I am from Poway, California and I have lived there my whole life. For the past three years, I have been attending VMI.  There are a few reasons why I chose to come to VMI. The first reason is because I wanted to get away from home. I wanted to become independent and travel to expand my breadth of experiences. The second reason is because I did not want to make a decision that I would regret in the future. I had offers from other schools, however, VMI would be an experience that I wouldn’t be able to get anywhere else. I want to serve in the military and VMI is an opportunity for me to pursue the military and further my academic career. Currently, I am working on a degree in Biology with a focus in plants. At VMI, I am part of the Horticulture club, and the 1st platoon sergeant for Bravo Company. During High School, I ran Cross Country and Track and was a part of Key Club. (!)

In the future, I want to pursue a masters and go to graduate school for Biology. I want to attend a school on the west Coast because I want to experience a different college atmosphere. This will be during or after my time in the military. During my time in the military, I hope to go to Ranger school and infantry school. After my contract has ended with the army, I wish to transfer to the Marine Corps and become an infantry officer. I plan to stay in the military for as long as possible. My back up plan for if things do not go as planned is to enlist in the Marine Corps. (#)

I enjoy going out and experiencing nature and getting away from technology. Some things I like to do are going to the gym, watch anime, people watch, and learning. Also, I have a pet moss ball named Chad. I used to play the violin, however, I stopped once I started going to VMI. I used to cook a bit when I was home and my favorite thing to cook was pasta. I have travelled to many other countries when I was about 11. I have been to Mexico, Germany, Taiwan, Austria, England, and France.($)

I want to be known as a person who leads by example. After going to this school for 2 years, I have observed a lot of different types of leaders and the ones that inspired me most are the ones who lead with humility. I hope I can be a person that people look up too and trust while also being knowledgeable. I want people to see me as a person that loves to learn new things. Most my ideals are focused on trying the be the best Marine officer I can. (%)

I have thought about this a lot the past few weeks. This image captures my thoughts of leadership quite well. There seems to be two types of leadership that I have adopted, however, they are opposite in nature. They try to achieve the same goal of leading and inspiring people to learn new skills. Just as this picture portrays, a mix of 2 different things that make up one figure. The leadership style that I aspire to is to lead with humility and to lead by example. I seek to inspire others with my action and hard work. This can be portrayed in the image as the half that is a princess. However, when on the ratline, I lead with an adversarial approach, which I don’t prefer. This is because screaming at a person’s face doesn’t make them want to follow you into battle. This can be portrayed in the other half of the image portrayed by a King. (^)