As a young child, my creativity annoyingly outpaced my engineering skills. Many of my projects never went beyond a sketch in my engineering notebook, and almost all my DIY projects were only half-finished. 3D modeling was nearly impossible for me. 3D printing hadn’t existed in my universe yet. I got my iPad Mini in fifth grade expecting to exploit it by playing video games 24/7. Instead, my aspirations were redirected towards the hobby of homemade engineering projects. What started as an obsession with Legos morphed into an aptitude for assembling mechanisms from scratch. My iPad YouTube history, predominantly Lego videos, quickly became dominated by DIY craft and circuit videos. The world of engineering had found me—not the type to just study, but the one to physically engage in. YouTube had kickstarted my career in engineering. My skill of converting project ideas into reality is one I have been self-developing since I was eleven, which is apparent through the dramatic improvement of my countless DIY projects over time. I’ve built many remote-controlled planes, a CNC mill, and a couple of portable electric vehicles to name a few. 3D modeling is now in muscle memory. And 3D printing is my most useful tool. My expansive knowledge of circuitry, material science, and mechanics has enabled me to fulfill most of my project ideas into sweet fruition. According to my current trend of improvement, these skills will only be improving, leaving me to wonder what my next projects will be.

I founded Flite Club and Maker Club at Oak Grove High School. Flite Club revolved around the scratch building process of remote-controlled aircraft. I started this club to create an environment where students feel inspired to pursue their interests in aerospace through hands-on projects. Flite Club inspired several people to fabricate their own DIY drones, kindled their interests in aerospace, and educated members about the mechanics, dynamics, and design process of remote-controlled drones. We test flew our scratch-built aircraft models in our school field, where we had many enriching experiences and developmental takeaways whether or not our test flights were successful. Before Maker Club, I had longed to join an organization that accommodates my creative desires to make DIY projects and encompasses art and general engineering fields beyond aerospace. I founded Maker Club to help other students who have experienced similar difficulties and needed an encouraging environment to work on their projects. My club gave students access to a makerspace with machines and materials to create their projects with minimal limitations. We offered the free use of 3D printers, laser cutters, CNC mills, and other tools, materials, and electronics that people would otherwise not have easy access to. Members were trained on the operation of machinery, such as 3D printers, and the selection of components and methods for engineering their projects. Working on my engineering projects with an abundance of resources at my disposal is an advantage I highly value, and bestowing others with the same power is equally rewarding. I love teaching other students the sublime skills of DIY engineering that I have attained over the years of DIY projects. The possession of these skills has always been a fundamental element of my personal, creative, and career development, and I aspire to continue helping others achieve the same.

The dilemma of money versus a cleaner climate can be combated through innovative engineering. Cleaner energy farms and transportation are simply not efficient enough for more companies and governments to adopt. For the efficiency of renewable energy to be comparable to its non-renewable counterparts, clean energy systems must be cheaper, more energy efficient, and safer. All these factors influence the desirability of the use of clean energy amongst all socioeconomic classes. Every week after school, I wholeheartedly immerse myself in my engineering projects. These projects allow me to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of technology. Therefore, I plan to passionately study and research in the fields of mechanical and electrical engineering. More specifically, I plan to pursue these majors in conjunction with applications in eco-friendly transportation. My skill of taking project ideas and synthesizing them into reality is one I have been developing since I was eleven, which is apparent through the improvement of my countless DIY projects and the dramatic improvement of them over time. I’ve built dozens of remote-controlled planes and some portable electric vehicles, to name a couple. My homebuilt electric scooter and electric bike are very near and dear to me. There is something special about creating a machine that has the power to accelerate my body to twenty-five miles per hour, and gives me the privilege to effortlessly travel wherever I want without the nasty smell and carbon footprint of gasoline. I greatly aspire to employ my dextrous engineering skills and inspire others to innovate in the component fabrication and transportation industries, and contribute to a more sustainable society.

