I helped with purchasing, serving, and decorating. Promote our celebration in the school and spread multiculturalism to the school.

I've been selected again to be a dorm prefect this year. Service others and being responsible to my floormates.

Before I went to help out at the Greater Cleveland Food Bank, I was really curious. I wondered what it would be like and how so many different people could work together to help the poor. When I got there, it was cool to see how much of a difference we could make when we all worked together. Everyone was super supportive and focused on helping out. This whole experience made me see things differently. I now understand how important it is to help out in your community and how awesome it feels to be part of something that’s making a real difference. It’s made me want to keep finding ways to help out communities that are around the school.

We went to Cuyahoga National Park, and we set up different stations to service those bike riders.

I've been selected to be a dorm prefect in my junior year. Service others and being responsible to my floormates.

Throughout my six years at Gilmour Academy, I have fully understood the true purpose of serving others and the special joy in this process through different volunteer services. From preparing for cultural festivals and running the student coffee shop, to helping students in the dorm and assisting the local community, I've had many experiences that have taught me to discover the true nature of justice and compassion in my daily life. These experiences have inspired me not only to be a volunteer, but also to be a listener and a multicultural bridge.

One of the most transformative experiences for me was the school's Chinese New Year celebration. As an international student from China, I used to think that in order to integrate into the country, I had to hide my culture. But it wasn't until the annual Chinese New Year celebration that this feeling was turned upside down. I was involved in sourcing, decorating, and promoting the event, welcoming students and teachers from all backgrounds to sample hot pots, play games, and ask questions. In the process, I wasn't just sharing culture, but I was also building empathy and creating space for cross-cultural joy. In that moment, I felt that all the service I was doing was meaningful. Instead of simply offering something to someone, we created an environment of mutual respect and belonging. We weren’t just giving. We were learning from each other. It was then that I began to understand Gilmour's statement that “hospitality as a charm”. It's not just about being hospitable. It's about building community.

Another transformative moment of my service journey at Gilmour was my role as a Dorm Prefect, where I found meaningful ways to bring joy, comfort, and support to others in a shared living space. A week before school started, I needed to come back earlier than others to welcome new students for move-in, helping them adapt to dorm life by sharing room organization tips and encouraging them to keep common areas clean. I made it a priority to build connections between floormates by organizing off-campus activities, such as trips to Cleveland Cavaliers games, which allowed us to unwind together and form deeper bonds. As the year progressed, I became a trusted peer resource, offering advice on difficult AP classes, study techniques, and navigating different teaching styles. Through consistent communication and an inclusive spirit, I created an environment where students felt supported not only academically, but emotionally and socially. Our dorm became more than just a place to sleep. It became a source of happiness and belonging. I understood that service isn’t only about helping people who needed, but also about maintaining a culture where everyone feels valued and seen. This role taught me that justice and compassion are not limited to grand gestures; they often live in the quiet, daily efforts to make someone else’s day a little better.

My understanding of service and justice was also deeply shaped by a moment when I was the one in need. When I was a junior, one day at midnight, I dislocated my shoulder on my bed. So, I called the dorm director, Mr. Brown, who had to drive from home back to the dorm and wake up my floor proctor. They called the school sports trainer and stood around me to help reset my shoulder. I will never forget that night when my shoulder popped out and my body started to shake because of the physiological response. Mr. Brown stood on my bed, Ponce was holding my back, and Kara was on the phone during the mid of the night. The whole experience was hilarious. After I had surgery, everyone in the school had special treatment for me. My friends would help me carry my schoolbag to the classroom, bring me smoothies, and check in on my recovery. This experience taught me that service is a mutual relationship, built on empathy and care, and that true justice is present when a community instinctively surrounds someone with support in their most vulnerable moments.

Running the Sip O' Som coffee shop was another unexpected way I explored justice through entrepreneurship. In the beginning, it was just a simple on-campus student-run business, but it quickly became an opportunity for me to explore leadership, collaboration, and justice through a real-world lens. From the outside, it may have looked like just another beverage serving and snack store. But behind every product we offered was a team of passionate students working to foster community, inclusion, and student voice. When I first joined, I was involved in everything from inventory tracking and customer feedback to event planning and budgeting. I worked side-by-side with senior students and a faculty mentor, and together, we constantly evaluated how to make our service better. Nowadays, Sip O’ Som has become a safe space. It isn’t just about caffeine. It is about connection and helping students to find belonging in a sometimes unfamiliar environment.

In the last speech class, Ms. Ryan asked us to give a speech about what we would take after graduating. My answer will be the mindset that service is not a one-time task, but a lifelong way of seeing and engaging with the world. That justice isn’t about being the hero in someone else’s story, but about creating new stories and leading with love when people around us are misterying or in need.

I started to work in the SOS last semester. This is my first time to involve in a real business. I experienced everything about the SOS and realized how complex it is to run a business. I spent a lot of time preparing and the setup for SOS, every time after a shop, we would gather and talk about what can we do to improve our service and get our program better.

Our soccer team went to a community church to help them clear up their garden. We move the mulch cover the weeds.

That is a Chinese festival called Mid Autumn Festival. We have hot pop in the dorm. I help  the party prepare the food, set the party, serve other students in the party and clean after the party.