Helping Korea imagine a wider definition of a good life.

I plan to study sociology and psychology, with a strong secondary interest in technology and public policy. Sociology gives me the tools to see how family pressure, cultural values, and economic anxiety quietly shape entire generations of career choices. Psychology helps me understand the internal side — how young people make decisions under pressure and what happens when their sense of self doesn't match the path they were pushed onto.

Together, these fields let me ask questions that neither can answer alone: Why do so many capable students in Korea feel like they only have three "acceptable" careers to choose from? What does the AI transition actually demand from schools? What would it take to make nontraditional, hands-on, and creative work respected paths — not fallbacks?

I'm not trying to eliminate ambition or reject competition. Both are part of why Korea has come so far. What I want to change is the shape of that ambition — so it stops pointing every young person toward the same three doors.

In practice, that means building things: apps that widen how students see their options, programs that make invisible work visible, mentorship that helps young people find their own voice, and volunteer work that keeps me honest about who gets left behind when society changes quickly. Everything on the Activities page is a small version of the person I'm trying to become.

Long term, I want to work at the intersection of research, education, and public conversation in Korea — running studies on how young people actually experience career pressure, translating those findings into tools and programs schools can use, and pushing back on the media narratives that keep the old definition of success alive.

The goal isn't rebellion against expectations. It's a wider map — one where a teacher, a caregiver, a craftsperson, a researcher, an entrepreneur, and a civil servant can all be described, without hesitation, as successful.