Out of the blue one lunchtime, my friend punched me. “Ow, Kristie, abs of steel?” She recoiled, shaking out her knuckles. The circle of people standing around us tittered. “Plastic,” I corrected. Part of me wanted to disappear into the ground. On the other hand, I was basically the Man of Steel in real life. I laughed along instead. I was a hard(y) fourth grader—literally. When I was nine, my doctor told me I had scoliosis and put...

I've learned that a successful leader has to be willing to take risks. So, like any good editor-in-chief, I arrived at school on recruitment day as a walking billboard, dressed in a red tutu, a sandwich board, and black stilettos. Why? Pandora’s Box Creative Magazine was a failing club. After twenty years, our school’s only magazine was threatened with shutdown for lack of membership. As an officer sophomore year, I knew the problem was the exclusionary, cliquish environment...

From the age of four, I believed I was destined to become an oil painter. I was essentially fostered for twelve years in a small, unventilated art studio, and trained myself to approach artistic problems from multiple angles—imagining results, testing, making choices, and revising. At the dinner table, my father, my younger brother, and I frequently talked tech, discussing topics such as the parallels between cryptocurrency and the Dutch tulip mania. I was especially curious about product design and...

When I attended the Yale Young Global Scholars program, what I found most fascinating was how current international affairs and domestic industries were increasingly intertwined. As I devised a policy proposal for the recent Sino-American trade war, for example, I began by examining its repercussions on American industries—particularly agriculture. But after researching the issue, I realized the conflict’s effect on American farmers led me directly to the effects on farmers in South America and the European Union, who...

Out of the blue one lunchtime, my friend punched me. “Ow, Kristie, abs of steel?” She recoiled, shaking out her knuckles. The circle of people standing around us tittered. “Plastic,” I corrected. Part of me wanted to disappear into the ground; part of me wanted to claim I was the Man of Steel in disguise. I was a hard(y) fourth grader—literally. When I was nine, my doctor told me I had scoliosis and put me in a thick...