In my three years at the UW, I have learned about myself as a learner. In my portfolio, I placed a focus on personal growth, advocacy, and public service as well as the honors tenets of experiential learning, intentional learning, and interdisciplinarity. I would describe myself as a visual, hands-on learner that thrives on collaboration and discussions. I used to think that my most valuable knowledge came from my school, however, my view of knowledge changed. Over time, I came to realize that valuable knowledge must be learned from experiences that occur outside of the traditional classroom. 

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In my first year I learned that public service and experiential learning are some of my most important values. Practicing experiential learning and public service required me to lean on real-world experiences rather than in-class learning. For a long time, I knew behind my pursuit of becoming a dental provider was the passion to help my community. Throughout multiple experiences at the UW, I dedicated myself to helping marginalized communities and learning from experiences outside of a classroom. 

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After reflecting, I noticed that a major value of mine throughout my undergraduate experience was making personal growth and practicing intentional learning. Intentional learning means finding purpose and lessons from learning experiences of any kind. I learned to value the growth that I was making within even if it was something that didn't directly connect to my career goal. I learned to cook new dishes, run races, crochet tote bags, screen print onto cotton textiles, rock climb, and more. Through all of these experiences I made personal growth while practicing intentional learning.

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Lastly, through my education at the UW, I have grown a fondness for interdisciplinarity and advocacy. It seems funny thinking back to my interdisciplinary honors application, when I googled "interdisciplinary def,” but I am truly honored to have been a part of a cohort that shared a common interest in learning multiple branches of knowledge. The interdisciplinarity that was embedded in each honors course was refreshing and interesting. When I was in one of my regular classes, I would find myself practicing interdisciplinarity by connecting the lecture topics to my previous knowledge from another subject. Advocacy was a part of many of my honors courses and is a part of my personal mission. A major experience where I implemented my values of interdisciplinarity and advocacy was my study away program with Sankofa Impact, a non profit based in Seattle that celebrates Black culture and history. Sankofa Impact partnered with UW Honors and created an opportunity for honors students to travel 10 southern states. I learned about black oppression and liberation by sharing space with civil activists and visiting sites that I had only read about in brief segments of history books. 

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After the University of Washington, I plan to continue the process of reflection because I have found it extremely helpful in making steps forward toward my goals, and taking notice of my progress. I will continue to prioritize personal growth, advocacy, public service, experiential learning, intentional learning, and interdisciplinarity as I move forward in my life. If my experience of learning new values when I came to UW translates to my next years, I believe I will add more values to my list of major values.