The dilemma of money versus a cleaner climate can be combated through innovative engineering. Cleaner energy farms and transportation are simply not efficient enough for more companies and governments to adopt. For the efficiency of renewable energy to be comparable to its non-renewable counterparts, clean energy systems must be cheaper, more energy efficient, and safer. All these factors influence the desirability of the use of clean energy amongst all socioeconomic classes. Every week after school, I wholeheartedly immerse myself in my engineering projects. These projects allow me to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of technology. Therefore, I plan to passionately study and research in the fields of mechanical and electrical engineering. More specifically, I plan to pursue these majors in conjunction with applications in eco-friendly transportation. My skill of taking project ideas and synthesizing them into reality is one I have been developing since I was eleven, which is apparent through the improvement of my countless DIY projects and the dramatic improvement of them over time. I’ve built dozens of remote-controlled planes and some portable electric vehicles, to name a couple. My homebuilt electric scooter and electric bike are very near and dear to me. There is something special about creating a machine that has the power to accelerate my body to twenty-five miles per hour, and gives me the privilege to effortlessly travel wherever I want without the nasty smell and carbon footprint of gasoline. I greatly aspire to employ my dextrous engineering skills to innovate in the component fabrication and transportation industries, and contribute to a more sustainable society. SCU is a prestigious school that parallels my personal values for faithful engineering and would therefore complement the development of my career.

I created and led a project with a partner with the goal of creating a 12-foot-wingspan autonomous UAV to execute any unique aerial operation using swappable compartments. Exuberant about the concept, I immediately began designing the plane on CAD with the time distance learning gave me. We made several small-scale RC plane prototypes that failed to fly properly due to minor electro-mechanical faults. I also built a large 10-foot-wingspan prototype known as “The Prototype.” Its first test began with stable high-speed ground passes, ending with a crash into a small pole by the runway. Even after design improvements, the drone was unable to attain enough speed to take off due to our limited runway length. As we constructed more prototypes, we created presentations for the district, county, state, and international science fairs. Having committed ample time to fabricating The Prototype and CADing the 12-foot-wingspan UAV, both drones were quite robust. However, we failed to succeed in the county fair after prevailing in the district fair. My partner and I were appalled, considering that less successful drone projects succeed in the county fair. I then became demotivated since the county fair left us uninformed of our faults. Nevertheless, I kept developing prototypes to bring my brainchild of the pandemic to fruition. I strongly believed in the project's completion because of the amount of blood, sweat, and tears I’ve invested, as well as the implications of such a drone. Nowadays, I am finally constructing the final rendition after successful prototype flights.

The art class that I wholeheartedly participated in for nine years taught me the versatile language of art through the tools of pencil and paint. Now, I am a very proficient drawer and oil painter, more or less by second nature. I love doodling to create personal stories through art. My doodle drawings are a personal account of my topical emotions. This art often includes absurdly random objects to denote my emotions and thoughts. When I create art, I firstly prioritize emotion over reason to fully flesh out my creative ideas. My creative method prompts me to think critically, naturally leading me to synthesize logic and reason. This is how I convert art into engineering. These doodle stories are illustrated in such a personal way that only I can interpret the full story of it. In other words, I primarily create art for myself, not others, which is a value that keeps my creativity genuine. My art is heavily influenced by the imagery from my dreams. Art is one of the only healthy ways in life that one can momentarily feel the fruition of fantasies and the absence of anxieties. Living in dreams, although practically impossible, stimulates the most happiness and creativity, making it easier to deal with real world situations. As an artist, I strive to master the skill of simulating this creative magic through various forms of art. All forms of art are appealing to me since art universally embodies all these aforementioned qualities. On that note, I also have a passion for music production and am currently working on the skills needed to produce my own music. Music production is just another threshold to achieving the enlightenment of my dreamy imagination. Although the idea of pursuing “dreamy imaginations” may sound unrealistic to some, the real life implications of following this abstract philosophy is fundamental to the concrete projects I undertake, which is why I am an artistic engineer.

