Participating in YYGS was a very different experience from my daily life. It was great to meet new people from different countries–I got to know and learn more about different cultures and answered many questions that I had. I definitely felt like I had a second home.
YYGS taught me a new way to learn, more than memorising information from a textbook. I met the cross disciplinary approach which taught me how to critically analyse things for myself. Instead of being told what to think, I was taught how to reach meaningful conclusions on my own and explore my questions. YYGS has changed my perspective in many ways, and I desire to share this new approach to the world with whoever I meet.
YYGS showed me how diverse STEM is and how different fields overlap to answer a single question. Out of all the fields that are part of STEM, YYGS helped me understand that my passion is math and computer science. One of my favorite seminars,”Cryptography and Cybersecurity,” gave me the motivation and eagerness to learn more about computer science and explore many fields of it.
The most memorable part of the program was the opportunity to meet and collaborate with students from around the world. I was able to gain insight into their cultures and perspectives, which was incredibly rewarding. Additionally, I was able to make friends from all over the world, many of whom I still keep in touch with.
I had the opportunity to learn about concepts and topics I had never seen before, anywhere. Due to my session, I was able to know people with a lot of different fields of interest, nevertheless, they all shared a relentless desire to be agents of change in our current world and that was key to igniting the same spark they had in myself.
When applying to YYGS, I puzzled out a familiar motif from the myriad of testimonials I listened to: “You’ll find a family in YYGS.” Six months after the program ended, I can testify to that. I can confidently say that I’ve made lifelong friends with whom I’m still in contact. YYGS gave me the opportunity to be surrounded by the most diverse community I could ever imagine. One of the more unforeseen skills I gained through YYGS is being a time-zone teller; my family was made up of brilliant people from South Korea, Hungary, Turkmenistan, Ethiopia, Amman, India, and the US.
Students were also able to reimagine their learning and the environment around them thanks to the lecture and seminar themes covered in the program. This provided my classmates and I with the exceptional opportunity to simultaneously learn, unlearn, and relearn both old and new concepts.
YYGS has indeed changed my outlook on life–most importantly the academic side. Since I come from a country where people usually focus on science instead of literature and philosophy, I was shocked at how much fun it was to get into these subjects! I am still a STEM woman, but I believe YYGS has encouraged me to take a philosophy course in college.
I met amazing instructors and students from all over the world and had a memorable family time with our instructor, Maddy. I am never going to forget the “Trash Class” where we were challenged to categorize trash in our local communities and come do a presentation with pictures on how we understood the Trash subject. YYGS has been one of my most amazing summer experiences in 2022.
My favorite seminars were the ones on abolition with my animator, Nia Campinha-Bacote. I took into account what we were doing during classes and after the program I became more interested in the topic of abolition. It was interesting that I could also compare situations in different countries. We talked about equality, but not only in America. We compared prisons in different countries, noticing a big difference. Our classes were really exciting and informative.
