Charlie Varney is a name I want to be remembered. A name that breaks records and barriers in society. I am currently dual enrolled in high school and my local technical school where I will be studying aviation in the 2023-2024 school year. I applied prepared with the expectation of being the only female in the class. Aviation is a field that has long been dominated by men, but being a part of male-dominated spaces has never been new to me. I’ve been interested in aviation since I was young. Often captivated by my father’s airplanes, I would beg to fly them. He was always hesitant and rightfully so, many of them would take off whole and land in pieces, but I could never keep my greedy five-year-old hands off of them. I recount those days as the ones that sparked my interest in aviation, but I had to keep fueling the fire. Aviation is a passion that is hard to pursue at such a young age, but like most people I made it work. Going to air shows, and museums, building plane models, and drones with leftover electronics. When I entered middle school though I knew I wanted to start flying. I watched countless videos of people talking about how they got their private pilot's license. Trying to muster up as much information as I could. I was dismayed to learn I was too young and lessons were too expensive, but I continued my search. During my search, I uncovered my love for engineering, so combined with my passion for aviation it was a no-brainer to major in aerospace engineering. Later my father informed me of a skills center located near me so I applied for a summer course in aviation my freshman year that I passed with an A. I knew I had to wait till my junior and senior years to participate in the dual enrollment course where I would be able to further my understanding of aviation and get my private pilot's license. The course offered simulation time and opportunities to fly at a low cost. The skills center was a public school so getting my private pilot's license would cost much less than if I had gone the traditional route. I finally had my answer, and now that I was fully engaged in aviation and engineering I wanted to lead others into a similar path. Aerospace engineering is a field of work that only 18% of women partake in and women only make up 28% in STEM itself. I wanted to change those demographics. In my freshman year, I worked with my superintendent to plan and set up an outreach event at my town’s annual parade, which we've done since. In June I gave a robotics presentation to my school board discussing what our team does and increasing engagement by hosting CAD camps at my district’s middle school. I am also actively communicating with the robotics teacher at my school to share an upcoming robotics camp with next school year's class. Others are losing out on potential passions of their own by not being exposed to them, so it's important to reach out to your community to inspire an interest that might be waiting to be discovered. I’ve used my difference in being a female in aerospace to encourage others in my community to pursue their dreams and to be the reason they discover that interest.

Going to space is more than just a dream, it's a necessity. Becoming an astronaut and aerospace engineer has been in my heart since I was a child. Engineering rockets, shuttles, or planes to take others who share my passion for space to the stars, for this reason, my dream house would be located in space. The Andromeda Galaxy in particular. Located only 2.537 million light-years from Earth, it is a neighbor of the Milky Way Galaxy. Flying back home would be a trip to the post office for the Millennium Falcon, my vehicle of choice. I would not build a pink mansion, but instead, a space station with cobalt blue solar panels reaching out of the station's complex modules, absorbing sunlight from the star Alpheratz, one of Andromeda's biggest and brightest stars. In a similar fashion to Barbie though I would sport a pastel pink EVA suit and pink jumpsuits. Pink has always been my color of choice after all. My space shuttle would float equipped with an observatory module to gaze at nearby constellations and galaxies. The observatory module would be attached to the dining module. Full of dehydrated foods, liquid salt, and pepper. This way I can look at the stars while enjoying a meal. In module number three, space experiments will be held aimed at exploring the physics of space and how things compare to gravity on Earth. I’d need to keep my hands busy while on the space station and I love studying physics and engineering. So conducting experiments and designing planes and rockets is a need. A space station fit for a human though would not be complete without a module full of anti-gravity workout machines such as a treadmill, weight lifting machine, and other resistance workouts. It's crucial for astronauts staying in space long term to exercise at least two and a half hours a day. Without it, their muscles would deteriorate and their bones would weaken. Space has no gravity, so your body does not have to fight gravity, but on Earth it does, so you must maintain your muscle mass. A globe of Earth would also be a must-have on my space station. Not for the reason that it’s essential for living in space, but In the case of a long stay, I’d like to remind myself of the planet I am from when I miss it. However, I will not be living alone all the time. The sleeping quarters would be lined with multiple sleeping bags for friends and family when they decide to visit, or for other astronauts. The final layout of my space station would consist of five modules, solar panels, and the Millennium Falcon. My space station would be not only a dream house to me but also a home. A place that inspires the creative mind and a place full of never-ending discoveries and beauty. Space is more than just a black void, it's full of stars, and planets waiting to be explored, violet and orange supernovas, and black holes we have yet to understand. My dream is to aid in the exploration and understanding of space. Either by engineering the space crafts to take them there or exploring space myself. Space is my home and it's where I belong.

