What I Plan to Major in and Why by Star

What I Plan to Major in and Why by Star - April 2025 Scholarship Essay

I’m choosing psychology as my major because I need to understand people, not just laws. The world doesn’t need another lawyer who memorizes textbooks. It needs lawyers who know why people act the way they do, who can predict behavior, and who understand trauma firsthand. That’s where psychology comes in.

My uncle taught me my first lesson in human behavior. The same man who carried me on his shoulders as a child later set up an armed robbery against our family in Nigeria. When the police refused to help, I didn’t just see corruption. I saw a psychology problem. How does someone switch from love to betrayal? What makes systems protect criminals instead of victims? I don’t just want to put people like my uncle in jail. I want to understand how they think so I can stop others before they turn violent.

Then there’s the immigration system. Seven year old me stood silent during the Pledge of Allegiance while my father fought deportation. That’s when I learned laws don’t care about your feelings. But psychology does. It studies how policies traumatize families, how stress changes decisions, how fear keeps people silent. I’ll use my degree to prove in court what I lived at home, that the system breaks people mentally before it breaks them legally.

Psychology isn’t just about fixing minds. It’s about fixing justice. Running my school’s TV show taught me to read people, to know when to push and when to listen. At AlphaBest, I manage kids who’d rather fight than do homework. That’s daily practice in conflict resolution, in spotting lies, in motivating the unwilling. These aren’t just job skills. They’re lawyer skills.

When American University’s financial aid fell short, I took a gap year working at AlphaBest. Watching my friends start college without me hurt, but it taught me more about determination than any class could. Now I’m coming for my psychology degree with a mission, to build cases that consider motive, trauma, and the human cost of every law.

This major isn’t a detour from law. It’s the fast track. The best criminal justice lawyers don’t just know the system. They know the people in it. After a lifetime studying both, I’m ready to become the kind of lawyer who changes things, not just argues about them.