With the overwhelming pace of technological and societal developments in the past century, every generation has grown up in an entirely different world than the last—each group of individuals with unique perspectives and approaches to the challenges the world puts before them. If every generation had the same ideals, I am willing to bet we wouldn't have anything close to the massive innovations in medicine, communication, infrastructure, and beyond that make up the qualities of our lives that many of us are so fortunate to have today. The Ode To Millennials-Gen Z text offers a particularly optimistic yet realistic perspective on generational gaps. It is fascinating to see the parallels between today's world and the world that once was in the 1930s, with a failing economic system and global discord. On a planet that is metaphorically, and almost literally, crumbling beneath us, we are in desperate need of new ideas. To improve the state of our world, we need more than ever to join forces. Young and old, baby boomers and millennials, Generation X and Generation Z. We live in a melting pot filled with people from different worlds and that fact should be taken advantage of. I firmly believe in "The Greatest Generation 2.0", but I know we can't do this alone. Getting past the turmoil of "our way" and "their way" is the key to a brighter future.

Since I was a child, I have been very interested in engineering. One of my first designs was a massage helmet (a football helmet with a vibrating toy tied to it). Some may call it laziness, but I have always been passionate about finding any way to make a task more manageable. This could be a device to disperse water to rinse two plates at once or put a phone and a camera in a robot so I could bother my parent's friends from the comfort of my bunk bed. When I entered public school for the first time in 8th grade, after seven years of being homeschooled, I met a teacher I would have for five consecutive years and the best teacher I have ever had the privilege of knowing. Mrs. Elsasser is the engineering teacher at William Henry Harrison High School; she is very kindhearted and pushes all her students to be the best they can be. Over my years with her, she was able to blossom my love for engineering and design. She always supported me and my interests with fun hands-on projects like building sumo-bots and automated carnival games. In my junior year of high school, I took AP human geography. The topic of food deserts mentioned during the course was fascinating and concerning. In urban areas specifically, many people don't have access to affordable groceries, mainly because small local grocery stores worldwide are run out of business by their highly profitable supermarket competitors in higher-income neighborhoods, causing the unintentional marginalization of lower-income communities. During my senior year of high school, I was tasked with determining a topic for a research paper for AP capstone research. My concern surrounding food deserts still lingered in my mind, so I began to search for possible solutions I could engineer. During this research of countless academic journals, I discovered the concept of hydroponics. Hydroponics are methods of farming that, instead of using soil, suspend plants above a cycling nutrient solution to provide the minerals they would otherwise get from the soil. I noticed that hydroponics is almost always on an immense industrial scale or a costly novelty item. So, with the information I gathered, I combined my passion for engineering and concern for food deserts to conduct my research on an agricultural engineering design for an inexpensive, small-scale hydroponic system optimized for use in urban food deserts. While doing this research, I discovered how soil farming uses around 20 times more water than hydroponics because 80% of the water used for soil farming is entirely lost, not to be absorbed by any plants. I also found out that the world's freshwater supply is estimated to run out by 2050. This estimate is terrifying. I realized that what I was researching had far more underlying importance than just urban food deserts. The widespread use of hydroponics could potentially supplement the diets of millions living in food deserts and significantly decrease the world's overall freshwater usage. I designed a semi-autonomous small-scale in-home hydroponic sustenance system during my senior year. Afterward, I built a fully functioning prototype based on market research from low-income individuals living in urban food deserts. With more education, I want to expand my research and find ways to optimize my design, find the cheapest efficient materials possible, mass produce, market and distribute the design. Not only have I proved that it could significantly improve the quality of life, health, and overall diets of individuals living in food deserts, but the normalized usage of the design in households and businesses could significantly reduce highly concerning environmental issues.