“Arvin, you’re so creative,” my preschool teacher once praised me as I made Lego planes. That was the first time I had heard “creative,” an initially alien word. After understanding its meaning a few days later, I assumed it as my identity thereafter. This personal identity and my experience in creating contraptions strengthened my confidence and encouraged my artistic talent. Art was my daily driver; boats, birds, and the San Francisco Golden Gate Bridge dominated the majority of my drawings. Legos, building blocks, and trainsets littered my room, serving the basis of my developing dexterity and technological curiosity. At 7 years old, my parents enrolled me in an art class. I was thrilled. In retrospect, art class was a 9-year-long movie presenting the growth of my artistic skills and personal identity. Art class not only made me a proficient oil painter, but also a better project manager and executor. The components of a painting are very similar to a DIY project: a reference image for inspiration, a basic sketch to test geometries, backdropping colors as an underpin, and finally details to unify all components and create a coherent presentation. Art class also made me a very imaginative thinker. The planning process of my engineering projects often included hours planning and designing the project in my mind while doing other daily activities. By creating DIY projects at home for the past several years, this became a useful and time-saving skill. My passion for homemade engineering projects progressively strengthened as I got older. As an 11-year-old Lego Technic geek, making mechanical contraptions, most notably semi-automatically reloading crossbows, was right up my alley. Approaching the limits of the geometry of my Lego pieces, I resorted to sanding and sawing them to make custom ones. At some excruciating point, I thought, “The heck with Legos! I’ll use other objects to fabricate better mechanisms.” This moment marked an acceleration in my ultimate passion, getting my hands on my first hot glue gun, becoming best friends with a box cutter, and consolidating a reserve of to-be-recycled items from around the house. Dozens of electronic toys met their premature demise, facilitated by my screwdriver, and were reincarnated into RC airboats, cars, and planes. Styrofoam craft days were the most frustrating to my parents, unsurprisingly. As I continued developing my dexterity and expressing my creativity, I became more appreciative of YouTube and the desire to be a part of its creator community. YouTube has almost always been the initial source of inspiration and information for my projects and technical skills. In the last few years, I’ve felt compelled to go beyond simple gratitude for the YouTube creators I love. Therefore, I create YouTube videos myself, where I build and present DIY projects to inspire the future generation of engineers and content creators. I also enjoy helping other STEAM students bring their project ideas to fruition via hands-on involvement. I’ve created and led a few STEAM clubs every year since 8th grade. Each one gave students access to the machines, materials, and the sense of community needed to facilitate their passions, flesh out ideas, and develop careers. My intense passion for creative engineering and sharing it with others gives me the drive to push through ambitious projects, despite massive pitfalls. I created and led a project with a partner with the goal of creating a 12-foot-wingspan autonomous UAV to execute any unique aerial operation using swappable compartments. Exuberant about the concept, I immediately began designing the plane on CAD with the time distance learning gave me. We made several small-scale RC plane prototypes that failed to fly properly due to minor electro-mechanical faults. I also built a large 10-foot-wingspan prototype known as “The Prototype.” Its first test began with stable high-speed ground passes, ending with a crash into a small pole by the runway. Even after design improvements, the drone was unable to attain enough speed to take off due to our limited runway length. As we constructed more prototypes, we created presentations for the district, county, state, and international science fairs. Having committed ample time to fabricating The Prototype and CADing the 12-foot-wingspan UAV, both drones were quite robust. However, we failed to succeed in the county fair after prevailing in the district fair. My partner and I were appalled, considering that less successful drone projects succeed in the county fair. I then became demotivated since the county fair left us uninformed of our faults. Nevertheless, I kept developing prototypes to bring my brainchild of the pandemic to fruition. I strongly believed in the project's completion because of the amount of blood, sweat, and tears I’ve invested, as well as the implications of such a drone. Nowadays, I am finally constructing the final rendition after successful prototype flights. Over the years, I’ve worked on many significant projects, such as learning CAD a few years ago (now muscle memory), 3D printing (currently my most useful tool), my electric kick scooter (made from a hoverboard), and my autonomous utility drone (winning last year’s science fairs). My creativity isn’t just signified by my artistic capabilities, but also by my trust in my intuition and my genuine expression of my ideas, whether it is on paper in the form of an illustration or on the workbench as a DIY project. Engineering projects have been the basis of my passions for mechanical, electrical, and aerospace engineering as I seek to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of creative content and technology.

