How do I describe my dreams when I am inspired by everything? From athletics to artistry, I have dabbled in nearly every discipline. What little free time I have during the school year is spent painting, golfing, or snowboarding. Some hobbies I ensure I have time for are weightlifting, reading, and hiking. My free time is cut in half due to working to afford the cost of living and keeping up with my hobbies, but this only motivates me more. Since I was young, I’ve wanted to know everything about how the world works. I never really conformed to this idea that a person has to choose one hobby or career and stick with it. People are too complex to be completely content with one job for their whole lives. My career goals reflect this same idea. First and foremost, I’ve always wanted to learn more about how nuclear chemistry works. I believe it’s a field I want to go into, but I don’t have enough experience to know if it’s something that stimulates my mind. This is the same with neurochemistry and personality disorders. Within reason, I’ve always wondered what makes the ‘normal brain’ a ‘normal brain’. Where is the line between a brain that’s ‘different’ and a brain that’s ‘disordered’? Another idea is implementing my love for weightlifting in one of my careers. As I started lifting and taking supplements, I realized that most supplements for women were for nicer skin or losing weight. Women’s athletic clothes are made to contour the body and look curvier or skinnier. I intend to work with supplement brands to formulate supplements that encourage women to gain muscle and live healthier lifestyles, not thinner ones. At some point in my life, I plan on being a public science or math teacher in counties that are underfunded or have a higher percentage of underserved students. With my experience in my other careers, I will also work with the school boards to create interest/developmental STEAM programs. STEM/STEAM made me realize that my ambition and curiosity has a place. My degree(s) and experience can have versatility. However, it’s also important to me that STEAM workplaces are the epitome of diversity. This means incorporating people from different ethnic, socioeconomic, racial, cultural backgrounds into STEAM environments. With people from various backgrounds and upbringings, there is a plethora of thinking styles and ideas that can be utilized to solve a problem. I am equally motivated to complete all of these aspirations at some point in my life. I do not feel the need to have one singular career. I feel my thoughts are too complex to be satisfied achieving only one great means of living. I intend on living a long life and will work with on achieving one idea at a time. When I feel satisfied with my work in that specific discipline, I will move on the the next. Ultimately, I know my purpose is to help people. I intend to fulfill this calling no matter what I am doing. I may have to go to graduate school multiple times and it will be harder to do than it is to say it, but nothing excites me as much as thinking about all the different pathways ahead of me. I have always loved learning new things- especially when my classes became more focused on my interests. My biggest asset has always been my passion for everything. I’m looking forward to all the people I will meet, stories I will hear, and experiences I will share.

When I was young, STEM was always something I gravitated towards. I always wanted to be a scientist or a doctor. I did not have a ground-breaking experience or a specific inspiration; STEM was something I was always naturally good at, so I knew I wanted to stick with it. When I was working on math, it felt like the puzzle pieces of my brain were fitting together in just the right ways. Sitting through chemistry felt like stimulating all the right parts of my brain and how I naturally think. Once I realized what it felt like to complete a complicated math problem or help people around me who were struggling, I couldn’t stop. I had this hunger to solve these puzzles and to do it well. Although STEM was a constant in my life, I always found myself with hobbies opposite of STEM. My friends and I have picnics in parks while painting. We would wake up at four in the morning to go to sunrise in the blue ridge mountains where I lived. I have written books and have too many books to count. It’s actually become a problem and my mother now gets upset when she sees that I’ve come home with a book. I made my prom dress and altered my little brother’s prom tuxedo. To be completely transparent, I’ve always had a niche for everything around me. I’m curious about nearly every discipline. While I was discovering new passions and figuring out who I wanted to be as a person, I met Zach Byars. We started as friends who would go to the gym together, but he very quickly became who I looked up to the most. We always had profound conversations about anything from altruism to cartwheels. He was blessed with a gift in photography. I longed to be as passionate about something as he was in photography. When we went to the mountains, I would admire him in his creative element and nothing has inspired me as much since. One conversation I had with him is forever imprinted in my memory. I was explaining to him how I felt my purpose in the world was to do as much good as I possibly can. I wanted to spread positivity. My goal is to be as altruistic as one person can possibly be. He instantaneously got super excited and said that’s everything he’s wanted to do both with his actions, but also with his art. He wanted his photography to make people feel things- inspiration, blessings, and everything good in the world. While Zach and I were both working towards completely different fields, his passion, drive, and what motivated him is what inspired me. Had I not experienced his art, I would not have learned what it was to work towards a long term goal, let alone what it means for me to truly value my work. Unfortunately, last August Zach passed away in a car accident. I was unprepared for this tragedy, but I learned that, at the end of the day, just having the opportunity to know him is enough. He taught me so much about who I am and who I wanted to be in such a short amount of time. I obviously wish that I could still have our obscure conversations more than anything else in the world, but now my hope is to impact those around me in the way Zach taught me.

