Life At Its Best

Entering into my junior year of high school was a big change. I was finally one of the upperclassmen, and nobody could tell me what to do anymore. I moved on from basic general studies, to more advanced classes, and I was starting to think about my future. In my first two years of high school, I didn't work to the best of my ability. As I entered the high school ready to star my third year, I knew it was time to change.

The first class of the day was chemistry, and I was ready to accept the challenge that was ahead of me. The first impression I had on my teacher, was that he was difficult. However, after a while I started to go into help sessions, and I developed a better teacher student relationship. The help sessions helped me grasp chemistry, and make me realize how much I really loved science. The study habits I used in chemistry, I carried over to all of my other classes, allowing my grades to rise.

As I entered my senior year, I decided I was going to try even harder than the year before. Once again, I had the same teacher that I had in chemistry in physics. Physics was my favorite class throughout the year, and ultimately  it was this class that helped me decide my major. When March rolled around, it was time for five students out of the physics class to travel to Houston, Texas for the NASA Space Settlement Design Competition. When I found out that I was one of the five chosen, my life changed. When we arrived at Johnson Space Center and divided into our settlement groups I found my calling in the Automation/Robot Design group. Here I designed futuristic computer systems for our space settlement, and I ended up being one of the main spokespeople for my group. I presented my idea's in front of famous NASA engineers, and it was one of the greatest experiences in my life.

On the eighteen hour bus ride home, I started to rethink the field of study I would take up at Iowa State. Eventually, I came to the conclusion that I wanted to be a computer engineer. To this day, I still honor the decision I made on the way home from the NASA trip. This was a pivotal moment that marked the end of two of the greatest years of my life before I started college.