Welcome to my sophomore year

Quarantine made it difficult to maintain my social life. As a result, my sophomore year was full of professional development. I accomplished a lot this year and got to celebrate my wins toward the end of Spring Quarter. Since the COVID-19 vaccine got released this year, hope was starting to spread that life would start returning back to normal. Once I got my COVID-19 vaccine, I traveled to multiple states and finally reconnected with my friends and family in person after being seperated for so long due to the pandemic.

Personal life

In May 2021, I took a trip to Denver, CO with my dad for my cousin's high school graduation. It was a great escape from Seattle, and helped me reconnect with my family in Colorado. I also got to see what my life could have turned out to be - I was born in Colorado, so visiting places like the hospital I was born in and the apartments I used to live in was an interesting experience of envisioning "what could have been" if I had continued to grow up there.

When school ended, I took a trip to Los Angeles, CA with a few friends. It felt like my first taste of freedom since the pandemic began because I got to connect with a big group of friends in person for the first time in a year and a half. My friends and I also experienced a positive culture shock with the sunny weather and friendly people in California, and came back to Seattle refreshed and ready to keep travelling.

Academic life

Calderwood Seminar for Public Writing: Math That Lies: Communicating Why Some Quantitative Arguments are Misleading or Bogus (H 221)

This was my first writing class at UW and one of my favorite classes I've ever taken :) We critiqued everyone's work in front of the class, so came in super intimidated and worried my writing was inadequate. But in just 10 weeks I learned the importance of and the skills to simplify complicated quantitative topics to be easily understood through writing.

Professional life

Changemakers in Computing Mentor

During Winter Break 2020, I got hired as a mentor for the UW Changemakers in Computing 4-week summer program. As a CIC mentor, I created an outreach calender to recruit 25 mentees for our pilot year. Once the program began, I helped historically marginalized students code for social good in office hours and by planning a week-long hackathon for them to apply what they've learned.

CodePath.org Mobile Development Student

During Winter 2021, I enrolled in this 8-week course and learned how to code for iOS. I met for a couple hours each Saturday for coding lessons and fireside chats with professionals in the industry, and worked on the weekly deliverables on my own time. By the end of the program, I had created an iOS app where users could upload and save flashcards to their device. With a simple tap, users can alternate between their inputted questions and answers.