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发帖数: 25644 | 1 【 以下文字转载自 Boston 讨论区 】
发信人: smilhaNew (ha), 信区: Boston
标 题: zt 一封申请哈佛大学的推荐信
发信站: BBS 未名空间站 (Tue Jan 20 04:46:08 2015, 美东)
一封申请哈佛大学的推荐信
(2015-01-04 18:56:29)
三年前很多报刊都刊登了美华裔女孩李丹面对噩运自强不息被哈佛等名校录取的消息。
李丹被哈佛等名校录取主要是靠自己的努力。哈佛的录取率只有6%，竞争是非常激烈的
，只凭自己的努力是很难进哈佛。《俄勒冈人》网的记者史蒂夫在当地报纸发表文章为
读者揭开一个华人学生在美国自强不息、善良为人的奋斗故事，还帮助李丹写了报读哈
佛大学的推荐信 对李丹的录取起了很大的作用。下面就是记者史蒂夫的推荐信。
院长菲茨西蒙斯：
在成千上万的哈佛新生中，你将会发现一个来自克拉克马斯高三的李丹。
李丹的成绩达到了你对学生的期望：数学SAT800分，她的化学，中文，数学II也是800
分。 她在两周内，考了七门大学课程，其中化学和中文得5分。李丹的成绩使她有足够
的资格进入哈佛校园。
李丹的优秀成绩并不是哈佛应该录取她的原因。这个年轻女孩改变了俄勒冈人对坚持不
懈，不屈不扰，机遇和感激的理解。
在李丹15岁以前，她和她的母亲（俞昭燕）已经经历两次家庭危机。第一次家庭危机发
生在中国，当时李丹还是一个小姑娘。她的父亲是一个酒鬼 “有无数的夜晚，在他喝
醉了酒之后，像疯子一样打我的母亲 ” ，李丹在申请大学的文章里描述她的父亲“我
会跪在地上，求他停下来，祈祷邻居会听到打人的声音来敲我们家的门。”
李丹八时，她母亲离婚了。 2007年，俞昭燕又结婚了，这一次是jk史密斯，64岁，她
是在网上和史密斯认识的。2007年夏天李丹和她的母亲带着美国是“一块乐土，是充满
梦想和正义的地方。”的希望来到俄勒冈的格兰茨帕斯（Grants Pass）。
新婚的浪漫只有40天。当俞昭燕和她的女儿没有??屈从于史密斯，在争执中俞昭燕向丈
夫扔一个塑料水瓶，他打电话报了警，威胁母女两将被关进监狱。听了史密斯形容这一
切，警察问史密斯，他的妻子和继女现在正在做什么，“她们互相拥抱，”他说。
家庭的矛盾和冲突继续发生。八月份俄勒冈州警察以家庭暴力罪逮捕了史密斯.李丹和
她的母亲被送到当地的妇女救助中心。在接下来的几个月里，她们住在七个不同的妇女
庇护所，最后李丹终于在克拉克马斯住下来。
院长菲茨西蒙斯，你可能会认为李丹陷入绝望或怨恨中。她没有绝望和怨恨，而是带着
慈善的心情在妇女庇护所里从事教师和医院护士志愿者的工作。
“这种经历帮助我学习英语，” 李丹说。 “我必须站出来。与我的母亲出去找住房和
工作。如果我在我的继父的房子留下来，我不会有机会做这些事情。我觉得自己真的很
幸运。如果这样的事发生在中国，结果将会更糟。”
哈雷Potampa，一位退休的数学老师，2007年12月首次发现李丹。不管多早，他来到高
中，李丹一直在学校的一台计算机上工作或在雨中等待开门。在接下来的两年里，他看
到李丹筹集资金用于慈善，以帮助在中国和海地地震灾民; 在Reed学院修大学的课程;
在Kaiser森尼赛德做志愿者。在Kaiser做志愿者的第一天，正是她的16岁生日，她的第
一个美国生日。"她是我见过的两个或三个最鼓舞人心的高中学生，” Potampa说。 “
我很惊讶于她的应变能力，她比任何我见过的人都坚强，看着她利用各种机会，她使我
看到了我们这个国家应该向年轻人提供什么。”
这个女孩的生活动荡仍在继续。去年二月严重的车祸俞昭燕被迫退出她作为一个护士的
工作。钱是非常紧，李丹和她妈妈住在低收入公寓里。没有自我怜悯或怀疑颤动，她无
视生活中的困难，并为你敞开她的心扉。
“我可以说，” 福特-李丹的生物学老师的评价 “是这个学生启发我成为一个更好的
老师。”
她希望做慈善组织工作。 她想上医学院。 她希望到北京学习中医和服务于这个星球上
最贫穷的村庄。
但首先，院长菲茨西蒙斯，她想上哈佛大学。她申请了十几所包括斯坦福大学，华盛顿
，杜克大学，加州大学洛杉矶分校和加州理工学院等学校。
但是你有第一个机会。 如果你意识到你是多么幸运，你最好快点给李丹打电话。
Dear Harvard: This student will rock your world
Dean Fitzsimmons:
Among the thousands of applications that will arrive at Harvard before year'
s end, you will find one from Dan Li, a senior at Clackamas High School.
