“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

It took a moment of profound despair for me to grasp what Oliver Wendell Holmes said, "in our youth our hearts were touched with fire... given to us to learn at the outset that life is a profound and passionate thing." Knowing that my friends had perished on the levels beneath where I stood in the Pentagon instilled in me a rage which has given way to patient, nuanced deliberation.

Where I once believed that America should carve out her interests in the world, heedless of the repercussions on other nations, my world view has broadened during my two years here. I have been privileged to sit in these classrooms, listening to your perspectives and offering my own. Whether it was probing racial injustice in South Africa or restructuring Mexico's debt, I have come to see our worlds as inextricably linked that I might impact through the inspiration you have provided me.

As I embark on a career in technology, I remain in awe of innovations that allow the light of ideas to penetrate darkness. These advances allow oppressed people to witness the power of democracy and expose their own struggles which compel us to act. By improving access to information in remote places, we broaden the next generation of thinkers who will take us all forward with their unique dreams.

There is much work to be done and now I will get down to it.

— Michael Worosz