As I developed my dexterity and expressed my creativity in engineering, I became more appreciative of YouTube and the desire to be a part of its creator community. YouTube has almost always been the initial source of inspiration and information for my projects and technical skills. In the last few years, I’ve felt compelled to go beyond simple gratitude for the YouTube creators I love. Therefore, I create YouTube videos myself, where I build and present DIY projects to inspire the future generation of engineers and content creators. I also enjoy helping other STEAM students bring their project ideas to fruition via hands-on involvement. I’ve created and led a few STEAM clubs every year since 8th grade. As founder of Flite Club and Maker Club, I have provided resources to students engaged in engineering projects, inspired others to get into the hobby of 3D printing and do-it-yourself projects, and taught many the necessary skills to operate a variety of machines plus procedures to make an effective and enjoyable product. I love teaching other students the sublime skills of DIY engineering that I have attained over the years of DIY projects. The possession of these skills has always been a fundamental element of my personal, creative, and career development, and I aspire to continue helping others achieve the same. My creativity isn’t just signified by my artistic capabilities, but also by my trust in my intuition and my genuine expression of my ideas, whether it is on paper in the form of an illustration or on the workbench as a DIY project. Engineering projects have been the basis of my passions for mechanical, electrical, and aerospace engineering as I seek to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of creative content and technology.

At 7 years old, my parents enrolled me in an art class. I was thrilled. In retrospect, art class was a 9-year-long movie presenting the growth of my artistic skills and personal identity. Art class not only made me a proficient oil painter, but also a better project manager and executor. The components of a painting are very similar to a DIY project: a reference image for inspiration, a basic sketch to test geometries, backdropping colors as an underpin, and finally details to unify all components and create a coherent presentation. Art class also made me a very imaginative thinker. The planning process of my engineering projects often included hours planning and designing the project in my mind while doing other daily activities. By creating DIY projects at home for the past several years, this became a useful and time-saving skill. My passion for homemade engineering projects progressively strengthened as I got older. As an 11-year-old Lego Technic geek, making mechanical contraptions, most notably semi-automatically reloading crossbows, was right up my alley. Approaching the limits of the geometry of my Lego pieces, I resorted to sanding and sawing them to make custom ones. At some excruciating point, I thought, “The heck with Legos! I’ll use other objects to fabricate better mechanisms.” This moment marked an acceleration in my ultimate passion, getting my hands on my first hot glue gun, becoming best friends with a box cutter, and consolidating a reserve of to-be-recycled items from around the house. Dozens of electronic toys met their premature demise, facilitated by my screwdriver, and were reincarnated into RC airboats, cars, and planes. Styrofoam craft days were the most frustrating to my parents, unsurprisingly. As I continued developing my dexterity and expressing my creativity, I became more appreciative of YouTube and the desire to be a part of its creator community. YouTube has almost always been the initial source of inspiration and information for my projects and technical skills. In the last few years, I’ve felt compelled to go beyond simple gratitude for the YouTube creators I love. Therefore, I create YouTube videos myself, where I build and present DIY projects to inspire the future generation of engineers and content creators. I also enjoy helping other STEAM students bring their project ideas to fruition via hands-on involvement. I’ve created and led a few STEAM clubs every year since 8th grade. Each one gave students access to the machines, materials, and the sense of community needed to facilitate their passions, flesh out ideas, and develop careers. Over the years, I’ve worked on many significant projects, such as learning CAD a few years ago (now muscle memory), 3D printing (currently my most useful tool), my electric kick scooter (made from a hoverboard), and my autonomous utility drone (winning local science fairs). Engineering projects have been the basis of my passions for mechanical, electrical, and aerospace engineering as I seek to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of creative content and technology.

As I developed my dexterity and expressed my creativity in engineering, I became more appreciative of YouTube and the desire to be a part of its creator community. YouTube has almost always been the initial source of inspiration and information for my projects and technical skills. In the last few years, I’ve felt compelled to go beyond simple gratitude for the YouTube creators I love. Therefore, I create YouTube videos myself, where I build and present DIY projects to inspire the future generation of engineers and content creators. I also enjoy helping other STEAM students bring their project ideas to fruition via hands-on involvement. I’ve created and led a few STEAM clubs every year since 8th grade. As founder of Flite Club and Maker Club, I have provided resources to students engaged in engineering projects, inspired others to get into the hobby of 3D printing and do-it-yourself projects, and taught many the necessary skills to operate a variety of machines plus procedures to make an effective and enjoyable product. I love teaching other students the sublime skills of DIY engineering that I have attained over the years of DIY projects. The possession of these skills has always been a fundamental element of my personal, creative, and career development, and I aspire to continue helping others achieve the same. My creativity isn’t just signified by my artistic capabilities, but also by my trust in my intuition and my genuine expression of my ideas, whether it is on paper in the form of an illustration or on the workbench as a DIY project. Engineering projects have been the basis of my passions for mechanical, electrical, and aerospace engineering as I seek to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of creative content and technology.

