Undergraduate / "We are not like white people - she can endure this." NYU Supplement (Transfer student) [3]

NYU is global, urban, inspired, smart, connected, and bold. What can NYU offer you, and what can you offer NYU? (200-400 words)

"We are not like white people - she can endure this."
My mother shot her eye wide open, tightened her lips, and locked her jaw shut. Check mate. Her impermeable stubbornness won.
My battles with my mother were recurrent throughout the winter of my senior year after my sister's depression was revealed to our family. Due to the stigma against mental illness in Chinese culture, my parents were reluctant to accept Abby's mental illness, pouring more salt on the wound.

Although my parents eventually accepted my sister's depression, prejudices about mental health are much too prevalent amongst Asian cultures; for example, South Korea has one of the high suicide rates in the world. With today's global community, it is becoming increasingly necessary to extend healthcare and health education beyond national borders. During my first semester of college, I grew dissatisfied with the idea of helping a few, select families - I want to help more. I want to reach out and impact multiple communities of families.

Seeking to work with the community, I am drawn to NYU's interdisciplinary approach to teaching Public Health. At NYU, students do not only engage with outside communities - they also learn from them. NYU innovatively uses community outreach as an educational resources and combines classwork with fieldwork. The school's affiliation with HealthRight International expands my learning curriculum, while its myriad amount of internship and research opportunities, including NYU's Ghana partnership, encourages me to learn outside the classroom. The school's holistic manner of teaching inspires me to view my future career as lifelong pursuit of learning.

I would have been intimidated by NYU's plethora of experiential opportunities a year ago. But before my senior year ended, my favorite teacher reminded me of Richard Branson's saying: "if your dreams don't scare you, they're too small". I took her advice and explored my most vulnerable subject - mental illness. For my senior year research paper, I toyed with my curiosity and explored psychopathology within the global community for my paper. At NYU, I am also ready to explore my curiosity in a hands-on manner. Subscribed to World Health Organization's online newsfeed, I hope to bring devotion for learning that lasts after class ends. In addition, having recently created a blog dedicated to using social media to initiate conversations on public health amongst the youth, I hope to demonstrate leadership and innovation in my educational endeavors at NYU.