I declared at age twelve, while watching a Doctors Without Borders video, that medicine would be my life. Today, biomedical engineering integrates my experiences and interests. My brothers, who survived because of maternal-fetal biomedical engineering, use biomedical devices for communication. We’ve benefited from technology others built, so I want to pay it forward with my own contributions. As an artist, a designer, and a voracious reader, engineering is a “must do”. Though I will probably be in product development, the delivery and beta levels consist of a great span of volunteers who speak up to attain better things to meet more needs, who get services to those who need them the most. As a biomedical engineer I will be always in pursuit of the novel by solving the issues of the present, improving the lives of those I will never know. But ingenuity for societal advancement works from the street to the top government levels. Where I live in northern Minnesota, I see a number of people with limb differences. I am direct-admitted to biomedical engineering school in 2023, and my ambition is to create a system of bionic hands that are easily interchangeable, economically feasible, and more proficient within narrow scope use. In volunteering, as well as being a competitive swimmer, a skier, an archer, a trap shooter, an artist, and a principal orchestral violist, I know such innovation will offer a less restricted quality of life. Within Minnesota, the presence of our world class medical technology manufacturing allows this to be a viable business model. With financial planning, our local engineering talent, our medical political relations, our world class hospitals and household-name medical manufacturing, we may see some of my contributions reach the globe, and that would be a lifetime achievement. After becoming fiscally sustainable in manufacturing and distribution, this product advancement would service the users’ social access to employment and opportunities, as well better facilitate the general economy with the promotion of user employment.

Recently, I painted the local food pantry so visitors would be received in dignity. I also worked in assisted living and volunteered as a baseball ump and ski coach. When I was 10, I requested the state to improve the science curriculum to align with animal experimentation guidelines. At age 11, I joined the Clean Water Action Council and petitioned for preservation of a local watershed, then I co-taught a field trip at that preservation. At age 13, I petitioned my city to recall demographically inequitable park planning, and I wrote a persuasive letter for referendum (which passed). At age 17, I was book ended by volunteerism for equity as a LGBTQIA+ community member. At age twelve, while watching a Doctors Without Borders video, I knew medicine was my life. Today, biomedical engineering integrates my experiences and interests. As a biomedical engineer I will be improving lives I may never know. I am direct-admitted to both physical therapy and biomedical engineering in autumn. My ambition is to create a system of bionic hands that are easily interchangeable, economically feasible, and more proficient. Within Minnesota, our medical manufacturing may allow this to be a viable business model. With our world class hospitals, volunteerism, engineering, political relations, we may see some of my contributions globally. That would be a lifetime achievement. We deserve teams that represent our society. It’s important to have a diverse group as the many perspectives will create a more universally applicable product. All new products are the result of building on previous works. This is like financial investing, but it’s investing in teamwork. When I was little, I was in Destination Imagination. I had ideas I liked very much, but I would get tunnel vision and insist upon only my idea. During a competition, we were challenged to building something. I had an idea, but it was not sufficient. So I turned to my teammates. I asked them each individually by name if they had contributions. They did, I listened, and we ended up winning an award for our collaboration and openness! Generational wealth is the whole of an estate as inherited through the passing of generations. Generous generational donors supported my park and water shed concerns. The food pantry has generational donors who care for those with presumably little financial wealth. Generational wealth is an inherited manner of all assets, including scarce properties minus relative debts. This includes all bonds, stocks, investitures, properties and businesses as well as other valuable assets. An average American inheritance is $46,000 with a 1% around $700,000. These estates are best managed by generational wealth management firms. The goal should be to achieve autonomy of finances and generational wealth by starting young within college. Achieving generational wealth shows relative safety from the crisis of financial debt and it permits granting that safety to our loved ones after our own passing. I hope to attain this by selecting a college which allows me to be debt free, and to stay living within a reasonable means, as well as growing my private investments with managed support as my career progresses. I expect that in typical times, my young allocations will be diverse. However, the ratios of this will change in time as markets change and my risk tolerance closes. Generational wealth is the ultimate goal of college decision-making.