Most people know hard work pays off, but growing up I learned that hard labor pays off. My entire life I’ve been surrounded by hard working blue-collared men and women. This has given me respect and gratitude towards my family but it has also taught me that going the blue-collared route is not the path for me. At a young age I found an unprecedented passion in my education. In school I enjoyed doing calculations and designing in CAD software more so than I did machining or assembling. So I turned one of those things into my dream and the others into hobbies. That dream being engineering. More specifically aerospace engineering because I have also been fascinated with the stars and being a test pilot. Becoming an aerospace engineer is no easy feat though, so before high school started I gave myself the goal of getting straight A’s and working hard to continue doing what I love. My freshman year of high school I joined a robotics team where I continued to design and build. I took an Intro to Engineering and Design class– learning how to CAD in Inventor. Got nominated for STEM Rising STAR where I was set up with a summer engineering internship. My sophomore year I joined my school's math team along with applying to my local dual enrollment skills center where I got accepted into aviation. I also got accepted into Brown University's Pre-College course Fluid Mechanics Through Hovercraft Physics which I took this summer. I did all this so I can involve myself into the world of aerospace engineering, but I’ve also been trying to get others involved into the world of STEM as well. My freshman year I worked with my superintendent to plan and set up an outreach event at my town’s annual parade, which we've done since. In June I gave a robotics presentation to my school board discussing what our team does and about increasing engagement by hosting CAD camps at my district’s middle school. I am also actively communicating with the robotics teacher at my school to share an upcoming robotics camp with next school year's class. Others are losing out on potential passions of their own by not being exposed to them. If we expose STEM to others, especially females, we can increase the amount of jobs in STEM, which currently makes up 6.2% of America’s employment and raise the percentage of 28% of women working in STEM. Engineering is my passion. It always has and always will be. It’s what I’ve been so focused on these past years and my academics go along with that. I haven’t failed my goal of getting straight A’s thus far and I don’t plan to. My parents have been nothing but supportive of these goals. They plan on paying for my college even though they know it’ll have to be taken out of their retirement. My parents have worked so hard to see me succeed and I hope that by working just as hard as them I can pay for my own college tuition through scholarships and working. This money would come as a blessing to me and the lives of my family. When I first discovered my passion for engineering as a kid I never would have realized that my dreams would come with a price tag, and no one should have to give up on their dreams because they can’t afford it. If I was awarded this scholarship it would make a family thousands of dollars stress free and one girl closer to her dreams coming true.

Math is a part of our everyday lives, because math is problem solving. It’s used in coding, cooking, sports, and more. Any problem you can imagine is math. Most people chalk it up to equations, formulas, and Archimedes, but it's much more than that. If we didn’t have math we wouldn’t be able to overcome any obstacle. You wouldn’t be able to bake a cake, build a house, or send astronauts to the moon. Whether we like it or not you are surrounded by math, even in nature with the fibonacci sequence that is also used in architecture and film making. Take a flower for example, if you were to count the number of pedals on it you will find that it is a number in the fibonacci sequence. If you take a close look and really investigate your surroundings you will start to go down a spiral of information all leading to math. One physicist, Eugine Wigner, observed that many things in the physical world can be described using equations, which sparks the question: is our universe mathematics? If everything in our universe could be described with mathematical equations then this could be true. Which would mean that without math we may never even exist. This makes math so much more important than most people think, and that's one reason I love math. Not just the problem solving and that feeling of success and understanding once you get an answer to a problem, but how much we have to learn about math even if we think we know it all. People are always making new discoveries and writing new proofs and to put it simply math is just one of the most fascinating subjects there is and people can learn so much about it if they just look beyond their usual high school math equations. I’ve found that's why many people don’t enjoy math, and I don’t blame them. Math can be an insufferable subject if you don’t have the right teacher. I used to not enjoy math, which may come to a shock for people who know me, but having a teacher like I did my sophomore year of high school reignited my passion for mathematics. They taught us about the fibonacci sequence, and how circles get their spherical shape when they didn’t have to, but they just loved math. They researched the best way to teach people, and that was in groups. This was a new way of learning for me and I loved it as most people did. I got to work through challenging problems with my peers and help others, which really led me to falling back in love with math. Sharing my understanding of math was one of the main reasons I got back into it and I started tutoring again, and it was all because of another person sharing their love of math. That's why I love math, I have so much to share with others, and even more to learn.

