'Most deserving': 18-year-old’s Harvard admission essay on losing her mother wins internet

An 18-year-old girl from Massachusetts recently got accepted into the prestigious Harvard University and her admission essay that got her there has taken the internet by storm. In a TikTok video, Abigail Mack narrated her essay, which was on losing her mother to cancer. She beautifully related her journey that moved many of the aspiring applicants and left netizens in awe. 

According to NBC Boston, Mack started her essay by declaring, “I hate the letter 'S.' Of the 1,64,777 words with 'S,' I only grapple with one”. She further went on to talk about why she started hating “s” after losing her mother. She revealed that when she was 12, her mom passed away and so she wrote about the difference between “parents” and “parent”. 

She said that for so many years, she was running from the letter ‘S’ in “parents” after the loss of her mom, Julie, who was a passionate dance teacher who opened a West Bridgewater studio just a year before she died from cancer. Mack said, “I can't get through a day without being reminded that while my friends went out to dinner with their parents, I ate with my parent”. She added that as she wrote the essay, there was a blue line under the word “parent” telling her to check her grammar. 

“Even Grammarly assumes that I should have parents, but cancer doesn't listen to edit suggestions,” Mack wrote. 

She went on to say that she won’t claim that her situation is unique, but it is still an exception to the rule - an outlier. Mack added that she spent a period of time distracting herself from the letter and the absence of her mother that it represents. She eventually learned to stop running away from the letter 's'.

Mack’s essay then went on to focus on how she immersed herself in extracurricular activities such as theatre, academics, and politics. She wrote about her experiences while working as a fellow on Senator Ed Markey's re-election campaign. Mack pointed out that she taught the volunteers how to phone bank for Joe Biden's campaign.

Netizens congratulate Mack 

While taking to Instagram, the 18-year-old even shared her happiness at making it to Harvard. In the caption, she wrote, “It's officially official — I've committed to Harvard! I'm so unbelievably grateful and I can't wait for the next four years”. In her post, several users also congratulated her and showered her with love. 

(Image: Instagram)