My first memories are sitting on my mom’s lap at city hall meetings. Recently, I painted the local food pantry so visitors are received in dignity. I also worked in assisted living and volunteered as a baseball ump and ski coach. When I was 10, I requested the state to improve the science curriculum to align with animal experimentation guidelines. At age 11, I joined the Clean Water Action Council and petitioned for preservation of a local watershed, then I co-taught a field trip at that preservation. At age 13, I petitioned my city to recall demographically inequitable park planning, and I wrote a persuasive letter for referendum (which passed). At age 17, I was book ended by volunteerism for equity, and I was now protesting for women’s and LGBTQIA+ rights. Only now, I was also working for myself as a LGBTQIA+ community member. At age twelve, while watching a Doctors Without Borders video, I knew medicine was my life. Today, biomedical engineering integrates my experiences and interests. As a biomedical engineer I will be improving lives I may never know. But ingenuity for medical advancement comes from the street, to the clinic, to the manufacturer, then to the government. I will be collaborating with many people inside clinical healthcare. I am direct-admitted to both physical therapy and biomedical engineering in autumn. My ambition is to create a system of bionic hands that are easily interchangeable, economically feasible, and more proficient. Within Minnesota, our medical manufacturing allows this to be a viable model. With our world class hospitals, volunteerism, engineering, political relations, we may see some of my contributions globally. That would be a lifetime achievement. But this starts in rehabilitation and surgical centers. Collaboration with doctors and staff is how I will consider the designs. I need to be ready to listen with no barriers of bias. Likewise, my opportunity to develop plans with physicians and staff needs to be received without bias to my LGBTQIA+ identity. Our patients deserve all of our talent, in all of our roles, collaborated in a safe environment of exchange and communication. They also deserve to receive service from a team that represents our full society. People may need reminding that we can bring our own chair, and we can bring chairs for our community members. It’s important to have a diverse group as the many perspectives will create a more universally applicable product. All new products are the result of building on previous works, and the same goes for ideas, since working together makes something bigger than oneself. When I was little, I was in Destination Imagination. I had ideas I liked very much, but I would get tunnel vision and insist upon only my idea. During a competition, we were challenged to building something. I had an idea, but it was not sufficient. So I turned to my teammates. I asked them each individually by name if they had contributions. They did, I listened, and we ended up winning an award for our collaboration and openness! Teams are successful when they are diverse, recognized, and mutually delegated. I will change the world by being my whole self, by engineering, by listening to each individual person, by asking for contributions by name, and bringing more chairs when needed.

My first memories are sitting on my mom’s lap at city hall meetings. Recently, I painted the local food pantry so visitors are received in dignity. At age 17, my life was already book ended by volunteerism for equity, and I was still advocating for women’s and LGBTQ+ rights, but now as an LGBTQ+ community member. At age twelve, while watching a Doctors Without Borders video, I knew that medicine would be my life. Today, biomedical engineering integrates my experiences and interests. Even in product development, the delivery and beta levels consist of collaborators who aspire to create product to meet more needs. As a biomedical engineer I will be in pursuit of the novel by solving issues of the present, improving lives of people I will never know. But ingenuity for medical advancement comes from the street, to the clinic, to the manufacture, then to the government, so I will be collaborating with many people in healthcare. Respect is the first premise for clinical collaborative care. I learned the importance of lateral communication while working at an assisted living facility when I collaborated with staff and administrators during dynamic patient chair transfers. Had communication been opaqued with personal bias, information would not process properly and the resident would have been at risk of falling. I am direct-admitted to both physical therapy and biomedical engineering in 2023. My ambition is to create a system of bionic hands that are easily interchangeable, economically feasible, and more proficient. Within Minnesota, our world class medical technology and manufacturing allows this to be a viable business model. With our local and state tools of world-leading hospitals, volunteerism, engineering, political relations, and medical distribution, we may see some of my contributions reach the globe. That would be a lifetime