2023 ACADEMIC ELITE TEAM AWARD - part one
The MMCF Academic Elite Team Award honors student/athletes who excel in the classroom and on the slopes, which is no easy task! This application is not just a questionnaire for one to fill in the blanks.
In order to be awarded with the Academic Elite Team Award, students need to maintain a minimum of a 3.5 GPA plus be on the Mammoth Mountain Ski Snowboard Team.
In addition, we ask the student/athletes to write a short essay. The essay prompts are age appropriate and are:
Elementary School Students
Think about what it means to be a good friend. Describe three things that make a good friendship, and why they are important to you.
Middle School Students
Can failure be good? Discuss a time you made a mistake and what you learned from it.
High School Students
If you could give a TED talk, what topic would you discuss? Describe at least three main points you'd like to share and why this subject is important to you.
The essay responses from the student/athletes covered a large range of subjects and many were thought provoking, interesting and encouraging as well.
We, at MMCF, were impressed and so over the next several months, with the permission of the essay author, we would like to highlight and share some of the essays with you – our MMCF family!!
BRYANT ZHANG – 10th GRADE
Hey everyone, I'm Bryant Zhang, and I am here to talk to you about social media and how it's affecting our mental health. I know that I'm not the only one who spends hours scrolling through Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat. But have you ever thought about how it makes you feel? Here are three main points to think about:
First of all, social media can make us feel bad about ourselves. We see all these perfect-looking people with perfect lives and we start to compare ourselves to them. We feel like we're not good enough or that we don't measure up. But guess what? Most of the time, people are only showing their highlight reels online. They're not showing the messy parts of their life, like when they're feeling sad or lonely. So, don't believe everything you see on social media!
Secondly, social media can be addictive. When we get likes, comments, or followers, we get a rush of dopamine in our brains. It feels good, so we want more and more of it. But this can lead to us spending too much time on social media and neglecting other important things in our lives, like schoolwork, friends, and family. We need to learn how to use social media in moderation and not let it take over our lives.
Lastly, social media can contribute to cyberbullying. Unfortunately, some people use social media to bully or harass others. This can be really hurtful and can have long-term effects on a person's mental health. We need to stand up against cyberbullying and create a safer online environment for everyone.
Overall, this is an important topic for us to think about because social media is such a big part of our lives. We need to learn how to use it responsibly and in a way that doesn't harm our mental health. So, next time you're scrolling through your feed, remember to take a break and think about how it's making you feel. Thanks for listening!
MAXWELL MCCARTHY – 4th GRADE
Last month I crashed on a jump on my snowboard and hurt my wrist. I had to stay off the mountain per doctor's orders for a month and wear a brace. My good friend was so supportive with encouraging words, telling me "You are going to come back stronger", "I know you are going to get better sooner than later", and "stay strong, you got this!" I think it is important to have friends that support you when you are struggling and are hurt.
It was a huge winter here at Mammoth Lakes and there were times on team we would get stuck on Dragon's Tail. We would ride big powder days. One afternoon, I got my legs stuck in a tree well. My good friend saw me, she took off her board and started digging me out. She grabbed my hand, while I pushed and eventually, with her help, I got out of the tree well. A good friend is there for you when you need them the most. As she was helping me, she said "you're going to get out of this", "I won't leave you and will stay with you". She patiently waited for me and even found some candy in her pockets that she shared with me, which was awesome! It was scary, but I was so lucky to have a good friend with me that is patient and kind.
My coaches are always honest with me, even brutally honest at times, which is a good thing. Their honesty helps me progress in life and in snowboarding. They tell me when I need more work on a trick or feature. It's tough to hear, but in the end, when I get it right, their praise really makes me feel great and pays off. Honesty is the most important trait to have in a friend.
In my opinion, being honest, patient, kind and supportive is what makes great friends. I am so lucky to have friends with these qualities!
ELISE CHOU – 9th GRADE
If I could give a Ted Talk on anything, it would be about the reality of growing up Asian in a mostly white community. The first main point I would discuss is my own personal experiences. In school, in the ski team, I was the only fully Asian person that I knew. Everyone else was blond and pale, and I felt alone in my existence. At first, I tried to blend in with everyone else, eating lunchables and turkey sandwiches, forgetting Mandarin (my first language) and trying to pretend like I was white. I even became self-conscious about my Chinese middle name and my Chinese last name which people could not seem to ever get right. I was confused with other Asian girls, who looked nothing like me at all, but we were classified as the same. This made me grow to care too much about what my white friends, and classmates would think about me and my Asian heritage. It's hard being different from everyone around you, and even now, I am the only fully Asian person in my Big Mountain ski team. My second main point would be about learning how to accept and embrace my diversity from everyone else. I learned that being different was okay and being different from everyone was a good thing. I switched to being ashamed and embarrassed of my culture to loving it and embracing it. Over the long and hard years, I learned how to heal and rejuvenate my love for my Chinese heritage. I accepted my traditions, my holidays, my food, and learned that those are the things that make me, me. My third main point would be about helping others find and love their cultures. It can be hard feeling different from everyone else, looking different from everyone else, and not having the same traditions as everyone else. I would like this Ted talk to inspire all people of color and really hit home with my own personal experiences. I would love to hear other people's experiences about this topic because it is so important and relevant in my life. The reason I care so deeply about this topic is because it is something that I struggled with for a long time when I was younger. Now that I have learned to encompass my culture, I would like to share that with other people.