I wish I had a reason I was pursuing STEM. When I was young, it was always something I gravitated towards. I always wanted to be a scientist or a doctor. I did not have a ground-breaking experience or a specific inspiration; STEM was something I was always naturally good at, so I knew I wanted to stick with it. When I was working on math, it felt like the puzzle pieces of my brain were fitting together in just the right ways. Sitting through chemistry felt like stimulating all the right parts of my brain and how I naturally think. Once I realized what it felt like to complete a complicated math problem or help people around me who were struggling, I couldn’t stop. I had this hunger to solve these puzzles and to do it well. While I was in public school, I was confident in my academic abilities. I had no doubt that I would get into college and perform well. What I was ignorant to is the truth behind being a first generation college student. My mother immigrated to America from the Philippines so she was unaware of the systemic happenings of the American collegiate education. My father tried his best to help me, but when he was my age, the military handled everything for him. I had to figure out FASFA, applications, scholarships, and more on my own. Once I had everything submitted, I thought it might get easier and I was over the hump of struggles for being first generation. I was not. After arriving at college, it only got worse. I love my job and I love working, but balancing rigid courses, a job, and a social life is difficult. Students around me are able to focus solely on their education because they are able to have financial support from their families. This can be really discouraging for me, especially before a big test or when I’m not making enough money to support myself. However, it’s also empowering in a different sense. I am performing well in school, working enough to afford my car and any other necessities, working out regularly, and still getting enough social interaction. Listing it out makes me realize it takes an extremely strong, smart, and determined person to find some sort of balance with everything. I falter sometimes, but I know I’ll be able to finish my degree. I’ve made it this far and through the most rigorous courses in undergraduate education, so who would I be if I stopped now?

I remember the first time I watched a Jo Koy special. It's the same feeling when I saw a fiction murder mystery book centered around filipino culture at a book store. The first time I felt it, I was watching TV with my Lola. A Prego commercial had come on with a Filipino family sitting around the table eating together saying, "sarap". I looked at my lola and shouted, "Lola! that's us!". To which she laughed and nodded. I'm not sure if she knew that what I meant was, "people are seeing us! They acknowledge that we contribute to society in meaningful ways." Having grown up as a Filipina-american in predominantly white areas, my sense of identity surrounding my ethnicity was feeble until high school. I was willfully ignorant to the fact that I didn't look like my white peers. To acknowledge this idea meant an identity crisis for which I was unprepared... until covering imperialism in American History. From this point forward, I wanted to be proud of who I was and what my family had to do to come to America. My identity crisis snowballed from ignoring a crucial part of myself to embracing and being empowered by it. Shortly thereafter, my baby sister said she wanted to be a scientist. Specifically, Lily said, "I want to be a scientist... like you ate Chloe!" Every person loves to hear a child say that to them, but her saying this meant more than what's at face value. For my baby sister, I was her own personal Jo Koy or Vanessa Hudges. I was her Prego commercial. My studies and pictures from my labs I had shown her ensured that how she looked wouldn't set her apart from her peers in her head. This is when I knew every milestone I had was not my own. My triumphs are my family's, whether it's my ancestors from the Philippines, my family now, or my future family's. My achievements are not mine to claim, but for filipino's to claim. This realization has impacted my future goals arguably more than any other thought. I want every minority to feel like they are capable- specifically female Filipina-americans. I want my work in STEM outreach to inspire filipino children. I want my weightlifting journey to motivate Filipina women to be stronger both physically and mentally.