I feel like the basic answer here would be the man who raised me, my dad. My dad has always been my number one supporter in everything I have wanted to do and have achieved. He was always the loudest in a crowd cheering me on, but my aspirations for computer science did not originate with him. The person who made me want to pursue computer science and gave me the skills to do so was my Java 1 teacher, Mr. Sedon. On the first day of school, he made it a point that this class was not going to be easy and that we would need to put in effort to do well. I really struggled in the beginning of the year. I did not understand the concepts of coding or how the computer registered my code. He always made it known he was available if and when I needed help. My pride got in the way for some time, and I told myself I could do it on my own like I always had with schoolwork. In the end, I knew I enjoyed the class, but I needed help and I was not doing myself any favors by not asking for it. I started going to his class during my study hall, and he would help me. I eventually started doing better in his class, and every step of the way he would make it known that the effort I was putting in would allow me to achieve great things. Fast forward three years, at the beginning of senior year, I started applying to colleges. He was the person I went to ask about different schools’ computer science programs, and he helped me narrow my list down to schools that would be most beneficial to me and what I wanted. He suggested Penn State University Park. He raved about their program and their professors. I went on a tour of the school and immediately fell in love. I applied knowing that is where I wanted to study. When I got the notification that my portal had been updated, my parents and I checked and, to my surprise, I got into the College of Engineering for computer science. My parents were beyond proud of me. After the wave of excitement hit me, Mr. Sedon was the first person I wanted to tell about my acceptance. I went into school the next morning and told him. He immediately congratulated me and told me he knew I could do it. I told him I could not have done it without him and his constant efforts to help me achieve this accomplishment.

In 8th grade, when we were filling out our schedules for our first year of high school, my math teacher thought it might be a good idea to take a computer science class. I thought, sure, another math-based class would be good for my transcript. I had never coded a day in my life, but when I started the class, I immediately fell in love with everything about the class. I loved the effort I had to put in, the problem solving, and the satisfaction of seeing my final code work. My teacher was a huge inspiration to me because, in my first year of computer science, I struggled with the concepts of how the computer registered my code. He helped me achieve my goals in his class and pursue computer science in college. When I got accepted into Penn State University Park, besides my parents, he was the first person I told. He has always been a huge supporter of me wanting to pursue computer science, even when I was a beginner. When I told him I got accepted, he congratulated me on my achievements, and this time my achievements were due to his teaching skills and the effort he put in to help me. With my degree, I want to build, edit, modify, and debug code. I want to minor in AI studies so I can understand how to use AI for beneficial purposes and not for corruption. I want to be able to re-innovate its skills and goals. I want to be able to do this because in the middle of my freshman year, AI had just started becoming popular with how useful it was. But instead of using it for help, people started depending on it for their coursework and tests. This made it difficult for teachers to differentiate between the students’ own work or if it was created by AI. I think AI can be very useful if done correctly, and I want to get it to that point, not to where it keeps being used to help students do their work. If students keep depending on AI to do their work, they won't be learning, and it gives teachers a disadvantage. I also don't think we need AI to take over job positions that can be completed by humans just as well. With my degree, I want to be able to work with all of this and make it into what it was meant to be.