the

Victorian view of women and gender roles, especially within marriage, he did not realize that a

balance must be found between the freedom and responsibility of the modern woman.

5. Discuss the topics of the seminars, in the order of your preference for attending each,

addressing the following: What attracts you to this seminar? What would you like to gain

from this seminar topic? What concerns would you have if placed into this seminar? Please

indicate if there is any seminar you would definitely not want to attend, and explain why.

Please be succinct. We do not expect a formal essay. Your answers to this question will help

us to place you in an appropriate seminar if you are selected.

First off, I have to say that I would be satisfied in any of the four programs. All of the

topics are interesting, stimulating and worthy of discussion, and I find myself attracted to every

single of the four programs.

Having said that, my number one choice would be the Michigan I Program, Freedom,

Dialogue, and Polarization. I have always loved to discuss the idea of freedom, and the question

of where it begins and where it ends. Abortion is a topic I find ethically fascinating and

challenging, and freedom as a whole is a concept I am passionate about. Individual freedom is a

enigmatic concept that I would love to explore, especially seeing how it is reflected in history as

well as in the present day.

My second choice would be the Cornell II Program, Thinking Girls, Thinking Boys. Part

of the seminar description mentioned discussion of the social justice and political change our

views of “Girlhood” and “Boyhood” can affect. After reading “Thee Cups of Tea”, I am

seriously interested in investing in education all over the world to fight terrorism and inequality.

I also find the study of people and their characters exciting and interesting in itself, so this would

be a seminar I would love to attend.

My third choice would be the Michigan II Program, Visions of America from Abroad.

This topic is particularly interesting to me, having been abroad this year, in Germany, with the

Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange scholarship. The view of America from abroad is a idea I

believe is not discussed enough in the United States, and one I would be excited to learn more

about.

My fourth choice would be the Cornell I Program, Intergenerational Justice, solely

because one had to be chosen last. To be honest, I would be as excited with this seminar as with

the others. I agree that we as a human race have the incredible gift of being able to affect the

lives of future generation, but I know that we often use this gift for evil. The questions of what

we owe posterity and what voice they should have in the decisions made in the present day are

ones that would excite me, and I could see myself studying this summer,

6. List the titles and authors (where applicable) of some of the books you have read

in the past year that you consider most significant, for whatever reason, along with any

periodicals you read regularly. Indicate with an asterisk which books you read for school.

This should not be a list of every book you have read in the past year.

The Glass Castle – Jeannette Walls

Not For Sale – David Batstone

Three Cups of Tea – Greg Mortenson

The Shack – Paul Young

Pygmalion – George Bernard Steward

*Outliers – Malcolm Gladwell

*The Tortilla Curtain – T.C. Boyle

The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald

Freakonomics – Scott D. Levitt

Eat Pray Love – Elizabeth Gilbert

Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte

The Doll’s House – Henrik Ibsen

Nothing to Envy (Ordinary Lives in North Korea)- Barbara Demick