The first time I picked up a camera was in sixth grade during my yearbook elective class.  Working with such an intricate device delighted me, and the fact that I could capture my middle school memories...

Doljabi is a Korean tradition held on a baby’s first birthday, where the parents place an array of objects in front of the child, and the child's choice foretells their future. For mine, my parents placed...

“Mr. Li’s daughter.”  For most of high school, this was typically the first thing people knew about me. Teachers recognized my last name on their class roster before the school year began. Students...

I used to fill every quiet moment. Music in one ear. A podcast in the other. There was always some sort of background noise. Silence just felt awkward — almost like something I needed to fix. Then,...

I joined journalism hoping to find my voice in writing. Instead, I was handed a camera and told to find everyone else’s. When I first took Journalism 1 in my sophomore year, I thought I knew what...

Planning ahead has never really been my thing.  If you looked at my desk, you’d probably be able to tell: Papers stacked everywhere, tabs open across multiple screens and notes in random places....

Since I was 5 years old, music has been engraved into my life as my main outlet for creativity, so for years, I thought I had developed my artistry to its fullest potential. However, when I began to get...

Room 138 is what I like to call my sanity haven.  This sacred space — though unexpected — became my high school sweetheart. This room, which I initially viewed as just another class with white...

“She won’t talk.” As my second-grade teacher situated my parents by her desk and expressed her concerns, I stood afar, staring blankly into the fish tank by the door.  I saw many breathtakingly...

Going into high school, I thought I had it all figured out. I knew exactly which friends I would hang out with, that I wasn’t athletic and that I was a shy, quiet girl who kept to herself. But...

I learned to balance my days by splitting them into two — early afternoons holding Biology club lectures on cell regulation and late nights in Room 138 editing leads for The Accolade’s quarterly magazines....

Times New Roman, 12 point font. Bolded black and underlined, they always stood out against the rest of my writing.  The yellow bubbles and the mounting number of comments always stared back at me as...