As I developed my dexterity and expressed my creativity in engineering, I became more appreciative of YouTube and the desire to be a part of its creator community. YouTube has almost always been the initial source of inspiration and information for my projects and technical skills. In the last few years, I’ve felt compelled to go beyond simple gratitude for the YouTube creators I love. Therefore, I create YouTube videos myself, where I build and present DIY projects to inspire the future generation of engineers and content creators. I also enjoy helping other STEAM students bring their project ideas to fruition via hands-on involvement. I’ve created and led a few STEAM clubs every year since 8th grade. As founder of Flite Club and Maker Club, I have provided resources to students engaged in engineering projects, inspired others to get into the hobby of 3D printing and do-it-yourself projects, and taught many the necessary skills to operate a variety of machines plus procedures to make an effective and enjoyable product. I love teaching other students the sublime skills of DIY engineering that I have attained over the years of DIY projects. The possession of these skills has always been a fundamental element of my personal, creative, and career development, and I aspire to continue helping others achieve the same. My creativity isn’t just signified by my artistic capabilities, but also by my trust in my intuition and my genuine expression of my ideas, whether it is on paper in the form of an illustration or on the workbench as a DIY project. Engineering projects have been the basis of my passions for mechanical, electrical, and aerospace engineering as I seek to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of creative content and technology.

I created and led a project with a partner with the goal of creating a 12-foot-wingspan autonomous UAV to execute any unique aerial operation using swappable compartments. Exuberant about the concept, I immediately began designing the plane on CAD with the time distance learning gave me. We made several small-scale RC plane prototypes that failed to fly properly due to minor electro-mechanical faults. I also built a large 10-foot-wingspan prototype known as “The Prototype.” Its first test began with stable high-speed ground passes, ending with a crash into a small pole by the runway. Even after design improvements, the drone was unable to attain enough speed to take off due to our limited runway length. As we constructed more prototypes, we created presentations for the district, county, state, and international science fairs. Having committed ample time to fabricating The Prototype and CADing the 12-foot-wingspan UAV, both drones were quite robust. However, we failed to succeed in the county fair after prevailing in the district fair. My partner and I were appalled, considering that less successful drone projects succeed in the county fair. I then became demotivated since the county fair left us uninformed of our faults. Nevertheless, I kept developing prototypes to bring my brainchild of the pandemic to fruition. I strongly believed in the project's completion because of the amount of blood, sweat, and tears I’ve invested, as well as the implications of such a drone. Nowadays, I am finally constructing the final rendition after successful prototype flights.

My passion for homemade engineering projects progressively strengthened as I got older. As an 11-year-old Lego Technic geek, making mechanical contraptions, most notably semi-automatically reloading crossbows, was right up my alley. Approaching the limits of the geometry of my Lego pieces, I resorted to sanding and sawing them to make custom ones. At some excruciating point, I thought, “The heck with Legos! I’ll use other objects to fabricate better mechanisms.” This moment marked an acceleration in my ultimate passion, getting my hands on my first hot glue gun, becoming best friends with a box cutter, and consolidating a reserve of to-be-recycled items from around the house. As I continued developing my dexterity and expressing my creativity, I became more appreciative of YouTube and the desire to be a part of its creator community. YouTube has almost always been the initial source of inspiration and information for my projects and technical skills. Therefore, I create YouTube videos myself, where I build and present DIY projects to inspire the future generation of engineers and content creators. Over the years, I’ve worked on many significant projects, such as learning CAD a few years ago (now muscle memory), 3D printing (my most useful tool), my electric bike (my method of transport), and my autonomous utility drone (winning last year’s science fairs). My creativity isn’t just signified by my artistic capabilities, but also by my trust in my intuition and my genuine expression of my ideas, whether it is on paper in the form of an illustration or on the workbench as a DIY project. Engineering projects have been the basis of my passions for mechanical, electrical, and aerospace engineering as I seek to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of creative content and technology.

