As part of my graduation from high school I had to complete a total of 60 service hours for the totality of my high school career. I completed this mostly by helping young kids learn at a library summer camp. I also got involved, and I’m still involved in, helping with my neighbors’ lawn care or watching their pets when they go for vacation. Finally, I have also helped tutor other students who are struggling, which has been my main contribution to the Ohio State community in my time here.

I have helped fellow classmates and friends alike to understand concepts which they may have not completely understood. My proficiency in math and economics were of great use here. On top of this my club got involved in service by teaching financial literacy to people in the Columbus area. We worked with a local alumnus who had experience with these types of presentations and formed our own take. In the future I plan to continue to aid the community in the ways previously mentioned and to hopefully take full advantage of service opportunities sponsored by organizations I am a part of, whether that be professional or religious.

Currently I am involved in two active clubs on campus, the Undergraduate Economics Society (UES) and the Casual Sports Club. I am the treasurer of UES and a longtime member of Casual Sports Club, this means that in both settings I am often trusted with managing a group of people whether it be talking about my club, getting a gam started or coordinating purchases for a club event. I also work as a grader in the Economics department and have to proctor tests, which means that I am in charge of a room of students and have to ensure they are well informed and follow the rules.

I have had many group projects and taken on a leadership role in more than a few of those group projects. With all of this experience I have learned how to communicate with others what I expect and how to hold intercourse about what should or should not happen.

I have actually already put these skills to work in a workplace environment. Last summer I worked as an intern at Safe Auto and collaborated with the other interns to name the program. I lead the team created most of the proposed names, organizing meetings, organizing name voting and putting together the naming presentation meant to be presented to the CEO and other managers. In the end we even decided to use one of the names I suggested. I have learned how to deal with unexpected results and how to work within diverse group settings. In a business setting it is commonly expected for employees to work together, therefore these experiences have prepared me for all of the continued group work I will embark on the professional world ahead.

Throughout my academic career I have prided myself on challenging myself with intense coursework. My membership in the honors college is proof enough of this. I entered college with many AP credits enabling me to take 2 minors in addition to my major. Over the course of my college time I have found a passion for data analysis, and thus I have chosen my major and minors accordingly. Economics is defined as the study of decision making, data analysis is a tool used to improve and inform the decisions we make, so majoring in economics is definitely insightful into data analysis. The data analysis techniques I will have to use are also heavily based in math, so minoring in math has given me a much deeper understanding of the techniques, rather than just letting the computer do it for me. Finally, getting the numbers right is all well and good but if you can’t communicate your insights you will not go as far as you hope in the business world. So, to better understand the business world and the expectations of analysts in the business world, I decided to add a business analytics minor as well.

I have taken honors college approved GE courses and challenging math and economics courses and have not had a single grade below an A-. My incorporation of numerous high-level courses and complementary course work show my willingness to push myself and my forethought for my future life. I have always had the drive to push myself further and Ohio State has been a great place to do that and I believe so far I have pushed myself to achieve the most I can.

In almost every economics class I’ve taken I have had to write a research paper; therefore, I am well-seasoned in reading economic research and writing my own. For example, I have had to write research papers in the economic format for research on the informal economy, the effectiveness of charter schools and do my own research and data analysis on the impact of geographic region on student outcomes.

However, my research experience doesn’t end here in my sociology class a classmate and I had to pick a social experiment and study it and report our findings, my partner and I studied how people interact on public transportation, having to ride the bus for about half an hour 3 separate times and collect observations. This research paper also included an extensive literature review. I plan to use the research skills I have collected in my preferred job as a data analyst. In data analysis context is key, so doing adequate research is necessary in order to fully understand the context and do a good analysis. In order to do the best I can, I have been trying to learn more coding languages to aid in doing research on things that aren’t readily available on the internet and are encoded into databases and web pages.

Coming into college I felt I already had more experience than most with global studies given the fact that I have been lucky enough to visit Europe on three different occasions. My family and I have visited Ireland, Span and Italy and on all three trips I learned so much about those countries and how they differed from America. However, what was more surprising was how those countries were so similar, at least in the metropolitan areas. Here in the cities, globalization is most notable, with recognizable fast food chains and many tourist-based attractions and the fact that many people speak English even if it isn’t their first language.

In college I also learned more about other countries from both my coursework and fellow students. When students from different backgrounds gave their point of view in class discussion it was always interesting to hear how they connected with the content differently than I did. One example of learning from others is how I learned more about Palestine and their struggles through in-depth conversations with one of my friends in a Palestinian life on film class. Finally, the last source of added global awareness is talking with my fellow executive board members in my club. We have a diverse e-board so hearing about the different experiences growing up, and relationship structures in Chinese and Indian families was very informative. I hope I can continue to find people of diverse backgrounds who I can connect with so that my knowledge base of other communities can grow and so that I can better connect with people from that community in the future.