Being a woman in a STEM field, mentorship is a key form of empowerment that I have always been grateful for. Throughout my upbringing, education, and professional career, mentorship has provided me with the growth, knowledge, and confidence to enter a male-driven field. In turn, I have become a mentor to other young girls throughout different pathways and I hope to continue to mentor others for as long as I can. The impact that I hope to have is that I will empower the younger generation to follow their passions and maintain the confidence that will allow them to succeed in any field. Empowerment and education go hand-in-hand in how we can bring up a future generation of young women that are passionate leaders and unstoppable changemakers. Mentorship is a critical tool to accomplish this as it provides guidance and support for those who need it, as well as sets an example for mentees to follow. I hope that as a mentor, I can relay the many lessons I've learned throughout my experiences to a younger generation and inspire them to face the many inevitable challenges that life will bring them with strength and wisdom.

One creative thing that I do to have a positive impact on the climate is to limit my consumption and practice the art of repurposing to reduce waste. I think that society today has promoted a culture of mass consumption, including the consumption of both food products and material items. Social networks and other media we consume are constantly marketing items and convincing consumers of some "need" they have that their product will meet. Even within the more climate-conscious community, brands will create products that are marketed towards sustainable living and reusability, however in essence they still consume resources. Due to my background in engineering and my creative perspective on "waste", I try to impact the climate positively by both practicing and promoting what I like to call "repurposing". Repurposing to me is finding creative and artistic ways of reusing items in new ways to prevent throwing things away and avoid new purchases. This includes everything from refinishing furniture, turning old car parts into art pieces, using old candle jars for storage, and anything in between. In sharing my projects with others, I find that they often realize how easy it can be to limit our consumption and our waste simultaneously in a fun and creative way.

If I was a highly influential figure, I would stand for compassion. Though I would want to promote more concrete causes that I am passionate about, such as women's rights and global health, the best way I can think of using my influence is to inspire compassion as it is the root of all of these causes. The issues that I care about can be addressed by raising money, spreading information, and advocating for change. However, it is compassion that would truly inspire my following to put the knowledge of these causes into real action. I think the biggest thing lacking in society today is compassion, as it seems we are so distracted by our own daily lives that we are forgetting our ability to sympathize with others. Issues that don't directly impact us don't concern us and we are forgetting to recognize our privilege and fortune for not being impacted by those issues. In promoting the practice of mindful compassion, the practice of sympathizing with others, I would hope that my influence would lead others to live more compassionate lives and not just hearing about issues, but truly take action on them.

In today's changing world, staying "true to yourself" has become a mantra correlated with being confident, being strong and independent, and following the path that you've laid out for yourself. This mantra is a reaction to the pressures and influences of external forces in our daily lives, such as social media and societal "norms", which pressure us to adhere to a certain standard and always think about how something looks to the outside world. Staying true to yourself is an important practice as it can serve as a reminder to be who you are without being concerned about these external forces that plague our culture. With social media putting lives on display for the world to see, this only becomes more and more important as social media continues to intertwine into our daily lives. I practice staying true to myself in my daily life through habits that are my own, practices kept away from social media and that can be used for centering myself. These habits include daily journaling, practicing meditation, engulfing myself in the natural world, and consuming books related to my greatest interests. I allow myself to be inspired by mentors and significant figures that have stayed true to themselves in their own ways. I also try to surround myself with friends, peers, and mentors that have excelled at staying true to themselves and empower me to do the same.

I am hopeful that the future will be better off because of the increased awareness and energy of changemakers I am seeing at the forefront of society today. Not only is this awareness and devotion to create change gaining traction across all sectors of society, but it is also creating its deepest roots in the youngest generations. Both global and domestic issues have come to shape social media, politics, education, healthcare, and the economy. At a younger age, children are more aware of what is going on in the world around them, from social justice to human rights campaigns across the world. This does not stop at awareness but bleeds into real action and hunger for inspiring change. The voices of this new generation are extremely powerful and will shape the changes that are to come in the next few decades. These inspiring voices are what give me hope that the future will be a better place for all people, regardless of location, race, religion, economic background, and sexual orientation, or gender identity. I feel empowered every day by the voices of people like myself who can't take in the news each day without feeling the weight of what I am reading about. The new generation is made up of inspiring changemakers who can't sit complacent or ignorant to the world's issues. Changemakers who understand the power of advocacy, media, storytelling, and a single voice are those who will have the largest impact through influence and following. That being said, this energy will continue to influence all aspects of society as these generations join the workforce. I am hopeful that the power of this influence will ripple across future generations and our future will be filled with world leaders with a deep-rooted understanding of the issues that impact society and the power of voice to ignite change.