To put it simply, I love math because I love problem solving, but really the reason I love math and why can’t be compressed into a mere sentence. Math has never been a simple subject, for most that is. I’ve come to find that math is something that is comprehensible to some but a hated subject by others, and I have always wondered why that is. How could someone hate math? What math really is is working through a problem to find an answer, or problem solving as I stated earlier. Does that then mean that someone who hates math hates problem solving? Well, no. Humans are problem solving every day. How to make a baby stop crying, crafting the perfect cheese sandwich, no matter what it is, math is an everyday part of our lives whether we realize it or not. If we do it everyday then how could we hate it? Maybe it isn’t that people hate problem solving, but they hate equations and formulas. I love math, and with that comes my love for working through a hard problem and finally discovering the solution and unlocking a new understanding that I wouldn’t have had if I didn’t try. I believe that people don’t like math because they never attempt to truly work through a problem because someone looks at an equation and deems it too difficult, but like I said math has never been a simple subject. It’s something that takes time and persistence, it’s challenging, and I love challenges. I also love sharing my love for said challenges, or in other words, math. Breaking through a problem and finding the answer gives me a feeling of understanding and pride, but that feeling is even better when I’m sharing it with someone. That's why I love math. It's a problem inside of a problem in the way that I have an equation I have to solve but also people to share my understanding with, which if I’ve learned anything from math tutoring, teaching isn’t an easy job, and maybe if I keep up my love for math someone else with unveil their love for math too.

Sweat drips down my face as I’m rounding my final lap at track practice. I’m running the daily timed mile, and as I pick up my pace a group of boys sitting on the jump landing pads begin whistling at me and my female counterparts. Despite their peeving comments, I don’t acknowledge them. It’d been a recurring event where the problematic boys would run a few laps and spend the rest of the time catcalling the girls and calling us slow while they never finished their mile. I endured the torment, assuming my coach would eventually hear their remarks and do something about it, but how could my coach not notice? That day I decided I was done with the excuses. Once I finish my final lap I approach my coach. I could feel my teammates’ eyes on me as I confronted her. She seemed flabbergasted. My coach herself was a female and had let us endure the boy’s comments. I felt disappointed in myself for not saying something sooner, but also in her. We’d all grown to accept that this is how life was and conformed to it. But feminism isn’t just believing women should have equal rights, feminism is loud. Feminism is speaking up when everyone around you is telling you to shut up, to deal with it. Enduring sexism and pretending it doesn’t exist doesn’t make it go away. That's why feminism to me is standing up for yourself and the women around you. I wouldn’t have been able to advocate for myself if it wasn’t for my middle school science teacher. She has been my idol since I met her in first grade and to this day she is one of the kindest and most genuine people I know. She has never been afraid to tell the world who she is. Her open feminism, independence, and involvement in STEM prompted me to join many of the extracurriculars and clubs my school offered even though I was scared of being the only girl. I would never have found my interest in engineering and be the bold person I am today if it wasn’t for Mrs. Callen. Since I discovered my interest in engineering and began pursuing my dream career of becoming an aerospace engineer and astronaut I’ve had to stand up for myself on numerical occasions. Engineering is a field dominated by men with only 16.7% of women in the US being employed engineers and an even smaller percentage of 11.2% of women being employed aerospace engineers. In almost all of the robotics, aviation, and engineering classes/courses I’ve taken I’ve been the only female. This has led me to face a lot of criticism and stereotyping throughout my journey of pursuing engineering and aviation, but I never let that discourage me or push me away from my interest. In Fact, it motivated me. I use my experiences to encourage other girls in my community to pursue their dreams despite adversity, and to stand up for themselves because the future is female, the future is us.

I stand patiently waiting for a student to pick up a robotics flier. It’s incoming freshman night when clubs and sports try recruiting eighth graders for the following school year. I notice a group of students’ pace slow as they walk by. The TV I have set up with my robotics advisor has caught their attention. It’s displaying our robot reveal video from last year's competition. Once I notice I start a discussion with them. Informing them about our yearly build seasons and what we do. While I explain I can feel their judgment as they share glances. It’s not an easy task trying to get people to sign up for something like robotics. I feel like a salesman trying to convince someone to purchase something they don’t want. A total of five people sign up for our robotics team, to whom I only expect one to actually join. In previous years others have signed up, but none have attended. I am one out of two members from my school of 700 that are on our local FIRST robotics team. I know many people at my school who would enjoy, and grow in their career field of choice if they joined, but who are always “too busy.” I’ve always wondered why, but I finally understand; it's difficult to stand out. Reflecting on the experience at incoming freshman night I imagine someone in that group of students who was possibly interested. They would have immediately been discouraged to join after their friend's reactions. Fear of judgment is a big factor in making any decision in today's world. Society and social media pressure people to fit into their cookie-cutter idea of who you should be. Pressure that I have lots of experience with. I have stood out for most of my life, thanks to being female in STEM. I remember being in my Aviation, Robotics, and Engineering classes and being the only female. I’ve faced a lot of criticism and stereotyping throughout my journey of pursuing engineering and aviation, but I never let that discourage me or push me away from my interest. In Fact, it motivated me. I realize how different I am and I use that difference to encourage others in my community to pursue their dreams despite adversity. It’s not easy going against the current, but it has saved me from a lot of regrets and I am so glad to be the person I am today.