Despite having high school cut short due to COVID, Jennifer Wong had many achievements including coming out at the top of the class of 2022. Wong plans to go to UMass Amherst to major in biochemistry and molecular biology.
Wong said that COVID made everything a whole mess. “My experience with COVID was pretty interesting because I always expected my four years of high school to be just normal,” Wong said. For her, the most challenging thing after COVID was connecting people’s voices with their faces since she hasn’t seen everyone for over a year.
“Our class has been in challenging situations with the pandemic restricting us from in-person learning but we were persistent and I enjoyed volunteering for events like JVs and our senior class bake sales to fundraise,” Wong said.
Wong felt that the clubs she joined freshman year helped her come out of her shell more since she was extremely introverted. She tried to find things that she was passionate about. Wong is very excited about a new start in college as she is very excited about her major. Although she knows it will be difficult since the classes are challenging, she is confident she will do fine.
Wong hopes to get her bachelor’s degree from UMass Amherst and from there she thinks she might want to be a lab technician. She is also considering a master’s degree and a physician’s assistant program.
Some teachers that made a big impact on Wong’s four years of high school are Jessica Webber, Kayla Scheitlin, and Joseph Luongo because they reassured Wong that her future is flexible. She especially wanted to shout out Webber for always being supportive and always providing a safe space in her classroom.
Webber taught Wong her freshman year for bio and then again her senior year for biotech. Webber said that Wong was one of the best students she has had academically because she is diligent and never misses details. “She works really, really hard for her grades,” Webber said.
Webber believes that Wong grew in terms of coming out of her shell more and being more of a leader in the school since she was shy during her Freshman year. She also loves how modest Wong is. “No one would know how smart she is.”
Webber is going to miss Wong a lot. “She is so important to me as a person but also she helps me so much and she keeps me organized and my classroom organized and I will really miss her because I see her every day.”
After she graduates with her degree Wong hopes to travel and visit her parents’ hometowns in China and Myanmar.
