Griffon Willmorth

My name is Griffon Willmorth, and I am a student at One Stone. Over the past year and a half, I have been on a journey of self discovery in order to understand my Why. That is to say, why do I do what I do? After many hours of careful consideration, I created the following Why Statement: “To show meaning in monotony to allow others to live their lives with fulfillment.”

This year, I found meaning through a small act of good I was able to participate in: Love of Learning. Each week, every student in our immersion met with groups of kids at the Boys and Girls Club ranging from kindergarten through third grade. These kids were at the Boys and Girls Club due to the lack of in-person classes at their respective schools. They needed a place where they could be supervised while their parents were at work, a place that could help them with their online academic pursuits. Unfortunately, due to the fact that the entire school district was meeting remotely, the Boys and Girls Club did not have the staff to give each student the individual attention they needed to learn and thrive.

For one hour out of our week, we would work with the kids individually, engaging in activities such as coloring and writing, or helping them with their assignments. Many of the kids struggled with the utilization of their computers and tablets when participating in video meetings or completing their assignments. Us being there to assist the students and give them more personalized attention seemed highly beneficial to calm their frustrations with remote work and engage them on a more personal level, something I believe is crucial to the development of a child.

This opportunity has inspired me to be the good in the world. I gained a better understanding of another demographic I did not know very well, and it made me realize that there are so many unique problems going on in the world that I need to devote my time to changing the things that break my heart. Kids in elementary school are in a difficult situation, and they really do need our help. I am so grateful to have had this opportunity.

Hannah Lormore

My name is Hannah Lormore (she/her), and I am a YLab student at One Stone’s Lab51. My Why Statement is “to use my creative potential in order to forge connections with others and create change.” My favorite way to connect with people and do good is through theater and performance. Theater allows people to escape for a couple hours and find joy in what they’re watching. As a performer, it allows me to share the experiences and emotions of a character. In the current state of the world, I see and hear about so many people struggling to stay connected to the people and things that they love, so it’s important to me that I do good by spreading joy and happiness to people, and helping them feel connected to something. I have been a part of Idaho Regional Ballet’s production of The Nutcracker for nine years. This year, we weren’t sure what The Nutcracker would look like due to COVID-19 restrictions. Our studio built a blackbox theater this summer in order to have our own space for performances. We wore masks while dancing and restaged the performance to allow for social distancing. As it became clear that we weren’t going to be able to have an audience, we decided to livestream our shows. This allowed family members who couldn’t normally come to watch our performance. We were able to have audiences from all around the US, and also from several locations around the world, including places like Spain, Germany, and Norway. Through our performances, we were able to spread joy and holiday cheer to those who were able to watch. It was unbelievable that we were able to overcome all the obstacles that we did. It involved many hours, at least five different pivots, and blood, sweat, and many many tears, but it was so rewarding to be able to share our performances with as many people as we did. I’m so grateful for all the work put in by our teachers, volunteers, tech crew, and the amazing group of girls I get to dance with everyday.

Hannah Bruce

Wherever you are there's always a spider within six feet of you

I’ve now long forgotten where I first heard this saying, but it never failed to take up residence in my mind, and to be honest, I still think about this statistic quite a bit. It’s one of the many things that even though I know it’s not necessarily true, I doubt it will ever leave my mind.

What if you’re skydiving? That seems entirely impossible. Swimming? Snowstorm? I used to spend hours thinking about this question and how it could be possible for these bugs to be so common to be almost everywhere. I think about these sometimes when I have the window open at night and can hear the crickets chirping outside thinking about how close I am to a black widow or a brown recluse or even just a more common house spider.

