How to write about a difficult background in a college essay

RReaders in Stanford's admissions office, the office we learned from, are by temperament champions of the underdog. Offices like it are full of people who believe in access to education, and readers there pulled for students who were the first in their families to attend college, students from families with little money, veterans, students with undocumented status, and students whose parents drove buses or painted houses rather than practised law.

Many applicants never realise this, and so they hide the very facts a reader would most want to see, the context that explains what they have made of what they were given. Stating those facts is also only half of the case, and families who stop there can leave a reader moved and still without an argument to make in committee. Both halves begin with the plainest possible account.