My personal goal that drives my education and my career is to create an equal playing field across the world that allows for all individuals, regardless of the circumstances they were born into, an equal chance of success. My specific interest is in public health and in increasing the accessibility and quality of healthcare around the world. Healthcare is a major factor in all lives and due to the health disparities around the world, a lack of accessible healthcare can prevent entire populations from being able to progress, access education, raise families, work, and accomplish their own goals. I am privileged to have been born into an environment where I have always had access to both quality education and incredible healthcare. Unfortunately, that is not the case for the majority of the world. As a woman, I feel this privilege even stronger as so many women around the world are prevented from accessing these luxuries due to the health issues that burden them. I find it unquestionable that I use my own fortunate circumstances to better the lives of other women and work to address the issues that plague women’s health, such as child mortality, female genital mutilation, human trafficking, mental health, and infectious diseases. I come from an engineering background and I am seeking education in public health to understand the roots of these issues and the ways that I can address them. I seek to converge my engineering thinking and public health knowledge by using technology to address these issues from a systemic level. I believe that these fields should go hand in hand in addressing widespread global health problems and I see how technology can positively impact the world through advocacy, awareness, research, development of tools that provide accessible healthcare and treat diseases. After spending time volunteering as a biomedical equipment technician at a hospital in rural Rwanda, I witness how the failure of medical technology prevents the quality of medical care and thus results in a larger impact on individuals that are unable to work, seek education, or even just live healthy lives due to our failure to apply technology with a developed level of understanding. Meeting inspiring women that just need to be given this access to care to follow their own dreams has empowered me to make this my life’s work. I believe that technology should not be developed to solve an issue until that issue is fully understood, which is where the methods and study of public health will grant me the tools to make a maximum impact on global health. I envision using my deep passion for global health, the problem-solving skills I've acquired from engineering, and my future career in technology for public health to address these issues with a high level of understanding and technological expertise. Combining these fields and my personal passion to solve global health problems can make the world a better place and empower others to follow in similar footsteps by giving them a better chance of success.

The wisest thing I've ever heard is "Compassion is wisdom in action", a quote from Jan Willis's book entitled Dharma Matters. I believe that this quote stresses that not only is it important to be wise and to develop a comprehensive understanding of people, culture, and the world, but to put this knowledge into powerful action. Acting on knowledge is true compassion that creates a cycle of understanding and encourages impactful work. Learning about a particular issue that exists in the world is important, but putting this wisdom into action takes education one step further. Compassion is not an action that comes from ignorance, but from a true understanding of the issue you are acting on. Jan Willis's way of describing compassion is something that has stuck with me throughout my own educational and professional journey in engineering and public health, reminding me to not only understand a problem to the fullest before attempting to solve it but to apply this understanding at its most powerful level through informed action. I believe that too many times solutions are created before problems are truly understood and it is this definition of compassion that can lead us to develop the highest level of impact through using our knowledge wisely.

Education is constantly evolving, and a change that could be made to better education for future generations is expanded access to education that allows for applied learning. Being able to access quality education should not be a privilege but a right of life. Within this quality education, tools to apply learning and put education into practice should be used in conjunction with traditional education styles to allow students to dive deeper into their education and understand the impact of what they are learning. One example would be the opportunity to travel and witness other cultures of the world outside of one's own. Exploration of culture provides context for education and submerges students into their studies by placing them into an environment that allows them to witness and experience firsthand the histories, cultures, religions, and regions of the world. If applied learning through study abroad was more accessible to all learners, this would create more creative and compassionate thinkers and allow students to pave their own path into what they are most passionate about with a more comprehensive understanding of why what they are learning is important. Unfortunately, access to study abroad programs is not widespread enough and students are often held back from being able to take part in these experiences due to financial and circumstantial reasons. Expanding this access and providing all students with the ability to experience and apply their learning will transform education and empower students to continue their education in the fields they are most passionate about. Applied learning can also involve internship and work opportunities that provide students with guidance on how they can shape their career and work to better the world. I believe that working towards providing this broader access to applied learning and international experiences will create a future generation of more culturally aware students that feel prepared to take on the challenges they will face in their future careers.

My personal goal that drives my education and my career is to create an equal playing field across the world that allows for all individuals, regardless of the circumstances they were born into, an equal chance of success. My specific interest is in public health and in increasing the accessibility and quality of healthcare around the world. Healthcare is a major factor in all lives and due to the health disparities around the world, a lack of accessible healthcare can prevent entire populations from being able to progress, access education, raise families, work, and accomplish their own goals. I am privileged to have been born into an environment where I have always had access to both quality education and incredible healthcare. Unfortunately, that is not the case for the majority of the world. As a woman, I feel this privilege even stronger as so many women around the world are prevented from accessing these luxuries due to the health issues that burden them. I find it unquestionable that I use my own fortunate circumstances to better the lives of other women and work to address the issues that plague women’s health, such as child mortality, female genital mutilation, human trafficking, mental health, and infectious diseases. I come from an engineering background and I am seeking education in public health to understand the roots of these issues and the ways that I can address them. I seek to converge my engineering thinking and public health knowledge by using technology to address these issues from a systemic level. I believe that these fields should go hand in hand in addressing widespread global health problems and I see how technology can positively impact the world through advocacy, awareness, research, development of tools that provide accessible healthcare and treat diseases. After spending time volunteering as a biomedical equipment technician in rural Rwanda, I witness how the failure of medical technology prevents the quality of medical care and thus results in a larger impact on individuals that are unable to work, seek education, or even just live healthy lives due to our failure to apply technology with a developed level of understanding. Meeting inspiring women that just need to be given this access to care to follow their own dreams has empowered me to make this my life’s work. I believe that technology should not be developed to solve an issue until that issue is fully understood, which is where the methods and study of public health will grant me the tools to make a maximum impact on global health.

