Since I was a child, I've wanted to become an engineer. When I was in elementary school, I joined the "Tech Challenge" program, in which students would form teams, work together to engineer a solution to the titular challenge, and compete against other teams in May. After school, every Thursday, our teacher helped us build things like a crude robot, a building structure to withstand earthquakes, and a wooden glider. It was this experience that made me realize how essential engineering is as a profession to the things we take for granted in our everyday lives, but, more importantly to me, how fun it was to innovate solutions as a team. As I entered high school, I still liked the idea of becoming an engineer, but didn't feel I was passionate about any specific emphasis in order to pursue it. Instead, out of all my classes, I actually felt most connected to my freshman biology class; however, I was too afraid of interacting with patients in order to pursue anything aligned with becoming a doctor or nurse. When I spoke to my teacher, she brought up bioengineering. The very mention of that as a career field stunned me; I had no idea such a thing even existed! I was determined to major in this field by the time I was applying for colleges, though my motivation was for my own interest more than anything. Fast-forward to my senior year of high school, when my uncle was diagnosed with stage IV colorectal cancer. At first, I didn't think much of it and was still hopeful he would overcome the disease, but as time went by, I was proven wrong. I watched him go through chemo and lose his strength, going from playfully dancing with me to family events to not being able to walk across a room on his own. I could barely make conversation without him losing his train of thought midway. The last time I saw him was a trip home in the middle of my first semester at USC. He was hospital bound, and died the week after. My uncle's illness was the call I needed into this career field. There are still so many gaps in healthcare that we need to solve. I kept thinking, if imaging was better maybe we could've caught my uncle's cancer before it became untreatable. If our treatments were more effective maybe the tumor could've shrunk. If surgical tools were better maybe the surgery to try to remove the tumor wouldn't have cost him his life. My uncle passed, but all these questions of what could've been done better still remain, and people are still suffering the same way my uncle did. This is my motivation now. For years, I'd been pursuing biomedical engineering without any personal stake, and now I realize how significant this job is. I wasn't able to save my uncle, but, in the future, I hope to save someone else instead.

From 2007 to 2011, I lived in San Fernando, La Union, in the Philippines, where my mother had grown up along with her parents and eight siblings. They lived on a farm, barely able to collect enough food to eat day after day, which is why it had completely shattered my mother’s world when her older sister was diagnosed with leukemia. They did everything they could: my grandpa would take my aunt on bus rides all the way to Manila for hospital visits and treatments, they sold their belongings and slept on the floor, and they worked despite most being in middle or high school. It was to no avail, as they eventually could not afford her bone marrow transplant. She passed away at 14. When my mother told me this story as a child, I couldn't help but wonder why things like this were allowed to happen. Why must one's life be pay-walled? As I grew older, furthered my studies through high school, community college, and university, I continued to ruminate on this question and realized just how layered this problem is. I decided to pursue a career in STEAM, specifically that of engineering, to find more effective, more accessible, and more equitable ways of treatment. The world’s treatments are only as effective as the amount of people that they are able to help, and, during my first semester at USC, I found a position as an undergraduate researcher in a lab whose values perfectly align with mine. The Laboratory for the Design of Medical and Analytical Devices is one that specifically focuses on affordable point-of-care devices to ensure healthcare access to all. Along with my mentor, I'm working on a device to measure one's calcium levels without having to go to a laboratory, an ingenious solution that would be quick and easy, costing pennies to manufacture compared to the items on the market selling for hundreds of dollars a piece. It was an opportunity that sounds too good to be true -- that's because it is. This research is incredibly important to me as it helps me gain experience directly transferrable to my future ambitions. I look forward everyday to learning something new in my lab through tangible hands-on work, and I'm able to feel like I'm actually making an impact before I even graduate. The catch? I don't get paid. I worked up to eight hours per week in addition to being a full-time student in order to continue working on this project, which I so desperately want to see to completion. I want to keep working at this lab forever, but the truth is, passion doesn't pay the bills. This scholarship would help me continue studying at USC and pay for my books, supplies, food, all while continuing to pursue my dream just as I am right now, rather than having to quit research to find something that pays without fueling my dreams. I'd do anything to stay on this project, but before I can help people, I could use some assistance myself.

