Why I've Changed by Kayvon

Why I've Changed by Kayvon - June 2017 Scholarship Essay

It’s difficult to judge a young child’s aspirations without using the adjective innocent or naive. The sentiment “I want to serve society through hard work and justice,” is one that is recycled. It’s why most six year olds say I want to be a fireman, a policeman, a doctor. But I didn't have an orthodox childhood. I would sit on my mother’s stool as she gracefully held her palette with marvel and gratitude as if it was all she possessed. I would peer past my father’s shoulder as he made visual metaphors with callused hands and an unmitigated determination. Their will to create is what encouraged me to pursue a fundamental element of life, food. Yes as a six year old I paraded around my house with a chef hat, a spatula, and a toy skillet, ready to masterfully craft the first order of cheese sandwiches that came my way. I can remember baking Tuesdays with my mother at age seven when I would help prepare freshly baked blueberry scones. I can remember Friday nights as an eight year old, helping my father prepare salad and stir fry for dinner. But as time pressed on, my culinary exploration waned and I switched my palette from a creator of food to one that simply enjoyed eating it.
I can’t point to a specific date or class or instance when my aspirations took a definitive turn but I can say with ease that my personality throughout my education has been filled with bursts of excitement and curiosity. This is because my high school experience has been filled with a breadth of people and experience. Since fifth grade, I have made friends from countless countries, India and South Korea to name a few, and have had the pleasure to take courses from AP Human Geography to AP Art History. That diversity was what defined my high school career. It is what encouraged me to try new dishes like fluffy Indian dosas. It is what inspired me as a fifth grader to want to teach with the same fervor Mr. Woods expressed in his Latin classes. It is what encouraged me as an eighth grader to pursue law or some form of public speaking when I joined the Speech and Debate club.
But no moment has defined who I am today more than these past few months. From February to April of this year I worked on my Senior Research Project, a program devised by my high school that allows seniors to create a research question and work at a site to help answer it. My central question was how can gardens improve STEM-based education in inner-city schools. To answer this question I worked in New York for a company called BlocPower. There I was able to code in Python and HTML, work on their marketplace sprint team, and access their research database. But in the end what I took away from the experience was an interest in educational psychology and administration, a topic I want to major in when I attend Amherst. The hope is that this degree will help me attain a position in local government where I can ultimately consult policymakers on how we can improve STEM curricula. This endeavor is exciting to me because I want to encourage and enliven a spirit to learn in students that I came to appreciate in my years of high school.
My hope is that I am as impassioned as my mother, a woman who to this day stays up late at night—enveloped in her projects. My wish is that I can paint aspirations for inner-city schoolchildren with the same ease that I continue to watch my father do through his graphic design. It is with this work ethic I have observed from my parents combined with the nuances I have gained throughout my schooling experience why I believe I have changed fundamentally: from a boy dreaming of a profession in the culinary arts to one starting a career in educational administration.