I wrote this for a class which I am sitting in on but which I am not taking officially. It involves the study of how Penn can benefit the impoverished West Philly population through academic analysis applied to social problems.

These two questions are inextricably linked as it is my identity which shaped my learning outcomes I hope to achieve.

I was born in Singapore and studied in a neighborhood school (government-run schools catering to students with poorer academic abilities and coincidentally (or not), from lower income backgrounds). Students at my middle school came from lower to middle-class backgrounds. After graduating from middle school, my grades helped me matriculate at one of the top high schools in Singapore, where students were largely wealthier. I could have lived a normal life, oblivious to the poverty and social problems around me… but I failed at this.

At high school, most of my schoolmates, having lived in elite social circles all their life, did not even know that poverty existed in Singapore. Whereas students in my high school had resources and opportunities to dream of attending Ivy League universities, teachers in my middle school told us that we should be grateful if we even made it into a university, much less a renowned university.

It is this exposure to various social circles, and the contrast in opportunities, that fueled my interests in poverty and inequality. I believe that poverty is a vicious cycle, where inequality of resources feeds into inequality of outcomes. I embarked to change this by joining a community service project to teach English and refurbish a school in rural China. My team raised $40 000. Full of idealism and enthusiasm, I embarked on a journey that changed my views on community service.

In China, I realized my team had conceived our project on poorly thought out premises. The school children did not need new computers; they needed electricity. The school children did not need new walls; they needed teachers. There was also little use of teaching them English when after we left, they would never have the opportunity to use it again. When I left, I felt that I did not create the positive impact on the community which I set out to achieve. It was a rude shock to learn that all my efforts in raising the funds and organizing the project were inconsequential. For a while, I was tempted to rationalize the experience and convince myself of its benefits. But I chose to confront the painful reality in the end. In doing so, I realized that enthusiasm was no substitute for rigorous academic analysis applied to solving practical problems.

I wanted to contribute not only enthusiastically but effectively. On my next project, I tried to approach the problem methodically and analytically. In founding ArtIntern, an organization encouraging talented students to believe in the possibility of an arts career, I analyzed the reasons for the lack of artists through interviews and data collection. I also challenged myself to think of creative ways of implementing the chosen solutions. On this project, I was both an academic and practitioner; I see no reason why the two roles must be mutually exclusive.

It is this fusion of academic thinking with practical implementation that brings me to this seminar. I appreciate the opportunity to apply academic analysis to community problems. Equally important is the opportunity to share ideas and solutions with a community of equally passionate students, and in doing so, develop better solutions.