Student Experience Archives

Class of 2020: Txuj Ci Yang

May 11, 2020

As the 2019–20 school year comes to an end, we’re sharing the college choice stories of several members of the Class of 2020!

In what grade did you come to MPA?

I came to MPA in 9th grade.

How did you come to choose the college that you did?

I came to choose St. Catherine’s due to an overnight I attended in the fall! I was looking for a college with a supportive academic environment just like MPA. Upon my overnight at St. Kate’s, I experienced just that. The prospective students and the current students there were absolutely amazing. We clicked instantly. I was able to see how the current students interacted with each other and how much fun they had while still helping each other with their work. I also encountered dozens of amazing individuals who shared the same passion for learning and had wished for everyone around them to succeed!

What are you most excited about as you embark on your college experience?

I am most excited about branching out and meeting new people with different insights! I am not much of a talker, but I adore listening to people’s stories. I believe that they reveal their beliefs and dreams. Being able to listen to new people passionately talk about what they hold dearly to them inspires me daily to work harder in order to aid them in their path to success. Read More

MPA Goes Virtual: Dhruv Muppidi

April 22, 2020

This story series illustrates how our community is embracing, growing, and connecting through virtual learning together. Read on to hear MPA junior Dhruv Muppidi’s experience as #MPAgoesvirtual!

Upon beginning virtual learning, Dhruv said he was feeling a little bit of anxiousness, but a lot of excitement. To establish a sense of normalcy, he’s been sticking to a familiar routine and curating a classroom space at home.

“It’s important to get into a regular schedule and stick to it. As much as this feels like a break, I believe it’s critical to treat this process as similarly as possible to a normal week at school,” Dhruv said. For him, that means setting an alarm to continue waking up at 6:30 AM and being ready promptly at 8 AM to tune into his Global Voices class. Read More

MPA Goes Virtual: Elli Carlson

April 8, 2020

This story series illustrates how our community is embracing, growing, and connecting through virtual learning together. Read on to hear MPA senior Elli Carlson’s thoughts as #MPAgoesvirtual!

Away from campus, Elli has adapted to virtual learning in her at-home classroom, making sure it’s super cozy and an enjoyable place to attend her online classes in. In addition to her synchronous classes on Zoom, she is excited to further explore more online tools, such as peardeck.com.

Elli defines “virtual learning” as moving the MPA classroom to an online setting while maintaining the unique dynamics of the learning environment at MPA–and she agrees her teachers are successfully doing that and more.

“MPA teachers have already done a great job of taking initiative around virtual learning. By reaching out and showing students they are thinking ahead, they have always communicated that their doors are always open, in real life and online,” she said. “Thank you, MPA, for making this transition so seamless! We are all very lucky to have so many avenues to communicate in this situation.”

MPA Goes Virtual: Isak Dai

March 25, 2020

This story series illustrates how our community is embracing, growing, and connecting through virtual learning together. Read on to see what MPA junior Isak Dai looks forward to as #MPAgoesvirtual!

While virtual learning may look and feel different than a regular school day, Isak breaks it down in a way that makes it feel very familiar, even away from campus–to him, virtual learning is “bundling up the work we do at school and doing it at home through the internet.”

“Before our current situation, we certainly were practicing some aspects of virtual learning by accessing online resources like Schoology, but now have been forced to take all of MPA online,” he said. “My hope is that through this challenge we can learn to take advantage of the many virtual learning resources at our disposal and take these lessons with us when we eventually return to school as usual.” Read More

MPA Goes Virtual: Kaija Kunze-Hoeg

March 20, 2020

This story series illustrates how our community is embracing, growing, and connecting through virtual learning together. Read on to see what MPA sophomore Kaija Kunze-Hoeg looks forward to as #MPAgoesvirtual!

Kaija tells us that she is excited to try this new style of learning. “To me, virtual learning is a new, innovative take on what a classroom looks like,” she says. “I expect to have to learn to focus harder as I will have more things that can distract me when I am learning from home.”

Knowing this may be a challenge for her, Kaija is preparing to set up her workspace to help her stay on task and continue achieving academically. MPA recommends starting with a quiet, well-lit area with strong Internet connection and a clean, clear working space to continue joyful learning away from campus. “I am going to try to make my at-home ‘classroom’ pretty close to what it would be at school so I can feel more engaged in my classwork,” she says. “I will use a desk, but it will just be more cozy.” Read More

Feeling Supported And Strong At School

February 4, 2020

The following essay is adapted from MPA Class of 2020 member Lilly Ramalingam’s Senior Speech.