At 7 years old, my parents enrolled me in an art class. I was thrilled. In retrospect, art class was a 9-year-long movie presenting the growth of my artistic skills and personal identity. Art class not only made me a proficient oil painter, but also a better project manager and executor. The components of a painting are very similar to a DIY project: a reference image for inspiration, a basic sketch to test geometries, backdropping colors as an underpin, and finally details to unify all components and create a coherent presentation. Art class also made me a very imaginative thinker. The planning process of my engineering projects often included hours planning and designing the project in my mind while doing other daily activities. By creating DIY projects at home for the past several years, this became a useful and time-saving skill. My passion for homemade engineering projects progressively strengthened as I got older. As an 11-year-old Lego Technic geek, making mechanical contraptions, most notably semi-automatically reloading crossbows, was right up my alley. Approaching the limits of the geometry of my Lego pieces, I resorted to sanding and sawing them to make custom ones. At some excruciating point, I thought, “The heck with Legos! I’ll use other objects to fabricate better mechanisms.” This moment marked an acceleration in my ultimate passion, getting my hands on my first hot glue gun, becoming best friends with a box cutter, and consolidating a reserve of to-be-recycled items from around the house. Dozens of electronic toys met their premature demise, facilitated by my screwdriver, and were reincarnated into RC airboats, cars, and planes. Styrofoam craft days were the most frustrating to my parents, unsurprisingly. As I continued developing my dexterity and expressing my creativity, I became more appreciative of YouTube and the desire to be a part of its creator community. YouTube has almost always been the initial source of inspiration and information for my projects and technical skills. In the last few years, I’ve felt compelled to go beyond simple gratitude for the YouTube creators I love. Therefore, I create YouTube videos myself, where I build and present DIY projects to inspire the future generation of engineers and content creators. I also enjoy helping other STEAM students bring their project ideas to fruition via hands-on involvement. I’ve created and led a few STEAM clubs every year since 8th grade. Each one gave students access to the machines, materials, and the sense of community needed to facilitate their passions, flesh out ideas, and develop careers. Over the years, I’ve worked on many significant projects, such as learning CAD a few years ago (now muscle memory), 3D printing (currently my most useful tool), my electric kick scooter (made from a hoverboard), and my autonomous utility drone (winning local science fairs). Engineering projects have been the basis of my passions for mechanical, electrical, and aerospace engineering as I seek to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of creative content and technology.

“Arvin, you’re so creative,” my preschool teacher once praised me as I made Lego planes. That was the first time I had heard “creative,” an initially alien word. After understanding its meaning a few days later, I assumed it as my identity thereafter. This personal identity and my experience in creating contraptions strengthened my confidence and encouraged my artistic talent. Art was my daily driver; boats, birds, and the San Francisco Golden Gate Bridge dominated the majority of my drawings. Legos, building blocks, and trainsets littered my room, serving the basis of my developing dexterity and technological curiosity. At 7 years old, my parents enrolled me in an art class. I was thrilled. In retrospect, art class was a 9-year-long movie presenting the growth of my artistic skills and personal identity. Art class not only made me a proficient oil painter, but also a better project manager and executor. The components of a painting are very similar to a DIY project: a reference image for inspiration, a basic sketch to test geometries, backdropping colors as an underpin, and finally details to unify all components and create a coherent presentation. Art class also made me a very imaginative thinker. The planning process of my engineering projects often included hours planning and designing the project in my mind while doing other daily activities. By creating DIY projects at home for the past several years, this became a useful and time-saving skill. My passion for homemade engineering projects progressively strengthened as I got older. As an 11-year-old Lego Technic geek, making mechanical contraptions, most notably semi-automatically reloading crossbows, was right up my alley. Approaching the limits of the geometry of my Lego pieces, I resorted to sanding and sawing them to make custom ones. At some excruciating point, I thought, “The heck with Legos! I’ll use other objects to fabricate better mechanisms.” This moment marked an acceleration in my ultimate passion, getting my hands on my first hot glue gun, becoming best friends with a box cutter, and consolidating a reserve of to-be-recycled items from around the house. Dozens of electronic toys met their premature demise, facilitated by my screwdriver, and were reincarnated into RC airboats, cars, and planes. Styrofoam craft days were the most frustrating to my parents, unsurprisingly. As I continued developing my dexterity and expressing my creativity, I became more appreciative of YouTube and the desire to be a part of its creator community. YouTube has almost always been the initial source of inspiration and information for my projects and technical skills. In the last few years, I’ve felt compelled to go beyond simple gratitude for the YouTube creators I love. Therefore, I create YouTube videos myself, where I build and present DIY projects to inspire the future generation of engineers and content creators. I also enjoy helping other STEAM students bring their project ideas to fruition via hands-on involvement. I’ve created and led a few STEAM clubs every year since 8th grade. Each one gave students access to the machines, materials, and the sense of community needed to facilitate their passions, flesh out ideas, and develop careers. Over the years, I’ve worked on many significant projects, such as learning CAD a few years ago (now muscle memory), 3D printing (currently my most useful tool), my electric kick scooter (made from a hoverboard), and my autonomous utility drone (winning last year’s science fairs). My creativity isn’t just signified by my artistic capabilities, but also by my trust in my intuition and my genuine expression of my ideas, whether it is on paper in the form of an illustration or on the workbench as a DIY project. Engineering projects have been the basis of my passions for mechanical, electrical, and aerospace engineering as I seek to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of creative content and technology.

