As a kid, I never felt like an outsider with my family. I enjoyed the moments of growing up in a South Asian culture: the get-togethers on Eid, wearing shalwar kameezes at home, the excitement of fasting during Ramadan, and spending weekends with my extended family. I never felt like an outsider until third grade. We were going over traditions of Thanksgiving: people watched football games, ate turkey and mashed potatoes, watched the Macy's Thanksgiving parade, and gathered with their family. I remember being asked, "So you don't celebrate Thanksgiving at all? How do you give thanks then?" Those questions stuck with me: how do I give thanks? As a seven year old, I went home and asked my dad, my usual process of dealing with confusion. I still do it to this day, whether it's understanding where on a basketball court a three-pointer is shot from or the discourse in Middle East. Back then, he said, "We give thanks everyday, through prayer, through helping others. We don't need one day." While the words sound blunt, they're true. Being thankful isn't a one-time, family gathered at the table, metaphor for Native Americans and Puritans getting along---being thankful is a daily thing. This idea has stayed with me, being thankful for what I have and what I can do. The first in my family to come from Pakistan was my grandma's oldest brother: Nana Sahb. He came in the 1980s, working taxis and eventually owning a grocery store in Lincoln Park. The rest of the family followed in the 90s: my grandparents, their cousins, siblings. My dad came to America when he was in fifth grade, growing up in Chicago and eventually moving out to Bensenville. My mom didn't move until she was twenty-one, after she got her bachelor's back in Pakistan. My family's story has shaped how I think about education. My grandparents and parents entered systems they had to learn as they went—new schools, a new country, different expectations, and opportunities that often felt hidden unless someone showed you where to look. Even though I grew up in Illinois and not Pakistan, higher education sometimes feels similar. There are unspoken rules: office hours, networking, research opportunities, internships, and building a path toward medicine. It can feel like everyone else already received an instruction manual. Because of that, I have learned to ask questions instead of pretending to understand. I ask teachers. I ask advisors. I use Google. I ask older students. And I still ask my dad. Being the child of immigrants has also changed the way I think about success. Education in my family was never treated as a personal achievement alone—it was connected to sacrifice. My mom left behind familiarity after earning her bachelor's degree in Pakistan. My dad grew up watching his family build stability from the ground up. Their experiences make me approach college with gratitude, but also responsibility: to use opportunities intentionally and create more access for others. As I enter higher education, I hope to build a career in medicine. I want to become a physician not only because I enjoy science, but because I have seen how meaningful it is when people feel understood. Growing up between cultures taught me to translate perspectives, listen before assuming, and recognize that there is more than one way to define family, health, and community. Entering higher education may sometimes feel like entering a system not built with families like mine in mind, but my family's story reminds me that unfamiliar does not mean impossible.

By the time I entered high school, I had already been exposed to substance abuse more than I should have at a young age. In middle school, vaping and drinking were surprisingly normalized among students. It was not unusual to hear about someone bringing alcohol to a gathering or vaping in the bathroom, and sometimes even during class. At the time, many students treated it like a joke or a trend, but witnessing those behaviors so early made me realize how easily harmful habits can become accepted in certain environments. Although I was never personally involved with substance use, being surrounded by it shaped the way I viewed health, decision-making, and personal responsibility. My understanding of substance abuse deepened during my sophomore year health class. Before then, I mostly saw it as students making reckless choices. However, learning about addiction helped me recognize that substance abuse is often connected to stress, mental health struggles, family environments, and social pressure. I learned about the long-term effects addiction can have on both physical and emotional health, as well as the damage it can cause within families and communities. That class changed my perspective entirely. Instead of viewing substance abuse with judgment alone, I began to understand the importance of empathy, education, and prevention. These experiences have strongly influenced my beliefs and relationships. Seeing how normalized unhealthy coping mechanisms had become among some students made me more intentional about surrounding myself with supportive friendships and positive influences. It also reinforced my belief that people, especially teenagers, need safe environments where they feel heard and supported. Many young people turn to substances because they are overwhelmed, struggling silently, or trying to fit in. Realizing this helped me become more understanding toward others instead of immediately assuming the worst about them. I now value communication, emotional support, and mental wellness far more deeply than I did when I was younger. My exposure to these issues has also influenced my career aspirations. I plan to major in biology and pursue a career in healthcare, where I hope to make a positive impact on others’ lives. Learning about substance abuse showed me how important healthcare professionals are in educating patients, supporting struggling individuals, and improving community health overall. Whether through medicine, patient care, or public health initiatives, I want to contribute to creating environments where people feel supported rather than judged. I believe prevention and education can make a meaningful difference, especially for young people who may feel pressured or alone. Although substance abuse was something I witnessed from the sidelines, those experiences had a lasting impact on me. They taught me the importance of empathy, resilience, and making thoughtful decisions even when negative influences are present. More importantly, they helped shape the person I want to become: someone who uses education and compassion to help others lead healthier and more hopeful lives.