Generosity is wisdom and compassion in action. It is not just having an understanding of a problem or a hardship, but possessing the true compassion to act in the benefit of others. To me, generosity means setting aside ones personal burdens to engage in selfless acts that truly serve to help others. Generosity means giving without expecting anything in return. There is no quantity that can signify generosity as it is unique to the person acting generously, for example maybe a billionaire can donate $1,000,000 to an organization fighting homelessness, while a working college student may only be able to donate $5. Both would be acts of generosity as they are expecting nothing in return and using their true compassion to lend a hand. Additionally, generosity can come in many forms of action, not just donating money. Generosity can involve giving up your time to help someone with a task or just lending an ear or a shoulder for comfort. Generosity is the purest form of giving that comes from a place of true understanding and empathy, setting a side self-interest. It is so important to practice generosity and inspire generosity in a myriad of ways, not only to make an impact on one person but to create a ripple effect as that generosity carries over from person to person. When I think of generosity, I think of the common example of giving a person to fish versus teaching them to fish. Teaching is an incredible form of generosity that creates a greater and more lasting impact on an individual.

My favorite scientific discovery is Edward Jenner’s discovery in 1757 that the milkmaids with cowpox were protected from smallpox, leading to his theory and development of the smallpox vaccine. The impact of this discovery was critical to the eventual eradication of smallpox in 1980, the only human disease to have been successfully eradicated via vaccination. Additionally, his impact lives on through the concept of vaccination and its success in protecting against diseases. However, I also distinguish this discovery to be my favorite because of its controversy in that the concept of vaccination and the practice of administering a small quantity of virus onto a patient to protect against disease was not something that began with Edward Jenner, but had actually been in practice over hundreds of years including in 17th century China and in Africa, where the process of immunization was actually taught to European settlers. While important to acknowledge Edward Jenner’s lasting impact through the development of vaccines, it is also critical to acknowledge the deeper roots of this discovery and the cultural practices of immunization that existed long before Jenner’s time.

As the world continues to evolve, technology holds an evolving impact on all areas of society, including education, healthcare, politics, and the economy. As none of these sectors function in silo and the overlap between all pieces of our world continue to grow, the importance of technology becomes clear. One way that technology impacts each of us is through access, for example access to education and access to healthcare services. Technology also serves a role through providing tools of communication to connect the interdependent web of people all across the world and allow ideas to grow across countries and borders. Lastly, technology works to solve problems. Across medicine, media, social issues, and the market, technology is evolving to develop solutions and improve quality of life. With those few applications of technology in mind, diversity in technology is critical to ensuring that both its development and its implementation truly serves the good of all and does not further the gap between privilege and historically underrepresented groups of people. Diversity ensures that there is representation from all backgrounds, cultures, socioeconomic backgrounds, races, and genders. Solutions can be developed that work to lessen this gap, not increase it. Diversity also brings different voices to the conversation that not only seek to represent, but to question the way that tech is typically developed. Having diverse backgrounds working on technology to solve problems allows for various perspectives to be incorporated into a solution. As an example, a public health issue should not just be approached by a team of medical professionals. It should include clinicians, engineers, public health experts, and the patients themselves. Within those groups, it should include individuals from diverse backgrounds. Particularly within the end user group, those who will be impacted the most by the technology, diversity of voice and perspective is critical. My aspiration is to converge the fields of biomedical engineering and global health to solve the issues that most frequently take a backseat. These issues include those that impact groups that often do not hold a voice at the table, such as issues of human trafficking, female genital mutilation, and period poverty. I seek to develop technological solutions to health issues in low-resource areas, where technology often times is not built for. An example would be the infant incubator. In low-resource areas, medical technologies like infant incubators are often times donated from high income countries and do not have the proper electrical build for the areas in which they are now being used. Developing solutions that are adaptable and usable within these areas is critical. I aspire to develop technology that can help underserved groups have better access to healthcare services, quality medical care, and health education. In doing so, it is critical to approach these issues in collaboration with the people that this technology would impact. It is important to have varying perspectives, cultural expertise, and a diverse group of stakeholders to consult on solutions. I believe that through the expansion of diversity in technology, the impact of technology can expand exponentially and can bring the world closer together, lessening the gap between those who have access to it and those who do not.