“lot of people were saying crazy things,” a month after I was let go from my job

My name is Daniel P. La and I am an undergraduate at the University of California, Irvine. I am the youngest of three sons and I live with my mom in Irvine. Her legal age is 65 and she has exhibited depressive symptoms.

Earlier this school year, I was on prescription medication and called the suicide hotline on a Sunday night during Fall quarter. I felt like my body and mind wanted to shutdown and it’s difficult to explain, but I’m doing a lot better now.

My uncle Larry lives on the other side of the country in Maryland. He has mailed us a check from across the country every month for about the past five years, just to support me and my mom. I called him on December 25, 2015.

I hadn’t kept in touch with him for most of my college career as an undergraduate, but I called him then to say that I felt bad about the money and I confided to him that I began seeing a therapist and was improving.

For most of my last year at the University of California, Irvine, I worked twenty hours and at a public high school in Santa Ana. I was the sole tutor in a cohort of ten who was still an undergraduate and I was very well respected.

Nearing the end of Winter Quarter, I was violently shaken and shouted out by a member of my fraternity who I have known for three years. I will wrote more Medium posts on that later, but I was severely traumatized.

I felt like I had PTSD after that occurred and at the high school I worked at, my supervisor asked me if I was ok and I felt like I could not tell anyone what happened because I was in the closet about my struggles with mental health.

Not long after, I was let go on a day my boss wasn’t even there. Because my boss lied and the tutor cohort of ten originally (one left and one was on the way out) had no real chemistry or cohesion and barely any actual trust.

Below are emails which detail the correspondence I had with a student regarding feedback he requested for his personal statement, as part of an application to his dream school. I heard back from him on April 7, 2016.

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From: Alvaro L. <redacted>
Date: April 7, 2016 at 1:37:17 AM PDT
To: “Daniel P. La” <ladp@uci.edu>
Subject: Re: Review Request for Personal Statement

Hey Daniel!

How are you? I’m sorry about what happened with you and AVID. A lot of people were saying crazy things but I hope you are holding up fine. I’m not sure if I’m allowed to contact you or not but I just wanted to let you know that I got accepted into Pratt Institute, my dream college in New York because you did help me!

I wanted to thank you so much for helping me revise my personal statement, especially in short notice that I gave you for it. I remember that the feedback you gave me really helped make my personal statement better. I can’t thank you enough because without your help I would have probably turned in a really shotty essay. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier when I found out a couple weeks ago since what happened. I didn’t get to see you to tell you!

You are a really nice guy and you helped me a lot. I feel like without your help I probably wouldn’t have made it to Pratt. I wish you still came around for tutoring and helped me with my essays and stuff. Anyway, I wish you the best! I hope everything is well! Once again thank you so much! I can’t thank you enough! Be safe!

Best,

Alvaro L.

(Also, can you give me the name of that website that you made for me? I’ve been meaning to use it.)

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On Saturday, January 2, 2016, 5:18 PM, Daniel P. La <ladp@uci.edu> wrote:

You’re very welcome Alvaro! And thank you! I hope you had a good one as well and keep me updated

Sincerely,

Daniel La

Daniel La
Undergraduate, The Paul Merage School of Business
University of California, Irvine 16
ladp@uci.edu

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On Wed, Dec 30, 2015 at 5:11 PM, Alvaro Lopez <redacted> wrote:
Thank you so much Daniel!

I really appreciate the feedback! I am sure with your input, my essay will be able to be taken to that level! I just feel like I have so much pressure on myself because this is my dream school. Thank you for getting to it so soon. I really so appreciate all your effort! I will take the time to think more critically on my personal essay. At this point, anyone’s opinion is well accepted if it means helping my essay become much better than it was when I first wrote it. Once again thank you so much! I really do appreciate it. I hope the next year treats you well. Have an amazing rest of your break! See you next year!

Sincerely,

Alvaro L.

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On Wednesday, December 30, 2015, 4:49 PM, Daniel P. La <ladp@uci.edu> wrote:

Hey Alvaro,

I got to it a little earlier than expected! Attached is a reviewed/revised version with feedback via comments inserted in the PDF. Anyways, no, you definitely make sense and I appreciate the fact that you cared enough about this to reach out to me. These essays are not easy to write, yet alone improve to the degree of really demonstrating your full self and level of qualification. Anyways, I hope my comments make sense, do not hesitate to let me know if they don’t (I’m human too). I know I highlighted and wrote a decent amount, but just take it all with a grain of salt, because at the end of the day it’s merely my (one person’s) opinion.