I got interested in STEM pretty much the way most people don’t expect you to—by realizing I actually liked understanding why things happen instead of just memorizing them and moving on like nothing. Biology stood out to me in particular because it’s the one subject that connects directly to people’s lives in a real, tangible way. It’s not just cells doing their thing in a textbook—it’s how bodies heal, how diseases progress, and how small decisions in healthcare can completely change someone’s outcome. One of the biggest turning points for me was a biology class I took where the teacher had this very sarcastic, slightly chaotic teaching style (honestly carried the whole class). He was also a former biochemistry lab technician, so instead of just lecturing, he would tell us real stories from labs and break down complex ideas in a way that actually made sense. That class made me realize STEM isn’t just about being “smart”—it’s about curiosity, patience, and learning how to think through problems instead of panicking the second something gets hard. Outside the classroom, volunteering at a hospital has shaped my perspective even more. Seeing patients and families in vulnerable moments taught me that healthcare isn’t just technical knowledge—it’s empathy, communication, and presence. I’ve had conversations with people who were exhausted, scared, or just done with everything they were going through, and those moments stuck with me more than anything I’ve learned in a textbook. That’s the kind of space I want to work in someday: one where I can combine science with genuine human care. In terms of impact, I don’t have some unrealistic “change the whole world overnight” goal. I want to make healthcare feel less intimidating and more human for the people going through it. Whether that’s improving how patients are communicated with, supporting underserved communities, or just being the kind of provider who actually listens, I want people to feel seen instead of rushed through a system. Even small improvements in how care is delivered can make a huge difference in someone’s experience. As for adversity, I’ve had my fair share of moments where I questioned whether I was even capable of pursuing something in STEM. Sophomore year especially was rough—I dealt with a lot of self-doubt and the feeling that no matter how much I tried, I wasn’t doing enough. On top of that, balancing academic pressure with family expectations and my own standards sometimes felt overwhelming. Being a Desi student in a household where education is taken seriously can be motivating, but it also comes with pressure that’s hard to explain unless you’ve lived it. There were also smaller, quieter challenges—like learning how to manage stress without shutting down completely, or figuring out how to stay confident in spaces where I didn’t always feel like I fit in. But over time, I learned how to push through without letting those moments define me. Overall, STEM is the field where I feel both challenged and grounded. It pushes me, but it also gives me purpose.

