【推荐3】While I was in 9th grade, I built a circuit (电路装置) for the traffic system of our city. After getting the first prize, I got this valuable advice from my father; “Do whatever interests you, and don’t let the work challenge you, make sure you are challenging that work.”

I have always preferred the projects which are challenging and related to real life problems. I clearly remember building a shipping program several years ago. I divided the whole project into several small sections. When I understood it clearly, used my brainstorming skill on it, and gave some basic ideas. Then I asked my professor for help before jumping into coding (编码). At first, I did not know how to ask questions correctly and always asked the question “How do I do it?” As I   kept working and discussed with my professor, I became more comfortable and those “how ”questions soon turned into “what if I do this and that” types of questions.

It took me four days to write the code. The desire to solve the problem kept me sleepless all nights brainstorming in even greater details. Every time I saw my program running smoothly, I exploded with joy. I still remember the last day of my work. I was getting some problem and didn’t know what to do. At that moment, a man came in to clean. He has headphones, and he was dancing while cleaning the room. Seeing this, I burst out laughing. That moment calmed me. I regained energy and interest and started to work again, and soon I fixed the problem.

My success in the project proved that breaking up a large problem into small parts could help find a possible solution. Discussing the problem with others was also very beneficial. Now I have gained the confidence to attempt any kind of project.

【推荐1】Every summer he came to our village on his cycle. The cycle was full of coconuts and on the handle was his small red money purse and the knife that he used to cut the coconuts. He was known for his toothless smile that tended to turn into a slight laugh.

He often announced the arrival of summer by standing under our village’s Gulmohar tree. During the first touch of summer, red flowers fell on the ground and welcomed him to out village; soon the red flowers turned into long sword-like fruits which hung above his head as he cut the coconuts.

He never ate anything except paan (a kind of leaf), which he always could be seen chewing, and he just sat under the tree until someone approached him. Then, he would choose the best coconut, and with expert skill, carve it so that the person could drink the satisfying liquid.

Nowadays, he doesn’t do much business. Kids no longer care for coconut water; they want soft drinks. I know his weak body will fail him in the coming years. He will not visit our village, and with him, all my memories of summer will disappear. No one will miss him apart from the Gulmohar tree, his only friend.

My friends and I have stayed in the same village our whole life. Now, in our mid-thirties, we don’t have time to talk about our childhood and the life beyond the chains of society.

I’ve made up my mind. Tomorrow I will talk with him. I will listen to him and preserve him in my memory. I will tell him how important he was for me, how he defined summer for me, and, during every summer, how he nurtured (滋养) me with the coconut water, which was filled with his love. I will take in his smile one last time — a remembrance of my childhood innocence. I will hug him until my tears mix with his.

【推荐2】Allan Guei, 18, was a star basketball player at Compton High School in the Los Angeles area before he graduated last month. His good grades made him eligible for an unusual competition: A free-throw contest in the Compton High gymnasium. The top prize: ＄40,000 in scholarship money.

Guei, whose parents immigrated to the United States from the Ivory Coast, knew how much that financial aid could mean for his family. He was also feeling a fair share of pressure as students and teachers crushed into the gym to watch Guei and seven other randomly compete against each other.

Guei won the free-throw contest by one basket and netted the ＄40,000. But it’s what he did next that’s truly astonishing.

In the weeks following the March free-throw competition, Guei learned that he’d scored a full-ride basketball scholarship to California State University---Northridge. NCAA(全国大学生体育协会)rules allowed Guei to accept the athletic scholarship and also keep most of the ＄40,000 he had won.

But Guei couldn’t stop thinking about the seven talented runners-up from the free-throw contest. They, too, had dreams and very real needs. So, he asked Principal Jesse Jones to make a surprise announcement at Compton High’s graduation ceremony: Geui wanted to donate the ＄40,000 to the other seven students.

“I’ve already been blessed so much and I know we’re living with a bad economy, so I know this money can really help my classmates,” Guei said in a statement. “It was the right decision.”

Guei elaborated on his decision to give the money away in an interview with ESPN(体育电视网): “I was already well taken care of to go to school, to go to university for free...I felt like they needed it more than I did.”