During my senior year of high school, my uncle was diagnosed with stage IV prostate cancer. At first, I didn't think much of it. Google told me that prostate cancer was one that lots of people recovered from, even by stage IV, so we had nothing to worry about, right? He could travel to the Philippines and walk around Universal Studios no problem. I would talk to him; he'd be soft-spoken and a little awkward, but no different than any other time we spoke. Eventually, I made my plan to transfer from the San Francisco Bay Area to Los Angeles in May 2024 after my acceptance to USC, and I was still hopeful he would overcome the disease. Truthfully, as time went by, I was proven wrong. That summer before my big move, I watched him go through chemo and lose his strength, going from playfully dancing with me to family events to not being able to walk across a room on his own. My uncle, who I'd never really seen wear hats before, beginning to wear them every time I saw him due to the speed at which he lost his hair. The weeks before I left, I could barely make conversation without him losing his train of thought midway. I was suffocated between midterms when my mother called me. He had been hospitalized. It was halfway through my semester when I found out I was wrong and misunderstood my father's Tagalog when I first heard the news; he actually had colorectal cancer, not prostate cancer, one of the deadliest by stage IV. Day by day, I'd call my mother and ask how he was doing, yet it always seemed to get worse, ranging from ineffective surgeries to short comas. I went home for a week to see him while he was in the hospital and tried to continue texting him on the phone when I returned to school. I remember checking everyday to see if he'd seen my last text about how hot it was in Los Angeles, and how I wish I could see him. He never got to read it. I was utterly blindsided when my uncle passed. I remember all the emotions hitting me at once, on a call with my dad, his twin brother, leading to me breaking down in a dining hall. I felt devastated every day and could hardly gather up the courage to attend class, let alone do assignments or go to clubs. After weeks of ruminating on why I'm still in school, the very thing that cost me time with my uncle, I realized my uncle's illness was the call I needed into my major: biomedical engineering. There are still so many gaps in healthcare that we need to solve. I kept thinking, if imaging was better maybe we could've caught my uncle's cancer before it became untreatable. If our treatments were more effective maybe the tumor could've shrunk. If surgical tools were better maybe the surgery to try to remove the tumor wouldn't have cost him his life. But mope all I want about what could have, or should have been done to save my Uncle's life, but there's no counting on change, or wishing someone else to do it for you. If you have the resources and the drive, why not try it yourself? I chose to pursue STEM without any personal stake, and yet I now realize how significant and powerful this job is. I wasn't able to save my uncle, but, in the future, I hope to save someone else instead.

In 2023, only 4% of the $36 trillion invested in health technology was toward a female-specific condition: a sobering statistic when women make up half the population. Yet this is only one of the large disparities in gender when it comes to healthcare. Women are additionally 50% more likely to receive misdiagnosis following a heart attack, and women are less seen by cardiovascular specialists than men. It is due to these inequities that led me to the path I am taking today; I am studying biomedical engineering in order to help bridge the woman's health gap in medical technology. Due to women historically being blocked off from being able to participate in fields such as healthcare, engineering, and technology, the research and innovation that has been conducted has historically leaned to focus towards men. For that, the solutions for female-specific conditions, when they actually exist, have been severely underdeveloped. The lack of funding towards research of female specific conditions is one that I feel very deeply. A friend of mine began taking birth control pills, recognizing that none of the birth control options were right for them, in order to ease premenstrual symptoms. However, they eventually had to halt the medication due to a host of other symptoms that happened as a result, including higher blood pressure and increased suicidal thoughts. Watching my friend struggle, choosing to persevere through their excruciating physical pain so that she wouldn't be in a mental health emergency every month, I found myself wondering, "Are these the only options available to us? Are we, as women, forced to simply settle for the rest of our lives?" That is a conclusion that I simply refuse to accept. It is because of this problem that I am majoring in biomedical engineering in order to focus towards solving these problems and bridging this gap. If the current world is resistant towards creating female-specific problems, then I have no problem approaching the problem myself through my studies. The amount of problems there exist to solve are endless, and, as a result, so are the amount of solutions possible in order to fix these problems. My studies, which I am approaching with a combination of both social justice and social studies to understand the gender disparities in society, as well as scientific topics in order to fuel my knowledge towards creating these solutions, are helping me to reach this goal. However, it is not only that, but what I am doing outside of my studies: this includes interning at Diversity By Doing Health Technology, a program focused on promoting health equity, partnered with organizations such as Novocuff, Medtech Women, and Medicines 360, which are specifically focused on female solutions in healthcare, where I specifically focused on expanding healthcare accessibility to experience a taste of health equity as a career. Although I am only 19 years old in my first year of college, I have no doubt that my efforts will soon come to fruition. "Just as ripples spread out when a single pebble is dropped into water, the actions of individuals can have far-reaching effects." I am hopeful that I will soon be able to feel the tangible effects of my hard work through pursuing this as a career in the near future.