I created and led a project with a partner with the goal of creating a 12-foot-wingspan autonomous UAV to execute any unique aerial operation using swappable compartments. Exuberant about the concept, I immediately began designing the plane on CAD with the time distance learning gave me. We made several small-scale RC plane prototypes that failed to fly properly due to minor electro-mechanical faults. I also built a large 10-foot-wingspan prototype known as “The Prototype.” Its first test began with stable high-speed ground passes, ending with a crash into a small pole by the runway. Even after design improvements, the drone was unable to attain enough speed to take off due to our limited runway length. As we constructed more prototypes, we created presentations for the district, county, state, and international science fairs. Having committed ample time to fabricate The Prototype and CADing the 12-foot-wingspan UAV, both drones were quite robust. However, we failed to succeed in the county fair after prevailing in the district fair. My partner and I were appalled, considering that less successful drone projects succeed in the county fair. I then became demotivated since the county fair left us uninformed of our faults. Nevertheless, I kept developing prototypes to bring my brainchild of the pandemic to fruition. I strongly believed in the project's completion because of the amount of blood, sweat, and tears I’ve invested, as well as the implications of such a drone. Nowadays, I am finally constructing the final rendition after successful prototype flights. As a young child, my creativity annoyingly outpaced my engineering skills. Many of my projects never went beyond a sketch in my engineering notebook, and almost all my DIY projects were only half-finished. 3D modeling was nearly impossible for me. 3D printing hadn’t existed in my universe yet. I got my iPad Mini in fifth grade expecting to exploit it by playing video games 24/7. Instead, my aspirations were redirected towards the hobby of homemade engineering projects. What started as an obsession with Legos morphed into an aptitude for assembling mechanisms from scratch. My iPad YouTube history, predominantly Lego videos, quickly became dominated by DIY craft and circuit videos. The world of engineering had found me—not the type to just study, but the one to physically engage in. YouTube had kickstarted my career in engineering. My skill of converting project ideas into reality is one I have been self-developing since I was eleven, which is apparent through the dramatic improvement of my countless DIY projects over time. I’ve built many remote-controlled planes, a CNC mill, and a couple of portable electric vehicles to name a few. 3D modeling is now in muscle memory. And 3D printing is my most useful tool. My expansive knowledge of circuitry, material science, and mechanics has enabled me to fulfill most of my project ideas into sweet fruition. According to my current trend of improvement, these skills will only be improving, leaving me to wonder what my next projects will be.

As founder of Flite Club and Maker Club, I have provided resources to students engaged in engineering projects, inspired others to get into the hobby of 3D printing and do-it-yourself projects, and taught many the fundamental skills of DIY engineering. Flite Club revolved around the scratch-building process of remote-controlled aircraft. I started this club to create an environment where students feel inspired to pursue their interests in aerospace through hands-on projects. Flite Club inspired several people to fabricate their own DIY drones, kindled their interests in aerospace, and educated members about the mechanics, dynamics, and design process of remote-controlled drones. Before Maker Club, I'd longed to join an organization that accommodates my creative desires to make DIY projects and encompasses art and general engineering fields beyond aerospace. I founded Maker Club to help other students who have experienced similar difficulties and needed an encouraging environment to work on their projects. My club gave students access to a makerspace with machines and materials to create their projects with minimal limitations. We offered them free use of 3D printers, laser cutters, CNC mills, and other tools, materials, and electronics that people would otherwise not have easy access to. The members were trained on the operation of machinery, such as 3D printers, and the selection of components and methods for engineering their projects. Working on my engineering projects with an abundance of resources at my disposal is an advantage I highly value, and bestowing others with the power to do that is equally rewarding. I love teaching other students the sublime skills of DIY engineering that I have attained over the years of DIY projects. The possession of these skills has always been a fundamental element of my personal, creative, and career development, and I aspire to continue helping others achieve the same.