Growing up in Harrison, Ohio, was fulfilling. Watching the same 5.32 square miles grow smaller is a bizarre experience. As you grow old, giant gaps become small cracks, and scary old people become friendly science teachers. This phenomenon has followed me during my entire experience of growing up. A certain painful coincidence, in particular, put the small size of my hometown in perspective. One warm spring afternoon after school in 8th grade, I was going on a bike ride. It wasn't unlike every other bike ride I take on most afternoons, coasting along the same few blocks of sidewalk near my house, enjoying the fresh air away from my smelly peers. I was pedaling across the wall of a small building in a parking lot when an unanticipated obstacle reached the corner at precisely the exact moment I did. Unfortunately, this obstacle was an older woman also enjoying a bike ride. We were unharmed and apologetic. What were the odds of the two of us biking into the same spot simultaneously? It may have been an odd dot for me to connect, but this event led me to think about how much more significance I have in this small town (geographically and population-wise) than in most other places. Mathematically, I am 610,734 times more significant in Harrison compared to the whole world. This number truly highlights the importance of being part of a tight-knit community. This thought made me realize that to change the world, you first need to make a difference in more minor ways and work your way up, making more extensive and significant differences over time. This starts with simply doing nice things for the people around you. This realization and the influence of many kind-hearted people I have met in this small town helped nurture me into the kind, compassionate person I consider myself today. Someday in the future, I hope to give back to my lovely community by providing medical technology. I plan to design medical technology for several purposes, whether they're new types of medicine or physical therapy devices. I plan to get a degree in biomedical engineering and focus on developing affordable and personalized medical technology. I would also love to partake in volunteer opportunities such as planting trees, packing free lunches, or picking up trash in parks. With the love this town has given me during my upbringing, its inhabitants deserve that same love, care, and respect.

To date, my most outstanding achievement is completing a 4500-word academic research paper and finding a possible method of feeding low-income individuals living in urban food deserts. I took a class my senior year of high school called AP Research. Since I was also taking Engineering Design and Development, I was also required to design and build a prototype with my research. At the beginning of the year, this task seemed incredibly daunting, especially with the numerous difficult classes I had on my schedule. We were required to choose our research topic. After brainstorming, I decided to research determining a sustainable farming system for low-income individuals living in urban food deserts. I recalled watching videos about a type of gardening called hydroponics in a geography class I had taken. The concept of hydroponics was fascinating to me, so I decided to learn more about it and find a way to design an affordable small-scale hydroponic system. I spent countless hours scouring academic journals about the infrastructural issues surrounding food deserts and different types of hydroponic systems. I had found adequate evidence to justify my research and found the direction I wanted my design to follow, but at the same time, I had no idea what I was doing. All I had ever done was write argumentative essays that were a page or two, but this project was a whole new beast. I had spent most of my high school career being relatively passive, never really asking teachers for additional help, but for me to go in the right direction, that had to change. Eventually, I asked my instructor for some advice. He did a great job not directly telling me what to do but guiding me in the right direction to figure it out myself. Thanks to his help, I figured out that I knew all along how to use the research I found to support and guide my prototype and experiment design. By the end of the year, I had a fully functioning prototype along with 4500 words of detailed research. Just a few months before, I had difficulty imagining the level of success I had achieved with the project. In doing this project, I learned how much I was capable of and that when I ask questions and remain persistent, I have no reason to doubt myself. I am very fortunate to have had this experience at such a young age. It will undoubtedly shape my future and prepare me for any difficult situation I may encounter in the future.

My favorite hobby is creating music. Over time, I have made a makeshift music studio in my bedroom, complete with many instruments, a microphone stand, sound panels, and a comfy chair. Writing music gives me a sense of purpose and individuality. It is fulfilling to come home and know I have several musical projects to work on created entirely by me and are inherently a reflection of my identity. I know for a fact this hobby will last a lifetime because there will always be new concepts to learn and master, whether it's mixing and mastering, strange new effect plugins, or finding unique sounds to make drum beats out of. Someday I hope to release a full-length album, complete with lyrical content. Writing lyrics for songs has been highly therapeutic. It is oftentimes difficult to understand what I am thinking and feeling, but something about turning those complex thoughts into music helps me to understand them. I hope that someday those lyrics can help other people to feel understood and even better understand themselves.

Calculus lays the foundation for advanced physics principles necessary for all STEM-related disciplines. Notably, our understanding of flying machines, computers, lasers, and many more highly valuable scientific breakthroughs would be inaccurate and incomplete without applying calculus. In addition to these tangible benefits, calculus also provides STEM students with a continuous increase in problem-solving abilities through its abstract concepts and connection to the real world.