Erik – future engineer

I love studying math and science and do really well in those subjects in school. I also love taking things apart and building things. My parents let me put a chicken coop together all by myself, which was lots of fun. So, when I grow up, I know that I want to be some kind of engineer. I really wish I could be a basketball player in the NBA, but that's not very realistic. I like to play basketball and I'm pretty good, but it seems that I should use my brain power and my skills in math and science to have a career in engineering. One of my favorite people, my grandfather, was a Chemical Engineer. He even gave me some very interesting things from when he was in college way before there were calculators and computers. I have his slide rule sitting on my desk in my room. He likes to talk about the neat stuff he worked on when he was younger, and he makes it seem fun and interesting, so I want to be an engineer... maybe even one who designs medical devices and equipment since I like to build things and it would be very nice to build things that would help people feel better. I study very hard so that I have really good grades so I can be an engineer; I work very hard in my math and science classes so that I understand everything. I am hoping to be an engineer and at the same time get to help people!

Erik's essay appears here as written, to preserve the young author’s unique voice and individual writing style. However, we have deleted personally identifiable information to protect the student’s privacy.