In the summer of 2010, I attended Shad Valley, a Canadian summer enrichment program for high-achieving high school students. It takes place at 17 participating universities across Canada for the entire month of July.

“Apply to Shad Valley. It would look good for your university application,” Mother said. Everything we did was to make our university application look good. How tragic… Anyways, my older brother applied and wasn’t able to get in. The following year, I was pushed by my parents to apply. While searching up Shad Valley, I genuinely became interested in the program and worked hard on my application, which included a Personal Accomplishments Profile that listed all of your accomplishments from the past few years:

Languages: English, Vietnamese, and French

Academic Awards: Best Overall Achievement (top student Gr.9), Science award (top student Gr. 8), & Honour Roll (Gr. 8, Gr. 9, & Gr. 10))

Tennis; swimming club; volleyball league

Summer camps; volunteer local hospital; volunteer senior’s home

Arts (music, dance, etc.)

Piano student; guitar student; concerts; festivals/competitions

Math Contest

Gauss

Canadian Mathematics Contest

Pascal

Certificate of Merit for the Canadian Mathematics Contest (top student Gr. 8); Certificate of Distinction for Pascal, top 25% (top student Gr. 9)

Reading club; debating club; member of school band (play piano & clarinet); intramural student-staff sports league

Hobbies: Reading, listening to music, watching TV, surfing the Internet, & exercising

Musical Abilities: Gr. 9 RCM piano, Gr. 2 Rudiments Theory, played clarinet in school, & a former guitar student

Other Awards: Outstanding Citizenship Award (Gr. 7), Notable Artist Gr. 7 Award, Diligence Award (Gr. 8), & various music awards (every year)

A few weeks after sending in my application, I received word that I was acceptance into the program! I was ecstatic! Initially, I wanted to spend my time at Shad Valley on either of the Canadian Coast, but opted to chose nearby universities at the suggestion of Father, who worried about transportation issues if I went somewhere far. I was accepted to the Carleton University location and absolutely loved it! I made so many friends and so many good memories. Shad Valley was where I first encountered love for and acceptance of the LGBT community. There was a Gay Pride theme that was hosted one night. I got emotional seeing how accepting my peers were of the theme. Even though I did not come out of the closet to anyone here, I felt such love and joy for LGBT people. At a time when I was wrestling with my identity, the event could not have come at a better time. I believe that this event helped me to begin the journey to accepting myself. Shad Valley remains one of my best childhood experiences of my life.