生活是一場(chǎng)長(zhǎng)跑，在行將就木之前，任何時(shí)刻所取得的成功都只是下一階段的起點(diǎn)。有人因?yàn)橐粫r(shí)的成功而裹足不前，比如中國(guó)各省歷年的高考的狀元，在后來(lái)取得顯著成就的，你能說(shuō)出幾個(gè)人的名字來(lái)？有人面對(duì)眼前的厄運(yùn)平淡對(duì)待、奮起直追、后來(lái)居上，比如Hao Wu，他曾經(jīng)就讀的華東師范大學(xué)和紐約州立大學(xué)石溪分校并不算院校，但他后來(lái)讓普林斯頓大學(xué)刮目相看。

四川大學(xué)的一個(gè)男生曾深深打動(dòng)過(guò)我?！拔业那髮W(xué)經(jīng)歷并非一帆風(fēng)順。我曾就讀于成都七中，一貫成績(jī)優(yōu)異。按照常理，畢業(yè)后進(jìn)入北京大學(xué)學(xué)習(xí)并在研究生階段赴美留學(xué)，幾乎是順理成章的事情。但是，由于家人突遭變故等客觀(guān)原因的影響，導(dǎo)致我未能在高考中發(fā)揮應(yīng)有的水平，于是與北京大學(xué)失之交臂，來(lái)到了并非自己夢(mèng)想學(xué)校的四川大學(xué)。我和有著類(lèi)似經(jīng)歷的同輩們都面臨艱難的選擇，將目標(biāo)定于更為現(xiàn)實(shí)的就業(yè)，或是堅(jiān)持自己初的理想，完成本科學(xué)業(yè)以后在名校中繼續(xù)研究生階段的學(xué)習(xí)。我選擇了后者，為此我通過(guò)層層選拔進(jìn)入了四川大學(xué)吳玉章學(xué)院。

在大學(xué)里我更加努力，憑著優(yōu)異的成績(jī)，我得到了去新加坡國(guó)立大學(xué)交換學(xué)習(xí)一年的機(jī)會(huì)。在新加坡的一年大大開(kāi)拓了我的眼界，不論是學(xué)術(shù)上還是人生觀(guān)方面。在Yatracos教授的指導(dǎo)下，我參加了數(shù)學(xué)建模競(jìng)賽，并寫(xiě)了一篇論文。

回國(guó)以后，我在幾位教授的指導(dǎo)下完成了一些較為基礎(chǔ)但也頗具意義的研究工作。從中我不僅感受到統(tǒng)計(jì)、不確定性理論及其應(yīng)用在現(xiàn)代科學(xué)領(lǐng)域的重要地位，也從中汲取了研究經(jīng)驗(yàn)，體驗(yàn)到了科學(xué)研究的樂(lè)趣，更加堅(jiān)定了畢業(yè)以后繼續(xù)研究生階段的學(xué)習(xí)的愿望。

李波(化名)滿(mǎn)懷感慨地陳述著他的過(guò)去。成都七中是一所百年名校，是北大、清華等著名高校在西南地區(qū)的重要生源基地，每年考入北大和清華兩校的人數(shù)占這兩所大學(xué)在四川招生人數(shù)的1/4左右，占在成都市招生人數(shù)的近1/2。

一向名列前茅的李波從成都七中考到四川大學(xué)，在心理上肯定會(huì)有很大的失落感。但他還是踏踏實(shí)實(shí)地走著學(xué)術(shù)道路，終獲得了哈佛大學(xué)和加州理工學(xué)院(California Institute of Technology)的博士全額獎(jiǎng)學(xué)金。

李波曾經(jīng)用來(lái)申請(qǐng)哈佛大學(xué)的個(gè)人陳述(Personal Statement)非常專(zhuān)業(yè)、漂亮，我一直保留著作為勉勵(lì)學(xué)生的范本，希望每一個(gè)有志去哈佛的學(xué)生能夠領(lǐng)悟到“”的涵義：

“For Whom the Bell Tolls” explored the interconnection of mankind, that all of mankind’s destinies are tied together, that we are all one and the same. Whatever I do will have an effect on others but that one has to learn to stand alone before he can stand with others. This struck a chord with me and I have taken it to heart as my motto in the way I live my life. My family and my community are my constant touchstones in my quest to find my full potential, pushing me to do my best in all my endeavors.My interest in the field of mathematics was cultivated in the thick academic atmosphere formed by the family members most of whom took up research work. 

I am convinced that scientific beliefs may be due to the persistent and objective truth, and think that in large part, is based on mathematics. Therefore, the choice of learning mathematics in pursuit of my belief logically follows it. In my view, the function of mathematics in the world is achieved through application. 

My love for mathematics began at a young age, during which I found it fascinating in all its richness and complexity. I attached great importance to it encouraged myself to explore it further and strive to fully achieve my potential. I excelled at mathematics in my primary and high school years, winning awards in various competitions and other extracurricular activities, capping my early years of study with a superb academic record. 

As time went on, I started to ponder two questions: what problems are actually studied by math, the way to solve them,?and how does?math work to?serve our lives.I chose pure math as my undergraduate major, because I think I need to know more to answer the first question and now I have decided to plunge into the field of statistics and operation research, because I want to find an answer to the second one. The more I study math, the more I feel that it has become the most reliable tool for human beings to cognize and analyze the world, which is always truthful to us as long as we are truthful. Borrowing a term in statistics, it has already become our “null hypothesis” for the real world.

Speaking of analyzing the world, mathematics is not full-fledged in its application. In this field, a very important issue is that most of the research done is driven by the existent literature while not the true source where statistics and applied math were born-practical problems in life. In a word, instead of seeking problems and creating paper from the papers of the pioneers in the field, I believe it is more important to look at the practical problem itself and extract what we need from the vast sea of all the mathematical knowledge to make our own way to the best solution. 

This is what I am looking to do for my graduate study.As for the preparation, I injected great enthusiasm in the field of mathematics modeling. I received my first award in mathematics modeling, when I was in high school. After entering the university, I participated in the MCM and led my team to the outstanding award. As captain of the team, I was mainly responsible for the model building and the writing of the original version of the paper. It was in this process that I gained valuable experience of solving practical problems and strongly felt that the use of statistical methods and operations research had a tremendous role to play to solve real world problems, which also further cemented my resolve to pursue advanced studies in statistics and operations research.My undergraduate advisor Prof. Luo is now doing research on how to use theories of uncertainty to solve practical problems. 

I am very interested in it and have already started to go deeper into this area under his direction. As we all know the statistics studies uncertainty, randomness and variability, while the uncertainty theory contains not just what statistics focuses on. In my opinion, fuzzy mathematics, and other branches of uncertainty theory can also become as mature as the statistics to address practical problems. I am very interested in the different starting points, means and effects of fuzzy mathematics and statistics in solving the same problems. 

Thus, I dedicated my