“The bird that would soar above the level plain of tradition and prejudice must have strong wings.” In order to make any change in the world one must dare to be different, willing to face the uproar that follows what they do. For this, I choose Kate Chopin's The Awakening for its groundbreaking themes and story. The Awakening tells the story of Edna Pontellier, the wife of a businessman who craves more than being a housewife. She yearns for a life of her own, away from the link to her family. Yet the main antagonist in this novel is society itself, unbudging, shunning Edna for her desires. Just like Edna, upon the novel's release, it received heavy censorship and criticism for its feminist ideas and the actions of its protagonist. The idea of a woman boldly desiring independence was seen as foolish and irritating, while a man expressing these same thoughts would most definitely not be as controversial. That is what makes The Awakening especially important: it would not be controversial if it was about a man because the story would NEVER work with a man. The story of wanting to break away from your spouse and family, to make a name for yourself, is simply commonplace for a man; the same is unable to be said about women. I believe everyone in the world should read this book at least once because of its reflection of the progress we have made as a society. Female sexual freedom and independence are seen as bizarre in this novel, and, in many parts of the world, it still is, yet simultaneously, we are now lightyears ahead. As a woman of color in STEM, I understand Edna's feeling of wanting to escape, her feeling of shame in her desires. This book is needed in order to understand the need for feminism. Everyday I am tested, whether it be having my ideas belittled as "less than" simply due to my gender or when I enter male-dominated spaces in my classes everyday. However, the fact that I am allowed to pursue this field and enter these classes is a sign of progress in and of itself. For us to have gotten here, to where we are now, women had to undergo what Edna goes through in the novel, and those women had to have allies. For us to continue progressing, the same is required.

A relatively new technology that inspires me is one that I personally wouldn't have any need for: Equalize Health's Brilliance phototherapy system, made to treat jaundice in neonates. It is not what the device does but everything that it stands for that makes it stand out to me. Growing up in the Philippines, on my grandfather's farm in La Union, I witnessed the struggle for healthcare accessibility everyday. My aunt died from leukemia before I was born in that same city due to our family's inability to afford her treatment. I knew various people growing up who couldn't afford any fancy medical technologies, such as my mother's best friend, who frequently combed my hair as a child with both hands on the brush, as she only had four fingers across both, or my childhood babysitter, who recently passed away from an undiagnosed disease. Medical technologies don't need to be flashy or ultra high-tech in order to really make an impact, to me; they just need to help people. I want to focus my career on expanding healthcare accessibility. I want to make sure that people all over the world, no matter where they are or how much wealth they have to their name, can access what has been invented to help them. There's no use in a solution that no one is able to use. It is due to this that I greatly admire the Brilliance Phototherapy system. After witnessing the poor conditions and lack of resources faced by many hospitals in Rwanda, Equalize Health came up with Brilliance, a blue light table that treated jaundice in newborns that only cost $500 per system: reputable and efficiently used in larger, prestigious hospitals but also affordable and practical enough for all. Since Brilliance landed on the market, over two million babies have received treatment, where around 1.6 million of those babies wouldn't have without it. When I began applying for colleges majoring in bioengineering, I knew I wanted to change the world through increasing accessibility in health technologies, but I didn't have a single clue on how to go about it. Hearing about Brilliance's story completely shone a light on just one path of this goal. Something seemingly so simple but so life-changing, the Brilliance system enlightened me on how one really has the power to change the world through health innovation.

