1. Name: Jesse Chen
2. Major, Year: Writing Seminars, Museums & Society, 2016
3. Hometown: Princeton, NJ
4. Affiliated with: Pi Beta Phi, Taiwanese American Students Association, Intercollegiate Taiwanese American Students Association, Inter-Asian Council, Black and Blue Jay, Admissions Representative, Study Abroad Office, Special Collections
5. You can probably find me… In class, at work, in a meeting, or running around between some combination of the three! When I get a chance to breathe I’m usually in Gilman or at one of the other lovely cafes around campus (shout-out to Alkimia for always having my Lola cookies!), grabbing a latte and studying.
6. The best thing about Hopkins is…The people! I love how passionate everyone is about what they study and what they do here. The professors (especially the amazing ones in my departments!) are so friendly and down to earth and always willing to give their time and energy to help students learn and grow. My fellow students are all driven by such unique passions and goals, and I feel lucky to be surrounded by people with such diverse perspectives and interests.
7. Something I’m especially proud of is…Being ranked a finalist for the Norman Mailer College Poetry Contest! I’m pretty new at poetry but I entered some of my latest work from class on a whim, and I made it to the top 5 in the nation! See below for one of the poems I entered.
8. Something most people don’t know about me is…I broke my big toe when I was 5 because I dropped a glass ketchup bottle on it! Not my proudest moment…
9. This year, I hope to…Meet new people and explore new interests both while at Hopkins this semester and while abroad next semester!
10. In five years, I will be…Working for a publishing company or in PR/marketing and living it up in NYC while applying to MFA programs! Or bumming on my sister’s couch in San Francisco and trying to find a job…one of the two!
11. Next up for me is…Finishing up my Woodrow Wilson Research Fellowship project! I’m using my funding and my time at Hopkins to study contemporary Asian-American identity. Working with Dr. Katrina Bell McDonald, my lovely mentor from the Sociology department, and Ami Cox, the fellowship supervisor, I was able to spend the last summer traveling the country and interviewing Asian American scholars, activists, artists, and ordinary community members about Asian American identity, history, and what it means to be Asian-American. This year, I’ll be working on compiling that footage into a documentary on contemporary Asian-American identity, called Looking for Asian America. Check it out at http://lookingforasianamerica.tumblr.com/
Check out my writing blog http://thecollegepundit.tumblr.com/! It’s fledgling but hopefully I find time to build on it this year.