A R K A N S A S T IME S
✭
A C A DE MIC A L L-S TA R S
FUTURE LEADER, ENGINEER
E
li Westerman is a natural born leader. A four-year letterman in track and football, he served as team captain in both as a senior. He made All-Conference in football and was named Arkansas Scholar Athlete of the Year. But Eli said that more than awards, sports helped him develop his leadership skills — “to speak up and lead people, and to lead by example.” ELI WESTERMAN It’s no surprise, then, that Westerman became Student Council AGE: 18 president. He was inspired to run after Fountain Lake extended HOMETOWN: Hot Springs school times “in a way that I felt was not really democratic.” He HIGH SCHOOL: Fountain Lake ran on a platform opposing the change and pushing for more High School transparency in government. “I worked my tail off to try and get PARENTS: Bruce and Sharon it revoked,” Eli said, and though he wasn’t able to get the hours Westerman changed, he said, “I think the fact that I’ve taken that stand, that’s COLLEGE PLANS: Yale what’s important in the end.” Sound like anyone? Eli’s dad, Rep. University Bruce Westerman, was the Majority Leader in the Arkansas House of Representatives and is now running for Congress in the Fourth District. Eli said he wouldn’t completely rule out running for office himself someday, but “right now that’s not what I’m looking for.” Instead, he’s following in the footsteps of his father, an engineer; Eli plans to study biomedical engineering at Yale next year. “I realize that my favorite thing to do is solve problems, whether that’s student government or athletics or in the classroom, I just love solving problems. That’s basically what engineers do. Maybe that’s what God has given me as a task to do on this side of the dirt.” In addition to founding his school chapters of the National Honor Society and the Science Club, Eli successfully sought a grant to found a Robotics team at his former middle school. He wanted to foster enthusiasm for learning among younger students and give them an outlet beyond just making A’s. Eli served as a coach and mentor to the kids, who created robots that completed various challenges, and also developed a program to educate the community about preparedness for natural disasters. In addition to all of his activities and athletics, Eli — a National Merit finalist — took a whopping 11 AP courses and finished first in his class with a 4.23 GPA.
GREEN THUMB
W
hen Andrew Willoughby was 6 years old, the family’s cat clawed a hole in one of the leaves on a rubber fig plant his parents had. Andrew, naturally curious, was fascinated by the sticky white sap that oozed out. Thus began an interest in plants that has become the passion of his life. When his grandmother gave him a houseplant as a ANDREW WILLOUGHBY present, he found he had a natural green thumb — now if his AGE: 17 family asks what he wants for Christmas or a birthday, well, HOMETOWN: Little Rock they already know the answer. “I made an Amazon wishlist HIGH SCHOOL: eStem Public and filled it with plants,” Andrew said. “Here’s a link, order Charter School whatever you want and I’ll grow it. ... And ever since I’ve had PARENTS: Dorothy and Bill any kind of money of my own, I’ve spent it on plants.” Among Willoughby the plants he’s currently growing: several young citrus trees COLLEGE PLANS: University of (the lemon tree is his favorite), hot peppers, herbs, ornamental Oklahoma grasses, cacti. Andrew is heading to University of Oklahoma next year where he plans to study, of course, botany. He’s also interested in biotechnology and synthetic biology. He recently contributed to a Kickstarter project to genetically modify a plant to glow. “That’s the kind of thing I’d like to do,” Andrew said. “That is amazing to me and I like to think about all the possible applications of that and all the problems you could solve. Creating transgenic plants that could produce medicines, biofuels, perfumes.” Andrew said he loves science because it involves the practical application of math, and numbers have always come naturally to him (he fondly remembers his dad helping him with multiplication when he was just 3 or 4 years old). After finishing every math class on offer after his junior year, eStem had to add math classes this year to keep up with his needs. Andrew also pursued more advanced study in science and math on his own via open-source college courses online. In addition to his success in the classroom and turning his home into a veritable garden, Andrew — National Merit finalist — found time to captain the Quiz Bowl team, intern at the Democratic Party of Arkansas, and play clarinet and piano. 24