Have you ever watched a show that was so mind-bendingly different that you were unsure if it even counted as a "show?" I have - when it came to wondering if what I wanted to write about for this prompt, one immediately came to mind. if you want your entire world flipped in twenty-six twenty minute episodes and a movie finale, turn on Neon Genesis Evangelion. When I first started watching Evangelion, I thought it was just a regular anime series about a kid who fought aliens inside of a giant robot. On the surface level, that's precisely what it is: tween Shinji Ikari is scouted by his father to jump inside of the EVA in order to defeat the Angels, giant beings from outer space who threaten humanity's safety. However, it is immediately apparent that Evangelion is different, recognizing the tropes that it uses and cleverly worming around them. Shinji is fourteen, and certainly acts that way: he's a coward, losing his first few missions, immediately running away from home out of fear of piloting an EVA ever again. His father, the head of the operation, is cold and unloving: traits that come naturally from the man who only contacted his son again to force him into a suicide mission. Every detail of the show, not just these synopsis-level aspects mentioned, are treated with this much deconstruction. Constantly, as you pace through these episodes, you find your expectations flipped, always feeling one hundred percent immersed. More notoriously, this show is known for its wild structure, going from fun with some serious moments to existentially depressive towards the second half. Generally attributed to the show-runner, Hideaki Anno, struggling with his mental health at the time of the second half's production, the tonal nosedive that this show takes is something like a beautiful train crash you can't look away from. MULTIPLE plot twists that completely restructure your entire interpretation of the show, characters dropping dead like flies, main characters introduced in the last three episodes, and an ending so infuriatingly open-ended that it prompted a proper finale, released in theaters but now, also on Netflix, this show truly has it all. I never watched anything like it, and, since then, I never have. But if it was just for the interesting plot structure or the insane second half, then this show would just be a fun experience, and nothing more. Thankfully, it has themes which uplift it above a fun weekend and to a lifelong lesson for me. Shinji's cowardice and fear of failure permeates throughout the entire show, leading to conflicts not only with other characters but more importantly with himself. While the giant aliens ripping up the earth and threatening the human race are a big problem, I'd argue the main antagonist in this show is Shinji himself. Shinji's struggle with his combined insecurity and selfishness was very relatable to me, watching this in high school in the middle of the pandemic. Often, one's idea of their self-worth feels serious enough to cause the end of the world, and, to Shinji, it quite literally is, completely encapsulating this feeling. However, this is far from wasted: Shinji's journey culminates in the 26th episode, "Take care of yourself," where multiple characters state, "The only person who can sympathize with you and understand you is you, so take care of yourself." A simple, but robust message which I made my senior quote, told in such a complex and memorable way, has cemented Neon Genesis Evangelion as the show I've binged the most on Netflix, and one I endlessly recommend to others.

My favorite K-Pop artist is the OnlyOne for Me, OnlyOneOf. Growing up in a very competitive environment has always impacted my self esteem. I've always found myself stuck in the comparison game, whittling my worth down to my identity. Being a queer woman of color in STEM, the first in my family to go to college in America, I feel like I am constantly being put into boxes. I am expected to be achieving much more than my peers, either carrying the unrealistic burden of being a role model to others or labelled with negative stereotypes simply because of my identity. Emotions like the embarrassment I felt from being the sole member of my friend group who went to community college, the shame of being called homophobic slurs, and the fear from being one of only three women in my physics class are felt everyday for me. However, it is because of these reasons that I find so much solace in OnlyOneOf. While it seems idols are getting much younger nowadays, every member of OnlyOneOf was an adult when they debuted. Their members included the charismatic, and, during their debut, 27-year-old KB, who planned to be a police officer before joining the group, as well as the elegant Yoojung, who was in the industry for seven years before their first album. From these two, my faith and belief in myself taking the path in community college strengthened - everyone takes different paths to their dreams, and mine, like Yoojung and KB's, was just as valid as everyone else's; hopefully their paths will pave the way for more idols to do the same in debuting later in life. OnlyOneOf are also unabashedly, unapologetically different from most other K-pop groups. Their creative vision interlaced with their music has an intense "so what?" attitude. Songs like "tear of gOd" and "sage" uniquely deal with themes such as religious guilt and sexuality, themes so untouched in K-pop. With their musical style and concepts, where they are so focused on being themselves and expressing their own ideas, I feel more empowered to do the same. I shouldn't care about other's expectations of me, why should their opinions matter? The way OnlyOneOf bravely approaches their concepts has influenced me in approaching new experiences and opportunities without fear. However, what OnlyOneOf are most known for is their unwavering support of queer fans. Their songs, "instinct," "skinz," and "libidO" focus on the innateness of human sexuality through gay relationships. Their undergrOund idOl series of singles showcased queer relationships between members, a concept practically unheard of in K-pop. Additionally, held over 40 different pride flags during their world tour and are constantly vocally expressing their love for their queer fans. On the release of his new song, "begin," Yoojung stated, "For whatever reasons, religious reasons, like parents' disapproval, I dedicate this song to all those lovers that couldn't be blessed." Their steadfast love for the LGBTQ+ community is unmatched, and they are constantly breaking barriers in their music and their performance. This resolve to doing what is right to represent others is something that I hold very dear to my heart due to OnlyOneOf. Their actions are not without threat; they constantly face homophobic hate and disdain for their forward actions. However, I hope that more groups continue to do the same and to spread this idea of outward love and care, unafraid of what they will face for their ideas. It is with this mindset that I continue to confidently strive as a student everyday, and I know OnlyOneOf has touched countless fans the same way.