Dan has the raw numbers you might expect from a student who aspires to
attend the best colleges in the land: an 800 on her Math SAT and 800s on her
SAT subject tests in Chemistry, Chinese and Math II. In a two-week span of
her junior year at Clackamas, she took seven advanced-placement tests,
scoring 5s in Chinese and Chemistry.
In the calculus of your admissions' process, I know there is prestige in
those numbers. There may be enough to guarantee her that celebrated free
ride through Cambridge.
But those are not the numbers that have shaped Dan's life. They are not the
numbers that define her.
And they are not among the reasons this young woman has changed the way so
many in Oregon think about perseverance, opportunity and gratitude.
By the time she was 15, Dan -- and her mother, Zhaoyan Yu -- had survived
two troubling relationships. When Dan was a young girl in China, her father
was an abusive alcoholic. "There were countless nights when after he got
drunk, he would beat up my mother like crazy," Dan writes in a college essay.
"I would kneel on the floor, beg him to stop, and pray some neighbors would
hear the noise and knock on the door."
Dan was eight when her mother finally secured a divorce. In 2007, Zhaoyan Yu
married again, this time to J.K. Smith, 64, who courted her online and
during trips to China. Dan and her mother came to Grants Pass that summer
believing America to be "a land that is full of dreams and justice."
The romance lasted 40 days.
When Yu and her daughter were not properly subservient to the man of the
house, push came to shove. When Dan's mother responded by throwing a plastic
water bottle at her husband, he called police, terrifying the women with
the threat that they would be hauled off to jail.
After listening to Smith describe all this, the police dispatcher asked him
what his wife and stepdaughter were doing now. "They're hugging each other,"
he said.
Some things never change.
After Oregon State troopers arrived that August morning and sorted things
out, Smith was arrested for menacing and domestic violence, and Dan and her
mother were entrusted to the local Women's Crisis Support Team. Over the
next several months, they lived in seven different women's shelters between
Grant's Pass and St. Helens before Dan Li finally arrived in Clackamas.
Somewhere along the line, Dean Fitzsimmons, you might have expected Dan to
spiral off into despair or resentment.
She did nothing of the kind. Dan was, instead, acutely aware of the small,
unexpected bursts of kindness from teachers, shelter volunteers and hospital
nurses.
"This experience helped me learn English," Dan says. "I had to step up. Go
out with my mother to find housing and a job. If I had stayed in my
stepfather's house, I wouldn't have been able to do these things.
"I consider myself really lucky. If this had happened in China, this would
have ended badly."
Harley Potampa, a retired math teacher and the Key Club advisor, first
noticed Dan in December 2007. No matter how early he arrived at the high
school, Dan was always working at one of the school computers or waiting in
the rain for the custodians to unlock the doors.
Potampa introduced himself. Over the next two years, he watched, with
increasing awe, as Dan raised money for Mercy Corps to help earthquake
victims in China and Haiti; single-handedly brought English language
learners into the fabric of the Clackamas community; enrolled in college
courses at Reed College; and volunteered at Kaiser Sunnyside.
She showed up for Kaiser for the first time on the morning she turned 16.
Her first birthday in the United States. The first morning she was eligible
to volunteer.
"I'm seen her develop into one of the two or three most inspirational high-
school students I've ever met," Potampa says.
"I'm amazed at her resilience. She's stronger than any human being I've ever
met. Watching her take advantages of opportunities we take for granted, she
's taught me a lot about what this country has to offer."
Everyone echoes those sentiments, even as the tumult in this girl's life
continues. A serious auto accident last February forced Zhaoyan Yu to quit
her job as a nurse. Money is so tight that Dan lives with her mother in a
low-income apartment off Southeast 82nd Drive in which the SAT study guides
outweigh their furniture.
And she lives without a quiver of self-pity or doubt. Lives with a blind eye
to her problems and an open heart for yours. Lives only to respond to the
kindness she has found in this angry, divided country of ours.
"All I can say," notes Ford Morishita, who taught Dan Advanced Placement
Biology, "is this student has inspired me to be a better teacher and human
being."
She wants to work for Mercy Corps. She wants to go to medical school. She
wants to study Chinese medicine in Beijing and serve in the poorest village
on the planet.
But first, Dean Fitzsimmons, she would like to attend Harvard.
She'll do fine if she never takes a run at orgo or the Yard. She's applying
to a dozen other schools, including Stanford, Washington, Duke, UCLA and Cal
Tech.
But you have first shot. If you realize how fortunate you are, you better
call and you best hurry.
Dan Li is just getting started. And she is no longer waiting for that knock
at the door.
Sincerely,
Steve Duin |
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