Cageless Minds by Bennett

Cageless Minds by Bennett - November 2020 Scholarship Essay

From a very early age until the second semester of eighth grade, my mother homeschooled me. At the time I remember dreaming of attending a traditional school with all the social opportunities it would provide. Finally, the time arrived and I matriculated in the last semester of middle school and continued through my current senior year, only to find the traditional classroom a bit different from what I was used to.

The motto of our homeschool was Work Hard, Play Hard, and we did. We followed a rigorous traditional curriculum. But, to my mother, even our playtime was an opportunity for learning. She always made sure we had toys that fostered creativity, encouraged playing outside, and best of all, created Tinker Time. Tinker Time was probably the most influential part of our homeschool journey for me. My mother would provide an old electronic item such as a computer, or tape recorder, or some other machine. Or she would hand me a pile of wood, nuts and bolts, screws and nails, and hinges. Our home was stuffed with art supplies of all kinds and she saved everything from buttons to bottle caps to utilize in creations. I now realize that what messy activities every other mother would flee from, my mother leaned into for us. This experience gave me the opportunity to understand how things worked, to think beyond what was in front of me, and to create. There were no boundaries in what was possible. I loved this time and had no idea that my mother intended it to be part of our schoolwork.

However, to this day, everyone chuckles when I declare, I have an idea! It’s usually followed by requesting 40 yards of cable, 18 rolls of duct tape, and a paper clip. I love to invent. Years ago, to my mother’s delight, she found me and my sisters watching Steamboat Willie cartoons under my bed from the movie theatre I had built with a magnifying glass, cardboard box, and my iPod Touch. I also constructed an automatic curtain opener for Boy Scouts using Tinker Toys, Lincoln Logs, a motor, and fabric so we could vacation without anyone knowing that we were gone. I am simply convinced that with some Superglue and a hemostat I’d be able to evoke world peace. I truly believe that it is due to being given the opportunity to tinker. In many ways, it is the highest form of learning, because it creates a love of learning. A student with a love of learning is more valuable than a student that earns straight A’s by memorizing information and regurgitating it.

Last year, I was accepted into the Moody Advanced Professional Studies (MAPS) Business Entrepreneurial Program. I was educated in the minutiae of Microeconomics, Economic Advanced Studies, and Entrepreneurship. I learned the details of developing a business. With incredible resources at my disposal, I was, once again, able to tinker and then invented a water filtration system called OGen, which I am currently building a prototype of, with a grant from the University of North Texas.

Paraphrasing, Mark Twain once said, one should find a job he enjoys, and he will never have to work a day in his life. That job for me is a professional tinkerer. I know that for me, removing the constraints of thinking inside the box, is where the corners of opportunity and innovation meet. Creating something that brings world value, is a life well-lived. And who knows, maybe my mother is right, she always said I’d solve cancer!