With record high complaints from high school students that the college admissions process has devolved into a bizarre lottery unscrupulously grounded in serendipity, one high school senior decided to take a different approach. Sophia DiBeta, a senior at Burr and Burton Academy in Manchester, Vermont, secured her spot at a top university by crafting her entire college application using only emojis.
While many of her peers spent countless hours writing meticulous essays that could have rivaled the sonnets of Shakespeare himself, chose to fully embrace the future of communication, demonstrating her advanced skills in media literacy. One small symbol at a time, she expressed the entirety of her academic journey by carefully curating the perfect strings of emojis.
The application in question began with a triumphant opening statement: 🎓🚀🌟 (“I graduate, I soar, I shine!” for those of you who may find yourselves in a position of lesser ability to decipher such texts: sufferers of ‘emojilliteracy’), followed by a series of icons that showcased her academic interests: 🦠📚🔬.
When asked about the other aspects of her application, DeBeta discussed her extracurriculars: “Oh, my extracurriculars? Piece of 🍰,” she stated boldly. I’m still pondering how she was able to sneak an emoji into our conversation as we were talking in person.
DiBeta proudly listed ⛷️🎨🎵 on her activities list, cleverly indicating her involvement in skiing, art, and music. She claims that the beauty of her application’s simplicity lay in the ways that the admissions committee could interpret it: “When they saw the music note emoji, which gives me so much more credibility than I deserve, by the way, they were totally imagining me busting out Beethoven’s greatest hits. Really, I was learning chopsticks on the piano for 4 months straight."
You might be wondering how her recommendation letters panned out. Well, worry not: Sophia had that covered down to every last detail, too. A ✅, a 👍, and a 💯 were all it took to assure universities that even the most discerning emoji-critics thought well of DiBeta and her qualifications.
As for the interview, which was conducted via Zoom, she aced every question with unadulterated ease. DiBeta’s responses consisted of a sequence of winking faces 😉 and duck-lipped emojis 😗, conveying the utmost confidence and charm to her interviewer. The admissions officer, baffled by this new form of expression, couldn’t help but be impressed!
And then came the moment of truth. Success!
When asked to share some advice to others who are undergoing a similar process, this is what she had to say: “Well, that was easy enough.” When prompted to comment further, she 👋 and left the room.