When I first started at UW, I felt lost. It was the feeling of stepping into an art gallery for the first time, beautiful but overwhelming, and unsure of where to go first. I had moved to a new location, almost all of my friends were scattered across the country, and nothing was familiar. The only places that were comfortable to me were on my phone, where I could communicate with my old friends, or going home on the weekends. I had been at my high school/middle school for 6 years, and had developed my friendships, cross-country community, and relationships with teachers and other students for over 4 years. The transition to college meant that I had to step away from all of these built up communities, and I had to learn to build new ones. And naturally, I was scared to do so.
My first steps in this gallery were in the Nance Lab, and with my roommate. Both of these were familiar from high school - my roommate having been a friend from cross country, and the lab having offered an online data science program during the summer of my junior year. Moving in was a new experience, learning how to deal with different sleeping schedules, cleanliness and more. The lab was also different in person, and meeting new people apart from my mentor was intimidating. However, this meant that I was able to start off my journey with a built-in friend and an isolated environment to push my growth professionally and socially. I have since learned so much about communication, not being afraid to ask for help from others, speaking up in meetings with my own ideas, what good mentors look like, and more.
My next step was with my classmates. Originally, I had been too afraid to talk to anyone, and gone and sat by myself. I eventually realized that I hated acting busy on my laptop when teachers asked us to talk to our neighbors or having to frantically finish homework without any clue how others were doing confusing questions. I knew I had to put myself out there, especially once my experience in the BioE cohort began. Being more open to talking to others and pushing myself to compliment stickers or clothing helped me open more doors than I expected. Having a group of friends in several of my classes helped me enjoy studying a lot more, gave me chances to learn from those that understood material much better, and gave me a new community to explore Seattle with and have fun.
Other pieces included various clubs I joined, my internship experience, and a study abroad trip to Japan through the honors program. The study abroad was a significant piece of my gallery, having been one of the most memorable experiences during college. I made a new very tight-knit friend group with those across various disciplines, explored a very new place, and learned more about educationally branching out from science. My club experiences allowed me to engage more with the student body at UW, and connect with more types of people. My internship helped me learn about forming new communities in industry, navigating professional settings and people of all sorts of ages and identities.
Finally, while my gallery is centered around the various communities I have connected to, learning to take care of myself has been a large part of my time at college as well. I have also continued to develop methods to take care of myself during my time alone, with new hobbies, physical health, study strategies, and more.
I knew that going into college, one of the hardest parts of my journey would be getting comfortable with putting myself out there socially and connecting with new people. However, I knew that I wanted to work to build up new communities in college. To me, communities are the groups of people I meet that I'm able to form friendships and relationships with, and those that I can learn and grow from. My portfolio will delve into all of these communities deeper, but the most significant lessons I have learned in college were tied to the wide diversity of people I connected with, and learning to apply these lessons to new people I meet and to my professional development. Interacting with so many communities throughout college has not only given me enjoyable experiences and relationships to look back on, but also so many lessons I was able to tie into my personal growth. Now, I feel like my college journey has prepared me for the next steps of my life.
In this portfolio, I present my gallery to you. If you are as overwhelmed as I was when starting out, follow from the top left piece to the bottom right. If you’re ready to explore, however, this portfolio is not organized chronologically, so enter however you’d like.