Harvard Summer School Program
Summer After: 10th Grade This was a seven-week program at Harvard University in which I took college-level courses in introductory microeconomics and public speaking. I chose to take microeconomics because I believed that gaining a basic understanding of the topic was a natural step towards understanding business. While microeconomics is a subject that describes many concepts primarily in theory, Professor Kasemi and his team did a great job of relating these ideas to real world examples and thereby lending credence to the theories. It was this explanation of real phenomenon through more abstract economics concepts that I found most interesting. I took public speaking because I felt that it is a very vital facet to strong leadership. From the course, I learned a very great deal about speech content and organization; the preparation, practice, and feedback/improvement process; vocal and gestural presentational techniques; and methods of overcoming to speaking tics. By working with Professor Remo Airaldi in multiple one-on-one sessions, I was able to develop and refine my speaking style tremendously. Each of the students gave six speeches over the course of the class. By having so many speaking opportunities, my confidence in getting up and speaking increased immensely. I received A-’s in both classes.
Youth Citizenship Seminar
Summer After: 11th Grade
This five-day program at Pepperdine University consisted mainly of presentations by a total of 15 speakers, many of whom were professional motivational speakers, though each had nuances that made him/her stand out. Others were experts in their field, like economics or politics. My favorite speaker was Mike Rayburn, a professional guitarist and speaker. Through music and recounting of personal experiences, he communicated his main theme, which was to ask “What if?” about things that seem impossible. Overall, I drew quite a lot of inspiration from the speakers. Yet I feel the most valuable part of the program for me came from the other students. Many, if not most of them came from greatly different backgrounds from me, many of them growing up with much less privilege than me. Many of them had had to overcome terrible hardships—chronic depression, bullying, substance abuse my family members, fatal diseases that their parents suffered, even one boy who had been raped as a toddler. It was very humbling listening to these stories, but at the same time just as inspiring. Even under these circumstances, these students had become high achievers academically, become leaders and activists at their schools and in their communities, become determined to turn their lives around through education. Everyone in the student body at the program was very supportive of one another, and it made for a very memorable and meaningful experience.
Boys State
Summer After: 11th This seven-day program at Sacramento State University focused on model government on the city, county, and state levels, allowed me to build my knowledge of a field I know little about, namely government. I ran for my county’s treasurer position in a mock election and won the vote 130-56. Boys State was a very unique and enjoyable experience in that it fostered competition but at the same time encouraged great patriotism, companionship,and teamwork. Most importantly it was also really fun. Everyone in my city of 34 delegates (the entire program had over 1000) and two counselors became very close by the end of the week, which was not common among all the student cities, but which made the program really enjoyable for me.
Jerome Fischer Management and Technology Summer Institute
Summer After: 11th This three-week program at the University of Pennsylvania integrated studies of business (mainly on the startup and venture capital level) with those of engineering. On the business side, we attended lectures given chiefly by Jeffrey Babin, a teacher at Wharton. We listened to a variety of guest speakers, from venture capitalists to entrepreneurs who ran startups themselves to Michael Grimes, the man who was in charge of the Google and Facebook initial public offerings at Morgan Stanley. On the Engineering side, we learned combined programming and electrical engineering; mechanical engineering and applied mechanics; bioengineering; and material science and engineering. We also listened to presentations by a variety of professors from the Penn school of engineering and applied sciences, each from a different field, to give us a taste or an idea of what that major was all about.
The most important aspect of the academic part of the program was the team project. Our program of fifty-five kids was split into ten teams. Each team had to develop and actually produce an invention, develop a business plan for it, and give a presentation on the final day to students, teachers, and parents. My team developed presSole, a shoe insole designed to measure pressure distribution to identify whether a runner is running with improper technique that may cause pain or injury. My team ultimately won best prototype and best overall product. I received an A in the program.
Uni-President Securities Corporation
Summers After: 8th,9th For three weeks each of my rising freshman and sophomore summers, I interned at a branch of a securities company in Tainan, Taiwan in order to expand on my interest in business by gaining some basic knowledge and experience in the field of investments. Over the two summers, I shadowed numerous employees at the firm, learning about stocks, bonds, commodities, and other securities products, and I was introduced to different methods of analyzing occurrences on the stock market. I also studied the profiles and business models of twelve companies and observed their stock performance.
ASE Global (Advanced Semiconductor Engineering)
Summers After: 8th,9th I interned at the Taipei World Trade Center headquarters of ASE Global, a semiconductor company, for four weeks of each of two summers, again pursuing my interest in the field of business. There, I focused on corporate accounting and resource management. As part of the accounting team, I helped to communicate with subsidiaries to compile, adjust, and finalize the company’s monthly financial statement. I also visited a number of the company’s semiconductor factories, where I was introduced to every aspect of the assembly process and observed how managers oversaw the entire operation and controlled quality.