achievement. But first, this starts in the rehabilitation and surgical centers. Collaboration with doctors and rehabilitation staff is how I will know what to make for their patients and practices. Coming into an existing care team means I need to be ready to listen to information without barriers of bias. Likewise, my opportunity to develop plans with physicians and care staff needs to be received without bias to my LGBTQ+ identity or any other bias to self or orientation. Our patients deserve all our talent, in all our roles, fully collaborated in a safe environment of exchange and communication. They also deserve to be cared for by staff who represent our full society. It’s important to have a diverse development team, as the many perspectives will create a more universally applicable product than if one type of person made it. All new products are the result of building on previous works, and the same goes for ideas. By definition, people working together make something bigger than an individual. When I was little, I did Destination Imagination. I had a lot of very good ideas that I liked very much tended toward tunnel vision and would insist upon my idea, alone. During a competition, we were challenged to building something. I had an idea, but it was not sufficient. So I turned to my teammates. I asked them each individually by name if they had any contributions. They did, I listened, and we ended up winning an award for the collaboration and openness our team displayed! Collaborating teams are successful when they are diverse, diligent, and mutually delegated.

People giving time saved my little brothers’ lives. I’ve been exposed to volunteerism from a young age; my first memories are sitting on my mom’s lap at city hall meetings, cleaning debris from creeks near vacated homeless encampments, and later painting the local food pantry to ensure those who visit are received in dignity. I declared at age twelve, while watching a Doctors Without Borders video, that medicine would be my life. Today, biomedical engineering integrates my experiences and interests. My brothers, who survived because of maternal-fetal biomedical engineering, use biomedical devices for communication. We’ve benefited from technology others built, so I want to pay it forward with my own contributions. As an artist, a designer, and a voracious reader, engineering is a “must do”. Though I will probably be in product development, the delivery and beta levels consist of a great span of volunteers who speak up to attain better things to meet more needs, who get services to those who need them the most. I am busy with an intense schedule as a full-time student as an on-university-campus student, participating in varsity sports and robotics, but I find hours to write emails, present to town hall, call government offices, and support civil protest. I lobbied to my state government regarding the learning curriculum for elementary school science and enacted a change in classroom animal experimentation in order to align with IRB guidelines. I also wrote to my local former city government to rescind park planning, which posed unsafe pedestrian conditions and limited access for a summer pool within a lower income neighborhood. We asked for a referendum. The community voted for equal access across demographic groups and safer pedestrian travel. As a biomedical engineer I will be always in pursuit of the novel by solving the issues of the present, improving the lives of those I will never know. But ingenuity for societal advancement works from the street to the top government levels. I recognize that I can be present as an employee, as a civic communicator, and as a volunteer. I started my volunteerism at age six, cleaning parks. By age 10, I was writing to the government to improve educational curriculum. By age 13, I asked the city government to consider a referendum because of concerns of inequity of park access. At age 17, I realized that my life was book ended by volunteerism. I was also a baseball ump, and I taught kids to cross-country ski. I planted flowers in the city garden with elders who needed to talk. The easiest way to begin living outside of yourself is to contact any place people go publicly, and ask if you can help with anything at all. Offer to send an email on their behalf. Where I live in northern Minnesota, I see a number of people with limb differences. I am direct-admitted to biomedical engineering school in 2023, and my ambition is to create a system of bionic hands that are easily interchangeable, economically feasible, and more proficient within narrow scope use. In volunteering, as well as being a competitive swimmer, a skier, an archer, a trap shooter, an artist, and a principal orchestral violist, I know such innovation will offer a less restricted quality of life. Within Minnesota, the presence of our world class medical technology manufacturing allows this to be a viable business model. With our local and state tools of volunteerism, engineering, political relations, and medical manufacturing, we may see some of my contributions reach the globe, and that would be a lifetime achievement.