I started preschool at the age of two at my family-owned Montessori school, Ramalynn Montessori Academy. My parents, my grandparents and my uncle have all taught at the school and it is a four-minute walk away from my house, so it was almost quite literally a home away from home. Before graduating from Ramalynn after eighth grade, I was a confident and happy girl, with none of the worries I would quickly take on during my first two years of high school.

After eighth grade, I didn’t have much of a choice on where I would attend high school, since my parents and grandparents had already decided to send me where my uncle had gone before he went to college at Brown back in the 90s. This high school I attended for two years before coming to MPA will rename nameless.

I went into this new school as a freshman, while the majority of students in my grade had been together for many years before high school, so I knew I was already at a slight disadvantage, but because I’m generally a very social person, I wasn’t too worried about finding new friends. Read More

The Ability To Choose A New Path

January 27, 2020

The following essay is adapted from MPA Class of 2020 member Ceci Driano’s Senior Speech.

I have always been a planner. The color-coded schedules and to-do lists kind of planner. Yet somehow my life has not gone according to plan. Eighteen years in the making, I now understand that change is constant and life is not always fair, but through it all, the most important thing is how I view change when my best laid plans go awry.

I went to elementary school in rural Minnesota and loved the small-town life. I was able to walk to school and recognize a familiar face everywhere I went. I have many fond memories partaking in events that would only happen in a small town. One of my favorites was walking in the Homecoming and Glows Parades, where the high schoolers were able to ride floats for their sports team and then run back to the beginning of the parade and do it all over again with another extracurricular. Whether it was running my make-believe Screwball Café where I took real money for fake food, or playing chip-it-over the river, where I just kicked a soccer ball over the wheelbarrow in my backyard–I found a way to have fun. My imagination seemed to run wild, and as my dad liked to say, I was basically a free-range chicken. I thought I had my whole life planned out: I would graduate, go to the college down the street so I could live at home with my parents, and then I would become President. What could go wrong? Read More

Moving To Collaboration Over Competition

December 31, 2019

The following essay is adapted from MPA Class of 2020 member Ella Jones’s Senior Speech.

As many of you know, I have only been a member of the MPA community since the beginning of eleventh grade. Before moving to Minnesota, I lived in China. Growing up in Beijing during the Chinese economic boom was a very unique and an eye-opening experience. I watched the entire city develop and grow in front of my eyes. I watched the roads outside my apartment shift overnight from dirt to asphalt, and the vehicles on them evolve from bikes to cars.

The city began to quickly fill with people from many provinces across China. Beijing became a domestic web of people from all corners of the country. Between 1990 and 2015, Beijing’s population doubled, reaching a staggering 20 million people in 2015. At my school in Beijing, there was no such thing as a student on financial aid or scholarship, and because of that, I was surrounded by people who were privileged and had opportunity. School became a competition of who had the nicest clothes or who went to the coolest places for vacation. I started to judge my self-worth on what I had compared to my peers, and not the amazing opportunities I was already provided with. School became a toxic environment where every aspect became a comparison. Read More

Discovering Confidence On And Off The Court

December 5, 2019

The following essay is adapted from MPA Class of 2020 member Catherine Moore’s Senior Speech.

I have been at MPA since kindergarten and during my time here, I have done and been many different things. In the early years, my aspirations ranged from being a veterinarian—a job that many regular people would think is a good life goal—to astronaut—again, a good job, though harder to get there, but still fairly normal … to finally … a mermaid. Clearly, my interests would wander, changing with whatever creative thought passed through my head. Luckily, MPA gave me a place to explore my less realistic, yet aspirational side. I don’t know about doing right, but I definitely dreamed big.

My afterschool interests varied, too. I tried soccer and swimming, joined basketball and played volleyball. I loved everything about sports … especially the competitiveness. I enjoyed being physical and loved my will to win. I engaged in as many sports as possible. Eventually, however, it was volleyball that caught my attention and gave me an anchor and a steady focus. In many ways, some of the most important lessons I have learned have come from being on a volleyball team, whether that was here at MPA or on a club team. Read More

Finding A Home At MPA

November 15, 2019

The following essay is adapted from MPA Class of 2020 member Elli Carlson’s Senior Speech. Elli joined MPA as a sophomore in August 2017.

I have been looking for “home” for as long as I can remember. Places I can be me, comfortably and unapologetically. Those places have changed as I have grown, and I’m sure my search will last my entire lifetime as I continue to evolve.

From a young age, I thought school would be my first home. I possessed an unrelenting love for learning, so I naturally imagined school as a haven for my curiosity. My mom frequently recounts the story of my first day of kindergarten, when I hopped off the school bus, ran up the driveway, and immediately asked her “When are we going to start the real learning? All we did was play!” Read More