Just prior to graduation, Mission Bay High School valedictorian James Ward, and salutatorian Edgar Seecof, discussed their school experiences, what they\u2019re doing this summer, their career aspirations, and outlooks on the future.<\/p>\n
Ward led a team of colleagues this past year in co-founding Alattis, a student-led business creating a new videoconferencing platform built by students, for students, to resolve some of the problems with Zoom, and other video-conferencing platforms. \u201cI\u2019ll be working this summer to bring the platform to summer schools in San Diego,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
An avid surfer and beachgoer, Seecof, who is going to UC San Diego this fall, will be busy this summer with an internship. \u201cI\u2019m going to be working at a little semiconductor place that works in automated tests, just helping with testing over there,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Ward started an entrepreneurship club at MBHS and was active in sports. \u201cI was all-league rugby this year,\u201d he said. \u201cI won league championships for individuals and doubles for tennis.\u201d<\/p>\n
Not a club or sports person, and more of a free spirit, Seecof said: \u201cI just kind of march to the beat of my own drum, do what I do after school. That\u2019s how I am.\u201d<\/p>\n
Of how they\u2019ll remember MBHS, both Ward and Seecof will remember it well.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe biggest thing I\u2019ll remember is the sports because I was really into sports,\u201d said Ward adding, \u201cAnd then I would say the people I met. One thing I really enjoyed was the homecoming dances and the pep rallies during my freshman and sophomore years. And then, also, the IB program at Mission Bay.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are lots of nice teachers here willing to get to know you, both after school and during class,\u201d said Seecof. \u201cEveryone\u2019s very accepting here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ward will be attending Warton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania this fall. \u201cI want to pursue a double major in economics with a focus in health administration and policy and computational and mathematical biology,\u201d he said. \u201cMy end goal is to be a CEO of a hospital. My grandma passed away because she wasn\u2019t able to get the care she needed. I want to be in charge of a hospital so I can prevent that from happening to other people.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI enrolled for computer engineering at UC San Diego, so we\u2019ll see where I end up, maybe in software or hardware,\u201d said Seecof. \u201cI went through the engineering program at MBHS and took IB design technology, the building side of engineering, which gives you more of a design orientation, not just grinding out mathematics for thermodynamics and linear algebra.\u201d<\/p>\n
The two young scholars had decidedly different attitudes toward current events in these times of inflation, the housing crisis, the war in Ukraine, and mass shootings happening more frequently nationwide.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs young people, it\u2019s our responsibility to educate ourselves on what\u2019s happening,\u201d said Ward. \u201cWe have access to so much information that other generations didn\u2019t have. We can use that to benefit the world in a lot of ways. For example, with social media, people can explore different perspectives of others that they wouldn\u2019t have been able to see in their own communities.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s good to be optimistic but not overly optimistic, thinking about stuff in the future, making all the stuff we\u2019ve done right now better, is not the way to look at it,\u201d said Seecof. \u201cWhat you want to fight, you need to fight right now, because counting on future generations, and future actions, to happen is not a good way to go about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Looking ahead, Ward said, \u201cI\u2019m definitely optimistic in people as a whole, as well as myself, to be proactive and make change where change is needed. With the power of social media and the internet, we can work together to begin solving the problems of the world. And the first step to solving any issue is awareness.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is stressful to watch inflation bumping up really fast, the really crappy housing market, and just the generic economic situation comparing it to past generations,\u201d said Seecof. \u201cThat\u2019s distressing. But you\u2019ve got to just roll with it. You can\u2019t do much by yourself. You need a lot of people to do everything.\u201d<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Just prior to graduation, Mission Bay High School valedictorian James Ward, and salutatorian Edgar Seecof, discussed their school experiences, what they\u2019re doing this summer, their career aspirations, and outlooks on the future. Ward led a team of colleagues this past year in co-founding Alattis, a student-led business creating a new videoconferencing platform built by students, […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":840,"featured_media":312620,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11559","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"Just prior to graduation, Mission Bay High School valedictorian James Ward (above), and salutatorian Edgar Secof, discussed their school experiences, what they\u2019re doing this summer, their career aspirations, and outlooks on the future.","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"3","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"1","show_view_counter":"1","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"1","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","show_zoom_button":"1","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":""},"jnews_social_meta":{"fb_title":"","fb_description":"","fb_image":"","twitter_title":"","twitter_description":"","twitter_image":""},"jnews_override_counter":{"override_view_counter":"0","view_counter_number":"0","override_share_counter":"0","share_counter_number":"0","override_like_counter":"0","like_counter_number":"0","override_dislike_counter":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[11559,11564],"tags":[12677,12543,12558,13354],"class_list":["post-312619","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beach-bay-press","category-education","tag-mission-bay-high-school","tag-pacific-beach","tag-uc-san-diego","tag-warton-school-of-business-at-the-university-of-pennsylvania"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312619","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/840"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=312619"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312619\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/312620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=312619"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=312619"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=312619"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}