Summer Camps
I’ve attended two summer camps: Biology at Choate Rosemary Hall for two weeks in 2024 and Robotics at Philips Andover Academy for five weeks in 2025. Both were very educational and fun! I learned a lot about friendship and the ability to live alone in a dorm at Choate, and learned more about friendship and the resilience in robotics at Andover.
At Choate, I gained the ability of living away from home for two weeks. I had to figure everything out by myself and at first I struggled in balancing time between hanging out with my friends and doing my homework before the lights were off. The condition also wasn’t as great. There was only a small fan in my dorm room to keep it cool, which of course, didn’t work, and I didn’t get much sleep for the first week due to the heat. I made many close friends and four of us decided to meet each other again at Andover summer next year. I learned so much about marine biology and different types of sea creatures. I also made a song called Party in the S.E.A with my partner in a project. The two weeks passed in a flash, and I didn’t get enough time to explore the campus fully, but I still remember the pingpong tables, the boba shop, and the pool table, which are the places we spend a lot of our time in.
As you can see, robotics has caused me much frustration and tears, but some of the funniest highlights of the year come from it too! For example, one team was having a conflict with another team for accidentally sitting on the arm of their robot. They were all shouting “DQ!” I was hearing the conversation from a distance and instantly thought of the ice-cream Dairy Queen. Confused, I asked my classmates and he said it stood for disqualification. The look he gave me was also hilarious. Another time was when we were talking about Mac & Cheese. One of my friends has never heard of it, and thought it was some type of burger from McDonalds with a lot of cheese. We all laughed it out, and honestly, I thought her explanation was pretty reasonable. That definitely made my day!
This summer, I took a robotics course at Andover because I wanted to learn something new. We were put into teams of three and challenged to build a robot that could compete in matches on the final day. When starting, two of my teammates, who were very enthusiastic about building, told me to go collect the materials. I had entered the material room thinking that I only had to grab a few screws and nuts. Easy right? But as every group started getting their materials, I was still in the room, very confused about which screws out of the 32 different kinds had the correct length and head.
On the day of the competition, our robot did fairly well in the first two matches but sadly lost the third one. I was very depressed and went outside to cry off my mascara, but returned with a positive attitude to cheer on the surviving teams. Needless to say, we did not win the tournament, but the experience taught me a lot about courage and resilience, especially when trying something brand new. Though my robot did not place as the best one in the class, it is always the best one in my heart.
These summer sessions have been very important in my personal growth, teaching me various lessons in resilience, independence, and collaboration. At Choate, I learned how to navigate life away from home as well as balancing friendships and responsibilities while adapting to the environment without air conditioning. At Andover, robotics pushed me out of my comfort zone. And despite the setbacks, I grew more confident and developed a strong sense of determination. Both camps expanded my knowledge and showed me how to find joy even in difficult situations. I am very grateful to both experiences and thankful to everyone who helped make it such a great time!
The following week, I made many mistakes. I put screws in the wrong bar when building the robot. When told to record a journal, I wrote a diary on my day instead of making notes of the pros and cons of our robot. These setbacks caused me to be less confident and more quiet in the makerspace than in the outside world. However, I did not give up. I worked especially hard during the following weeks, spending my break time by the table, asking questions to my fellow classmates and teachers. The resilience I showed definitely helped in building my robot as well as building my confidence.