APRIL 24, 2014
ARKANSAS TIMES
WALKING ENCYCLOPEDIA
B
en Winter thought it would be cool, he said, to participate in a research fellowship at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences last summer. What he didn’t expect: It turned out to be a “life-altering experience that set me on the path to doing science as a career.” Working with cutting-edge equipment to research BENJAMIN WINTER stem cells and cancer, Ben was like a kid in a candy store. AGE: 18 “It was wonderful, just a really great environment for me,” HOMETOWN: Little Rock he said. “It was a place where I can imagine myself being HIGH SCHOOL: Episcopal happy in a career and fulfilled — a place where I can just Collegiate School kind of discover and experiment to my heart’s desire.” A PARENTS: Douglas and Angela Winter passion for scientific research runs in the family — Ben’s COLLEGE PLANS: University of grandfather was dean of research at UAMS, where he Virginia worked in biochemistry. “He passed away a few years ago but I’ve gotten to go back through some of his notes and look at what he was doing when it was happening, which was really interesting,” Ben said. Getting a peek at his grandfather’s work on the sodium-potassium pump from years ago was inspiring to Ben, whose hope now is to eventually do research in biology, too, perhaps with a focus on stem cells. Something else Ben might have gotten from his grandfather: He’s more than just a science whiz. “He was just an encyclopedia,” Ben said. “He had books all around his home — about architecture, poetry, Dickens novels. I kind of picked it up and I’ve always had an appreciation for a whole bunch of different things.” Ben writes poetry, was the captain of the Quiz Bowl team, runs track and makes chainmail shirts in his spare time. He serves as class vice-president, participates in Student Congress and was elected Speaker of the House at Boys State. A National Merit finalist who scored a perfect 36 on his ACT, Ben managed all these activities while maintaining a 4.5 GPA, first in his class.
WELL ROUNDED
A
lex Zhang is clearly a brilliant student — an ACT score just shy of perfect, second in his class with a 4.47 GPA — but don’t try to pigeonhole him. He is a photographer, a guitarist, a theater fanatic, a poet. He’s a star debater, will soon become an Eagle Scout, and has a passion for teaching and mentoring younger students. Alex, who ALEXANDER ZHANG plans to study political science, philosophy and economics at AGE: 17 Yale next year, said that though he likes science and math, he HOMETOWN: Little Rock rebels against the stereotype of Asian-American students. He HIGH SCHOOL: Little Rock sacrificed a potential valedictorian slot to pursue his passions, Central High School giving up the additional AP class he would need to secure PARENTS: Xuming Zhang and the top ranking so that he could captain the debate team and Monica Cai take a creative writing class, because those were the things COLLEGE PLANS: Yale he “really loved,” he said. Though he’s had a dominant record University in Arkansas as well as national success, he said his favorite part about debate is mentoring younger debaters. “It’s that feeling of community in our debate squad,” he said. “You can’t match it anywhere else.” As for writing — for which Alex has won several national awards — he said, “Writing lets me explore things that I never get to do in real life.” He’s written everything from science fiction to poetry about his experiences as an Asian American living in the South (some of his amazing slam poetry is online; check it out). There aren’t enough pages in this paper to cover all of Zhang’s wide range of impressive achievements. He’s been an editor of the Central High Memory Project, an oral history project. Along with three other students, he presented a film on Asian-American slam poetry at the CAAMFest in San Francisco, one of the largest Asian-American film festivals in the country. He’s won awards for his conceptual photography projects and is now doing senior portrait photography around Little Rock. (“The camera is like my third eye,” he said. “It’s about self-exploration. I feel like myself when I take photographs.”) He does drama tournaments, solo mime-improv performances and has acted as the lead in plays at the Arkansas Arts Center. “There are never enough hours in the day,” Alex said, “but I just do what I love to do.”