Reflection

My expectations for high school as an eighth grader were way too high. In my freshman year, I tried fitting in with different groups of people. I was very scared of doing something wrong, and messing up my chance at a fresh start. I went through exploratory, breaking a welding machine in Metal Fabrication, needing to go to an eyewash station after sawdust getting underneath my safety glasses in carpentry, and failing to lift a tire in auto. I came in knowing I wanted computer science, and my opinion did not change after exploratory. 

I joined Student Council, Cheerleading, and Drama Club my freshman year. At the end of freshman year, I was elected Student Council Secretary. I still wanted to be more involved, so in my later years I joined Robotics, NHS, Non-Traditional Club, and the Engineering club.

Over my summers, I spent my time exploring my interests. In the summer of 2023, I started to make a Roblox game with Lua. I hated Lua, I struggled a lot with it. I was able to get the questionable looking dogs to follow the player though. To get such a small function working felt like a huge win for me since it took many hours of stress and confusion. 

In Sophomore year, I made a Tomodachi Life personality program for my AP Computer Science Principles exam. This was based on the actual calculations done to create a Mii’s personality type. Since I did not have as much experience, I would remake this program now with less else-ifs, magic numbers, and I would use JavaFX. I am excited for April 16th, 2026, because Tomodachi Life: Living The Dream comes out! If the personality calculations change, I might make a new program at the end of my senior year as an independent project.

My favorite year of dance was sophomore year. My recreational classes, jazz and contemporary, had both my favorite rec dances of all time. My favorite dance overall was also in my sophomore year, my competition jazz dance “Jazz Machine”. Everything about Jazz Machine was perfect, it was such an underrated routine from the blazers and the red hats to the shoulder bounces.

Tap had always been my least favorite style of dance, I would get frustrated when I couldn’t make the correct sounds and others were ahead of me. In junior year, I started focusing on proper technique and asking my tap teacher questions. Eventually, I got better and started learning new tricks to show my teacher at the beginning of each class. I started to realize that tap was actually my favorite style, I just had to learn to be patient. At the start of my senior year, I was selected for the small group tap routine, which is a group of tap dancers that compete in a separate dance.

In the summer of 2025, I discovered that reading wasn’t so bad. I spent my nights reading until the sun came up, which I would never expect from myself. In senior year I took AP Literature and Composition. I was nervous but excited to take this class, and after I started it, I realized it would definitely be a challenge. I had to learn how to write essays in a different style and fully analyze the points I was making. I enjoyed the challenge, and AP Lit became my favorite class of my senior year.

I plan to continue my education in college. I want to continue participating in activities like dance and drama, as well as joining other clubs. I am planning on majoring in Mechanical/Aerospace Engineering. I may also minor in computer science, since I still want to code in my future.