While volunteering at the hospital, I learned pretty quickly that helping someone in need doesn’t always look dramatic. Sometimes it looks like standing in line at Starbucks with someone who just finished chemo, waiting for a ride, and talking about life like you’ve known each other for years. It was a normal shift at the hospital when I met an older woman who had just been discharged after chemotherapy. She was sitting in the waiting area, bundled up and visibly tired, but she still had this energy about her that made her easy to talk to. I offered to walk with her to the café downstairs while she waited for her ride, and she immediately started chatting like we were old friends. We stood in line at Starbucks, and she talked about everything except what you might expect. She wasn’t focused on the hospital or the treatment itself. Instead, she kept going on about how she didn’t have her white SUV anymore. Apparently, her family had sold it while she was in treatment, and she found it both funny and frustrating at the same time. She kept saying things like, “I go through chemo and they take my car too? At least warn me next time.” What stuck with me wasn’t just what she was saying, but how she was saying it. There was humor in it, but also this underlying exhaustion—like she had been through something heavy and was trying to find normalcy wherever she could. Standing there, I realized that sometimes people don’t need deep advice or big speeches. They just need a moment that feels normal again. So I stayed in the moment with her. I didn’t try to redirect the conversation or make it overly serious. I just listened, laughed when she laughed, and asked small questions about her day and what she used to do before all of this. It felt simple, but I could tell it mattered. She wasn’t just a patient in a system for that short time—we were just two people waiting for coffee. When her ride finally arrived, she thanked me in a way that felt way bigger than the situation. She told me I reminded her of her granddaughter and that it meant a lot to have someone walk with her instead of letting her sit alone. I didn’t really know what to say to that, so I just smiled and helped her get to the car. That moment has stayed with me because it changed how I understand helping others. I used to think support meant doing something big or fixing something. But I’ve learned that sometimes it’s just presence—showing up, listening, and making someone feel seen in a moment where everything else feels clinical or overwhelming. Volunteering at the hospital has shown me that care doesn’t always happen in treatment rooms or through medical procedures. Sometimes it happens in the smallest, most ordinary spaces—like a Starbucks line—where someone just needs a bit of humanity in the middle of everything they’re going through.

We’re living in a time where you can text someone across the world in seconds, FaceTime your friend while they’re in another country, and still somehow feel like nobody is actually talking to each other. It’s kind of ironic. We’ve built more ways to connect than ever before, and yet people still feel isolated in spaces that are technically “full.” To me, the future of human connection isn’t about choosing between technology and real relationships. It’s about figuring out how to use technology without letting it replace the things that actually make relationships meaningful: presence, empathy, and intention. A lot of communication now is fast, but shallow. We react instead of respond. We “like” instead of listen. And while that sounds dramatic, it does change how we relate to each other over time. It becomes easier to scroll past people than to sit with them, easier to send a quick message than to have a real conversation that takes effort. But at the same time, I don’t think technology is the villain here. It’s more like a tool we’re still learning how to use without losing ourselves in it. Some of the most meaningful connections I’ve seen in my own life actually exist because of technology, not in spite of it. Group chats that keep friends together through stressful school years. Messages checking in on someone after a hard day. Even school organizations using group platforms to organize events and bring people together who might not have met otherwise. These aren’t “fake” connections. They’re just modern ones. During COVID-19, I wasn’t able to see my friends in person, so our only connection was honestly Roblox of all things. It sounds kind of silly, but it became our space to hang out when everything else was shut down. Once middle school started up, I wasn’t able to talk with my best friend, Aleksandra, as much since we didn’t share any classes and naturally started making different friends. Even then, we found our way back to each other in high school through social media, reconnecting in a way that still felt familiar despite the time apart. Experiences like that made it pretty clear to me that technology doesn’t really replace relationships—it just changes how they survive distance. And what makes them real is still the same thing it’s always been: effort. In my own experiences in leadership roles and service organizations, I’ve learned that connection doesn’t happen passively. Whether I’m working with classmates in student council, participating in community service through clubs, or helping organize events in cultural organizations, I’ve seen that people don’t remember every detail of what you do. They remember how you made them feel included, heard, and respected. That part doesn’t change just because the tools do. Going forward, I think the challenge is making sure technology supports those kinds of relationships instead of replacing them. That might look like using platforms to organize real-life service projects instead of just virtual engagement. It might mean being more intentional about how we communicate, making space for deeper conversations instead of only surface-level updates. And honestly, it might also mean knowing when to put the phone down and just exist in a moment with people. As someone who plans to pursue a career in medicine, I think about this a lot. Healthcare is not just science and diagnosis—it is communication at its core. Patients don’t just need treatment; they need to feel understood. They need someone who can explain, listen, and connect in a way that builds trust. Even the most advanced technology in medicine can’t replace that human layer of care. In the future, I hope human connection becomes something we protect more intentionally instead of something we assume will just happen. Technology will keep evolving, that’s unavoidable. But the quality of our relationships will depend on whether we choose convenience over depth, speed over sincerity, and noise over understanding. If we get it right, technology won’t weaken human connection—it’ll expand it. But only if we remember that at the center of every message, call, or screen, there is still a person who wants to be seen, heard, and understood. And honestly, that part has never changed.