I do agree a bit with Mai about that, I think you could leverage a little more colorful language for your essay. Just have fun with it, though. You shouldn’t be afraid to be less than 100% grammatically correct or professional sounding, even though this is an admissions essay. I think, as an art school, they want to see your creative side. More importantly, they want to see you and get a sense of who Alvaro Lopez, both as an artist and person, is. Honestly, from the couple of times we’ve interacted, I get the sense that you are a thoughtful person whose lighthearted and genuinely cares. I think it’s important to get that across, along with any other aspects which you think might help you stand out a little more and be seen as a student who would do great things at Pratt.

Furthermore, I think something you can capitalize on is talking about how much of your personal time you dedicate to doing art. And maybe anything you do with respect to learning more about it? I think they’re more interested in that aspect of it and your actual affinity/relationship to art, rather than what you’ve seen in animated works you like. Not to say you can’t talk about those, but make sure you make the connection of that to your artistic affinity and ability more apparent/explicit; if that makes sense.

Anyways, please don’t hesitate to let me know if you have any questions and if you need any clarification on any parts of what I just wrote, including the comments within the PDF. Again, happy to help and keep up the hard work Alvaro

Sincerely,

Daniel La

Daniel La
Undergraduate, The Paul Merage School of Business
University of California, Irvine 16'
ladp@uci.edu

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On Wed, Dec 30, 2015 at 4:13 PM, Alvaro L. <redacted> wrote:
Thank you for looking at my email during your “break”! Hahaha! I honestly thought you weren’t going to respond! But I totally understand. Enjoy your break! I don’t want to ruin your plans at all! Celebrate first!

Well I ran this by Mai first and she said since it is for an art institute that the readers would want to see more creative, imagery writing rather than like concrete. She said I should talk about passion and talk in present tense so it shows I still have these feelings for art to this day.

I still want to show the reader who I am as a person artistically as well as personally. I also wanted to point out that I did write a little bit about my interest in art even though the prompt says to write about how my major (2D/3D animation) manifested itself in my everyday life. I am having trouble with talking how animation “manifested” itself in my everyday life. I just wrote that every time I see an animated movie I pay closer attention that anybody else does but I want to say more than just that one thing.

I did write about my major in the last paragraph. I want to make sure that I give the reader the feeling that I really love art but still want to show I am interest in art. I want to talk about my interested major more than anything else because I do want to write ABOUT the prompt given to me.

I probably don’t make sense by this point but hopefully you followed along lol. Any feedback on it would be totally helpful since I suck at writing so grammatical and general feedback would be totally helpful! Also maybe like suggestions of what I can write about and what I may delete without taking about from the general message I am trying to give since there is a 500 word limit.

Thank you so much once again! Don’t party too hard. Have an amazing rest of your break!!

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On Tuesday, December 29, 2015 8:17 PM, Daniel La <ladp@uci.edu> wrote:

Hey Alvaro,

Yeah, well, this is a little last minute.. Kinda taking a dump on my break too.. But I guess I can take a look. Lol jk, totally joking actually, I would love to help you out man! I might not be able to get to this until Jan 2nd though because I’ll be pretty busy until then and have plans for New Years but I’ll set a reminder. Is there any particular thing you want me to focus on and is there anything I should keep in mind while reading? Also, would you like general feedback, grammatical advice, or both? Just let me know and hope you enjoy the rest of your break Alvaro!!

Sent from my iPhone

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On Dec 29, 2015, at 5:31 PM, Alvaro L.<redacted> wrote:

Hey Daniel!

I was wondering if you could look over a personal statement for an art institute I am applying for. I hope this isn’t last minute or anything but the application is due Jan 5th, the day we get back to school. I’m hoping to turn it in sooner though. Hopefully you’re not busy or anything. Sorry for ruining your vacation though lol.

I hope to hear from you soon. Any type of feedback would be great! Thank you!

Sincerely,
Alvaro L.
<Pratt.pdf>