QuestBridge is a scholarship program that awards students with a four year full ride scholarship. Senior Chris Tu, was awarded with one and now will be attending Pomona College in Claremont.
The process of applying to QuestBridge is pretty simple. Chris explained, “ You just just go onto the QuestBridge website and write 3 essays. Then finish some short answer questions, jot down your 5 most important extracurriculars, and get 2-3 letters of recommendation. After that, you make a ranking of up to 15 colleges.”
QuestBridge is a four-year, full ride scholarship. “It feels great knowing that my parents won’t have to pay for a single dime for my college education. I also feel really excited to be going to such a prestigious and small school,” said Chris.
Originally Chris didn’t put Pomona College as his top choice, but instead put Stanford and Caltech. But even though he didn’t get into his top choice, he is happy with the choice of committing to Pomona in the fall. He said. “While I didn’t get into my dream school of Stanford, I am more than happy to be going to Pomona in the fall. They have a great course into my career path and actually have a CRISPR research lab that I’m hoping to work in during sophomore year.”
In Pomona he plans on majoring in molecular biology and plans to do gene editing with CRISPR. His main goal with his major is to “advance the field of medicine with this bleeding-edge tech. It’s really cool what you can do with it and I think more people should be aware of its possible impact.”
Dr Patricia Filimaua, counselor, has seen Chris develop for the past 4 years of high school, “ I am beyond excited and thrilled that Chris received Questbridge, a full-ride scholarship to Pomona College. He has worked extremely hard and very much deserves this opportunity. Let me be clear, he worked for it all, every assignment, every test, every class, every activity, all the nights, all the sacrifices. I hope that I pushed the needle for a positive decision with the letter of recommendation. I was very thoughtful and intentional in his letter of recommendation trying to give the admissions staff a picture of who Chris really is. I also hope that I helped all four years in creating the best schedule and planning his courses to bring him the best possible GPA.”
To those who plan on applying, Chris recommends it. He stated, “If you meet the requirements for QuestBridge, you should 100% apply for it. The application process isn’t tedious, it’s a full scholarship, and you get to choose the schools you want to go to. You could just go to 1 school if you really want. You also get to meet other match students at the school you match at. As a result, I already have a few friends before even moving to Pomona.”
