How Paige Got Into UBC Sauder & Won $86,000 in Scholarships

There is no doubt that the beginning of my Grade 12 year was an incredibly exciting and busy time. Rushing from back-to-back cross-country races and volleyball games. Balancing my volunteer work as a mental health advocate with my job as an academic tutor. Organizing fundraisers at my high school as part of the club I was leading. And on top of this, I was supposed to leave time for school?! The hours just didn’t add up.

This left little—if any—time for me to devote to my goal of getting into my top university.

I remained determined despite this. I attended several university information sessions to try and extract bits of information about university & scholarship opportunities. However, these sessions were very generic, covering multiple universities and all faculties.

There was no clear direction.

As I dove deeper into the pursuit, I also found it overwhelming to tailor my multiple applications to meet all the different scholarship & university formats. Instead, I wished I could just submit my resume to all the scholarship committees and be done with it!

During my scholarship research, I came across AdmissionPrep’s program and was attracted by the success of their past scholars. Within a few days, I joined the program and I breathed a sigh of relief. This relief did not come from a lessened workload—definitely not!

Rather, AdmissionPrep gave me a sense of direction in how to approach the daunting university application process.

AdmissionPrep taught me which scholarships to prioritize and how to illustrate my activities and achievements in a meaningful way. Instead of listing every single extra-curricular activity, they taught me to expand on a few roles most relevant to a particular scholarship and clearly outline the impact I had made.

It was so nice to no longer feel isolated when navigating the complicated scholarship applications process.

Instead, I joined Mentorship Webinars and Office Hour calls with other students going through the process, which provided a great opportunity for us to learn from each other.

An unexpected benefit of my time at AdmissionPrep was self-reflection.

The program forced me to take a long hard look at why I was doing the things I was doing. I had to ask myself: what did I want to continue with? What was important to me? What were my values?

Taking a prolonged look at these things both further solidified my career path decisions as well as increased my focus on being a mental health advocate. I also learned the importance of life balance, especially amidst the many demands of my Grade 12 year.

As for my career path, I am now more confident than ever about what I hope to do.

I am interested in applying IT solutions to not only make organizations more efficient, responsive, and innovative, but also to make a positive social impact. To pursue this goal, I am excited to join the Business & Computer Science (BUCS) program at the UBC Sauder School of Business in September 2020.

I got into UBC's Sauder School of Business BUCS Program and received the UBC Presidential Award.

Completing the AdmissionPrep program, I gained meaningful self-reflection and personal growth.

I am going to be frank: there is no “secret” to university success. It is a ton of work. It requires a great amount of passion, commitment, and perseverance.

AdmissionPrep helped channel my energy to focus in the right areas in order to maximize my chance of success.

Paige Ingram is a 2022 AdmissionPrep Academy program alumnus and a former AdmissionPrep Mentor.

If you want to achieve success like Paige, AdmissionPrep can help. We provide 1-1 advising, essay editing, and mentorship from past students to maximize your success. Complete our short eligibility quiz to learn more about how AdmissionPrep can help you achieve your post-secondary goals.

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