The dilemma of money versus a cleaner climate can be combated through innovative engineering. Cleaner energy farms and transportation are simply not efficient enough for more companies and governments to adopt. For the efficiency of renewable energy to be comparable to its non-renewable counterparts, clean energy systems must be cheaper, more energy-efficient, and safer. All these factors influence the desirability of the use of clean energy amongst all socioeconomic classes. Every week after school, I wholeheartedly immerse myself in my engineering projects. These projects allow me to be less of a consumer and more of a maker of technology. Therefore, I plan to passionately study and research in the fields of mechanical and electrical engineering. More specifically, I plan to pursue these majors in conjunction with applications in eco-friendly transportation. My skill of taking project ideas and synthesizing them into reality is one I have been developing since I was eleven, which is apparent through the improvement of my countless DIY projects and the dramatic improvement of them over time. I’ve built dozens of remote-controlled planes and some portable electric vehicles, to name a couple. My homebuilt electric scooter and electric bike are very near and dear to me. There is something special about creating a machine that has the power to accelerate my body to twenty-five miles per hour and gives me the privilege to effortlessly travel wherever I want without the nasty smell and carbon footprint of gasoline. I greatly aspire to employ my dextrous engineering skills to innovate in the component fabrication and transportation industries and contribute to a more sustainable society.

Art has always been the core driver of my creativity. When I create art, I firstly prioritize emotion over reason to fully flesh out my creative ideas. This creative method of mine prompts me to think critically, naturally leading me to synthesize logic and reason, allowing me to convert art into engineering. As a young child, my creativity annoyingly outpaced my engineering skills. Many of my projects never went beyond a sketch in my engineering notebook, and almost all my DIY projects were only half-finished. 3D modeling was nearly impossible for me. 3D printing hadn’t existed in my universe yet. I got my iPad Mini in fifth grade expecting to exploit it by playing video games 24/7. Instead, my aspirations were redirected towards the hobby of homemade engineering projects. What started as an obsession with Legos morphed into an aptitude for assembling mechanisms from scratch. My iPad YouTube history, predominantly Lego videos, quickly became dominated by DIY craft and circuit videos. The world of engineering had found me—not the type to just study, but the one to physically engage in. YouTube had kickstarted my career in engineering. My skill of converting project ideas into reality is one I have been self-developing since I was eleven, which is apparent through the dramatic improvement of my countless DIY projects over time. I’ve built many remote-controlled planes, a CNC mill, and a couple of portable electric vehicles to name a few. 3D modeling is now in muscle memory. And 3D printing is my most useful tool. My expansive knowledge of circuitry, material science, and mechanics has enabled me to fulfill most of my project ideas into sweet fruition. According to my current trend of improvement, these skills will only be improving, leaving me to wonder what my next projects will be.

I created and led a project with a partner with the goal of creating a 12-foot-wingspan autonomous UAV to execute any unique aerial operation using swappable compartments. Exuberant about the concept, I immediately began designing the plane on CAD with the time distance learning gave me. We made several small-scale RC plane prototypes that failed to fly properly due to minor electro-mechanical faults. I also built a large 10-foot-wingspan prototype known as “The Prototype.” Its first test began with stable high-speed ground passes, ending with a crash into a small pole by the runway. Even after design improvements, the drone was unable to attain enough speed to take off due to our limited runway length. As we constructed more prototypes, we created presentations for the district, county, state, and international science fairs. Having committed ample time to fabricate The Prototype and CADing the 12-foot-wingspan UAV, both drones were quite robust. However, we failed to succeed in the county fair after prevailing in the district fair. My partner and I were appalled, considering that less successful drone projects succeed in the county fair. I then became demotivated since the county fair left us uninformed of our faults. Nevertheless, I kept developing prototypes to bring my brainchild of the pandemic to fruition. I strongly believed in the project's completion because of the amount of blood, sweat, and tears I’ve invested, as well as the implications of such a drone. Nowadays, I am finally constructing the final rendition after successful prototype flights.