In my research, people with limb difference using prosthetics want minimal electronics that are easy to repair at home and that are affordable. This is a current barrier to the utility of bionic hands. Users fear breakage and costs. I’m willing to make prosthetics that users actually want, that serve their needs first, and apply an appropriate level of design. I consider the whole person before I look at technology. I really want to make a fitting that is easy and understandable for the user, with an aesthetic from the user’s mind. Single task aesthetics seem to be a user-desired option for prosthetic hands. Bionic hands today, to do all functions, have such compromise that they can be devoid of target satisfaction. Like, they could open the refrigerator door (albeit slowly), but maybe not be able to carry the load of the lasagna pan. To tool a design that’s proficient to a narrow set of functions, yet affordable enough to buy other attachments for other functions, is a unique manufacturing approach. Specifically, a hand for volleyball could be made affordable so that hands could also be purchased, which are specific to swimming, viola, archery, or fine artwork. Our community is not fully accessible to people with limb differences. It shouldn’t be that their own tool for accessibility is innately inaccessible by utility and cost. People with limb differences may not be hired or placed in otherwise qualified positions of sports. Aside from overt discrimination, authorities may be unwilling or unable to adapt environment or roles. Accessible prosthetics, specialized for multiple situations, would habilitate a more complete autonomy, health, and equal workforce. As a lifelong USA Swim member and varsity swimmer, a Nordic Ski Team member, a Cross-Country runner, a former state level competition archer, the owner of the title “Best Female Shooter” on our school trap team, as well as a Robotics teammate and a principal violist in our youth city orchestra, I surely respect earning a place on any stage. My interests are in athletic competition, art, string orchestra, shooting sports, engineering, teamwork and general helping. I want everyone to be able to do this array of activity. My brothers survived by biomedical engineering, and they continue to use biomedical engineering. As I volunteer to ump their baseball games, I think about equalizing the opportunities in the sport for kids with limb differences. I draw those thoughts out. I spent at least 100x the hours that an average human draws hands, paying attention to how they look, the physiology. Minnesota is a proud birthplace of medical innovation, and my home in the Northwoods is a community yielding too many occupational or otherwise acquired hand injuries. I was born in Minnesota, and I believe that I’m here to improve the inclusion of Minnesotans struggling with physical barriers. The attention to limb design will promote Minnesota’s medical manufacturing industry. Minnesota will, yet again, bring even more medical tools to the rest of our world. With this concept, in a single afternoon, a kid could bat one over the fence, swim the 100 IM, play the viola and decorate sugar cookies using their own two (or more) really helpful hands. Providing multiple design would serve the individual in their many activities and places.

Two different lenses: is this an evil man in a backward society, or is this a tragic tale of a respected leader forced into an impossible situation? British and American readers considering Okonkwo, of Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe, interpret Okonkwo’s actions through a western lens, seeing his actions as villainous. But in Igbo society, Okonkwo was not only logical, he was mostly heroic. Okonkwo is an example of the ideal Igbo man. In the culture of Umuofia, Okonkwo “ruled his house with a heavy hand” but “… deep down in his heart Okonkwo was not a cruel man.” Okonkwo’s actions were socially expectant, as Okonkwo’s community mostly agreed with him and looked to him for guidance. He acted honestly on behalf of the spirit and in the best interest of the tribe. In such a close-bonded community, the responsibility entrusted to Okonkwo was immense, and he tried to act within the best interest of the tribe. A gray area in Okonkwo’s character is the toxic and strained relationship with his son, Nwoye. Okonkwo intended not to fail his son in the same manner his father had failed him. Nwoye did not always agree with Okonkwo’s stances, though he knew masculinity and violence were praised. He preferred the alternative stories that his mother told. Okonkwo thought his own stories enhanced Nwoye’s mindset, but instead Nwoye became uncomfortable and confused. This led to more tension. In such a society, it is not the responsibility of the father to consider the personal desires of his sons. Okonkwo’s manner is described as, “Whenever he could not get his words out quickly enough, he would use his fists. He had no patience with unsuccessful men.” As well as, “Okonkwo never showed any emotion openly, unless it be the emotion of anger.” Okonkwo’s main vice is his fear as “it was the fear of himself, lest he should be found to resemble his father.” Commonality between the Igbo and Western is the rebranding of anger as a non-emotion. In this, the prohibition of fear and insecurity is redirected into violence and hatred. This book is a Rosetta Stone for the use of context deconstruction anywhere informed inclusively applies.

