Every Friday in third grade, each student would receive a writing assignment, multiplication tables, division tables, and a reading assignment due the following week. Proud to be in the highest math class, I always grabbed my math problems first and left my writing for last as I was focused on timing myself over and over again to make sure I could pass that week's multiplication and division “minute” challenge (we were working up to an ice cream sundae celebration). However, one week in April, I remember being more excited than ever to complete my writing assignment - a “how to” paper. While most of my classmates decided to write about how to make a PB&J or how to make a paper airplane, I , on the other hand, decided to channel my creativity and my personal wants and wrote about how to adopt a dog. During this time, I discovered the website PetFinder, where you can find rescue dogs all across the country, and I spent all of my allotted internet time on this website - I believe this is where my love for research began. I loved dogs and wanted to find a new puppy for our family as our dog passed away a couple of months prior. This writing assignment was the perfect opportunity for me to capitalize on improving my writing grade, but more importantly, convince my parents that we needed to adopt a dog.
Megan (my sister), Maya, and I on the day of her adoption (left to right).
I finally found her. Hours and hours of searching. She was a year and a half year old yellow lab about an hour away who had been abandoned by her past owners due to her high medical bills. Her name was Maya.
I completed my writing assignment with a pending conclusion - would we adopt this dog, the final step. As a determined 9 year old, I took my assignment a step further and created a presentation for my parents. At this moment, my parents realized that I was the most persuasive and compassionate 3rd grader they had ever met. My last slide of my presentation was the adoption form. Unsurprisingly, my parents agreed and we all thoughtfully filled out the form together. A couple days later, my dad got the call that we were chosen to adopt Maya. My dad and I hopped in the car and drove to the shelter. Immediately, we both fell in love with Maya; she came home and became a part of our family. From this point on, my parents and I both understood that once I set my mind to something, I would be impossible to stop.
Even after third grade, I still loved math and quickly found a love for science too. In high school, I took two science classes a year and even had to take AP Chemistry at my rival high school because my school did not offer it. Because of this, I entered Santa Clara University as a mechanical engineer with pre-med. After my first year at SCU, I was selected as a Jean Donovan Fellow through the Ignatian Center. I had the opportunity to travel to Trujillo, Peru for six weeks and live with a host family. During my experience, I volunteered at a week-long medical mission and in the public hospitals, engaged with the community health workers, and created health-based curriculums for the local elementary school. I also spent time with my host family drinking coffee, making chocolate, going to their cousin’s baby shower, and learning chess from their 8 year old son, Jose David. While I would say I cherished most of my time in Peru, there were definitely some challenges. Most vividly, I called my dad crying because the toilet started to overflow (not the best plumbing) and I could not fix it, let alone describe the situation in my conversational Spanish. Thankfully, my dad sat on the phone with me for about 30 minutes while I struggled to figure out how to fix the toilet.
This was my first time being uncomfortable and I popped my bubble of unrecognized privilege and ignorance. Since this experience, I continue to want to push myself outside of my comfort zone as it is where I have found the most growth, both personally and academically. Through this growth in Peru, I found my passion for global health. And once I got home, I listened to my heart and made the decision to completely change my educational path.
Trujillo, Peru
Carlos and I playing outside after class.
In the classroom with our students learning about climate change.
Jose David playing soccer.
Now, I am a junior majoring in Public Health and Economics with a minor in Biology. On campus, I am involved in Residence Life, a Hackworth Fellow through the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, and partnered with a bioengineering senior design team through Engineering World Health. This past year I have worked on a team of five to develop a non-invasive, low-cost cervical cancer screening device for Sub-Saharan Africa. In addition to helping with the device, I designed a pictorial educational brochure on cervical cancer and HPV for women in Uganda. In addition to educating, another one of our focuses for the brochure was women’s empowerment and how women have the ability to take control of their own health and also provide support for the others in their family and community. As we speak, this brochure is being distributed to clinicians, midwives, and community health workers in Kampala and rural regions in Uganda by my partner, Rose Academies. I was also asked to speak with Rose Academies at the UN Commission on the Status of Women in NYC in March 2020. Sadly, this conference was cancelled due to coronavirus.
Because of this project, I pursued the Global Social Benefit Fellowship through the Miller Center. I want to continue to focus on the role women play in both the economic and social setting in developing nations. This fellowship provides me with the opportunity to intertwine both my majors and my passions of economics in public health through action research. This component of the fellowship highlights practical learning within the lens of a specific social enterprise. Through this deep investigation and research, I hope to make a measurable impact on the community and personally grow, develop, and vocationally discern. After SCU, I want to continue this work as I plan to pursue a Masters in Public Health with an emphasis on International Health Economics. This will push me to expand my global perspective and create new connections around the world. I want to make an impact through my education to address the medical and healthcare needs of others.