ANNELIESE MAXWELL – 11th GRADE
If I were to give a TED talk, I would discuss Alzheimer's disease as it has significantly affected my family. How many of you have a friend or family member living with Alzheimer's? A lot of you? It is a slow killing disease and if you aren’t diagnosed with it then you are the caregiver for someone that is suffering with it. This disease was the cause of death for my Oma while dementia is my other Grandma’s downfall. Both of my parents are becoming more forgetful with age. All of these family members were and are incredibly brilliant and lead good, healthy lives but there are many factors that go into increasing the chance of producing the disease.
When my Grandmothers were diagnosed they became easily agitated as the second part of the brain that's affected is usually the frontal lobe that contains personality. Then they mellowed down but the questions they asked became more repetent, as each time I visited there was less time between when they would re-ask a question. Then came the hearing loss which is in the occipital lobe near the memory portion of the brain. My Oma near the end of her life could barely speak or comprehend, she simply forgot how to as the neurons in her Broca’s area were degrading. My mom and her two sisters were by her side as her medulla oblongata neurons were suffocated and she took her last breaths.
Due to the disease, I didn’t really have a relationship with my Oma or Grandma because they already were having symptoms of the terrible disease by the time I was little. My family were always the caregivers until it became too much and home-care was needed. All of it was very stressful which doesn’t help out with the next generation’s mental health. Thankfully there are ways to try and avoid it such as eating a diet of various whole foods, consuming plentiful amounts of water, keeping to a regular sleep schedule all help keep your brain happy and healthy as the right stuff, especially enough sleep which flushes the toxins out of neuronal synapses of beta-amyloid as microglia cells act as the clean-up crew. And, cognitive reserve is a saving grace for helping avoid Alzheimer’s, but, not just doing your puzzles, the cognitive reserve built when you learn a new language or how to play an instrument. Genetics are usually unavoidable but preventative steps help to slow down the process and give you the ability to really live and enjoy life longer.
EMILE PAINTER – 10th GRADE
If I could give a TED talk, I would discuss the application of the ancient philosophy of stoicism in being successful in Freeskiing. The main reasons that I would choose this as a topic to discuss is because of its benefits in the progression of the Freeski community and its deep mental factors. Stoicism has been used in many sports but has still not been mentioned in freeskiing. This is another factor that I would put in the talk, how the Freeski community lacks a certain amount of discipline, but the athletes that ultimately succeed, are those who have a disciplined sense of mind and body connection.
Stoicism is a set of principles that one can live by, and was written about by one of the most famous Roman Emperors, Marcus Aurelius in his writings "Meditations". Its principles are patience, courage, humility, resourcefulness, reason, justice, and creativity".
Stoicism is important to me because it has played a major role in my life recently and helped me to get through some tough situations. Freeskiing as a sport is very risky. It takes a lot of mental fortitude to stay the course. The stoicism mindset has several principles, but the three most important principles for me in Freeskiing are; courage, reason, and creativity.
The first principle I would cover is courage. One of the main principles of stoicism is courage. Courage would be discussed in my talk regarding its ability to help you deal with risk. Freestyle skiing is a high risk sport. There are certain aspects of Freeskiing that definitely involve courage, which you need in order to take risks. In my knowledge of Freeskiing, the most common obstacle is the fear of getting hurt on a new trick which can become much more transparent and clear with the use of courage in stoicism.
The second principle I would cover is reason. I would discuss the benefits of reason and its importance in being able to assess a dangerous situation, and the decisions, being good or bad around that scenario. This principle helps many Freeskiers make smarter decisions and assess risks that could be extremely harmful to them. Those that don't use good reason, can get very hurt by making bad decisions around the current conditions of the mountain, and their egos regarding their ability level. Sometimes, the most courageous thing one can do, is to NOT attempt something that you aren't ready for.
The third principle I would cover is creativity. I would discuss why creativity is important in the Freeski community. Stoicism allows one to express themselves freely. It's one of the factors that drives people into the sport. We don't have a clock, or a timer to tell us whether we win or lose. The creativity that many Freeskiers have is mainly what drives the progression of the sport and the expansion of tricks and video ideas. I believe that this principle is important because it is what mainly started the entire sport.