In design, I am willing to look past what I personally want to do, what only I think is cool. My engineering power is that I’m willing to make something that the people who need it actually want, that serves their needs first. I look at the whole person. People with limb differences using prosthetics want minimal electronics that are easy to repair at home and affordable. This seems to be the main reason people don’t use bionic hands as much as they’re intended to be used because users are afraid of breakage and costs. I really want to make a fitting that is easy and understandable for the person using it, with an aesthetic from the user in mind. From the research that I’ve done, single-task aesthetics seem to be the best in terms of hands, especially. A bionic hand that could theoretically do everything, right now, has so many compromises that most things are done without overall satisfaction. It can open the refrigerator door but it can’t really lift much weight. So it’s actually best to make something that’s really, really good at one thing, that’s affordable enough to buy another attachment. This is like: you can make a hand that is specific to volleyball but is also relatively cheap, so that person can also buy a head that is specific to swimming, too. Most of the world is not accessible to people who have limb differences, and that’s not fair. They just can’t live their lives without discrepancies in accessibility. So it shouldn’t be that their own tool for accessibility is innately inaccessible. We must put more work into listening to amputees and people with limb differences because we’re trying to make things for them, with them in mind. The current situation shows that they’re giving feedback but are really not being heard enough about their own prosthetics. We have to fit the job, and I am very empathetic. I’m really good at listening and caring about making people’s lives better and easier. I will be there to listen and I will use my analytical skills after they talk. My interest in design and art, my interest in engineering, and my interest in just helping are in a lot of ways just the first tool of biomedical engineering. My brothers survived because of biomedical engineering and surgery, and to this day they still use biomedical engineering. Honestly, I’d be remiss if I didn’t pay it forward in some way. I am scientific and I really like to make things, to design new stuff. I keep thinking about different or novel ideas. Honestly, my brain never stops thinking of ideas. But I only ever start projects with half of an idea in mind. I resist a closed approach because things will inevitably change. I really like to have the extra space and ability to work around that. Because of that philosophy, I end up liking my finished product way, way more. I just kind of let ideas flow out from the original thing. It’s metaphorical to when I planted a maple seed without a specific plan. I just did it while eating lunch since I was just sitting there. So I decided to help the tree grow, to make it the absolute best that it could be, visiting it over my lunches. Now it is a replanted shade tree in my viola instructor’s yard, just because one day I was eating lunch and a seed fell beside me. That’s how ideas work. I like to draw a lot. I solve problems by drawing. I have spent at least 100x hours that the average human draws hands, paying attention to how hands look, and the movement of hands. It’s been a thing since I was very, very little. Some of the first things that I ever drew and was genuinely proud of and have kept to this day are sketches of hands. I would draw on my own knuckles these little ball joints that I would draw connecting with rods and levers. I think that anyone who had that in them since they were in elementary school has some sort of predetermined propensity. People with limb differences may not be hired for positions that they’re qualified for, partially just out of overt discrimination, but also out of accessibility concerns. Employees of those with limb differences have to meet accessibility requirements, and a lot of employers are unwilling or unable to adapt. Prosthetics that would work in a lot of different situations would reduce the need for accessibility limitations and would help facilitate autonomy and economic integration.