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Hello, My name is Hannah Bruce and I am a first-year DLab student at One Stone and I was also part of the first wave of X-Lab here, and at least in my opinion, I have grown quite a bit since joining the community here. Most of the information on my T-Popper has been subject to me being given the time and experiences to find what I’m passionate about and to find things that I want to pursue through the open learning style. I have found myself growing in different parts of environmental science, writing skills, and becoming a more empathetic person. These passions are specifically what brought me to want to share this artifact as my submission. My artifact is an art piece and an excerpt from a personal essay that I wrote during my Human Nature immersion and is what I based the drawing upon. This project (however weirdly insignificant it may seem being about an interaction with a spider and all) worked to help me deepen my understanding of the creatures, both with a bit of light research on the topic and in reflective writing. The art piece is an attempted extension of that, it’s a visual of a thought that I used to have constantly and that was the myth that there was always a spider within six feet of you. It’s a drawing of two people skydiving with an excerpt explaining my past with the topic. As for doing good with this project, I wanted the essay to make people pause and think back to experiences they have had with animals that they didn’t know much about, and therefore, didn’t feel bad about killing. I wanted to promote more empathy among animals that normally don’t get “fawned” over as much and therefore don’t get as much respect or warmth from us because they aren’t something that we have deemed worthy of it.

Hannah Thompson

I am Hannah Thompson and I love people! In 2015, my family went to Thailand to help save girls from human trafficking. We lived on a campus with about one hundred girls and spoke the language every day. Ever since then, I have loved to spend time getting to know and understand people. Some of the most important things in my life are my family, my faith and friends. I value kindness, compassion and loyalty. I believe that there can be good in almost every situation. That doesn’t mean that sad things don’t happen but there is always hope. Doing good is an amazing and big term that could refer to building a well in Africa or it could be the most simple small thing that nobody sees but, no matter the size, all pieces of doing good matter. After moving back from Thailand we moved into a little house on the Boise Bench. We gradually got to the point where we knew most of the people on our street deeper than just by name. This fall, after coming to One Stone and making so many new connections, I felt for the first time, a strong community with people at One Stone. We did a raking project for some of my neighbors who were elderly and would really appreciate the extra help. It was amazing to see the community of us all coming together to make somebody's day better. I was surprised and glad by the community I felt with my neighbors and my immersion pod members when we were all done. That is why I created this artifact of nature art with leaves! It is a simple way to show beauty and it helps me to remember the community and good we were a part of. Another reason why this raking/community project stood out to me is because I get sad when people are lonely or alone. Raking leaves for me is an amazing way to connect and show your appreciation for your neighbor in a simple way. I don’t want people to be lonely or sad and I think simple ways like raking leaves or shoveling snow are great ways to put a smile on someone's face. I have enjoyed learning more about myself during my first couple months at One Stone and I am excited to continue to. One thing that really stood out to me and that I have learned about myself is my love for understanding people. I love people!

Hannah Vargas

My name is Hannah Vargas. I am in XLab and have been attending One Stone through quarantine this past school year. I applied to be at this school with the hopes that it would provide a safe environment and effective learning strategies for me, and so far, I have been more than impressed with how professional and engaging the immersions are. I have a deep love for anything and everything artistically crafted, and I admire people who can portray the darkness of humanity through their works. I find joy in nature, and I like to locate intricacy in everyday objects. I feel strongly connected to animals, and I prefer them to humans. I enjoy investigating and learning about dark, and often strange, topics in history, and I am very interested in psychology. Nature and art are some of my most valued subjects and are a key section of my T Popper, so I combined them for this particular artifact of learning to showcase several native Idaho plant species using watercolor technique. To accomplish this, I used my skills developed during my Landscape Watercolor immersion, employing both accurate tracing and watercolor painting to make realistic renderings of the plants. To me, doing good is understanding a problem and being willing to take action to fix it. That is why I was so impressed and inspired when learning about nature conservation in Idaho. There are so many opportunities for land to be destroyed and developed for buildings, neighborhoods, workplace facilities, etc., but there will always be a need for balance between the amount of wildlife we take and how much we leave. During my immersion surrounding nature and watercolor, I attended an interview with an Idaho activist who makes it their priority to keep that balance and examine development plans and other laws to ensure no protected land will be harmed. Their work is difficult, because it requires them to stand up to our government and push back against companies that are being destructive in their land usage. It is important work, however, and provides us with natural habitats that we can enjoy freely. Though my artworks may not be much, I made them out of respect for the work done by conservation activists to show that part of the reason these plants still exist today is due to the work of those fighting to protect our environment. My watercolor artifacts depict plants native to Idaho, and are related to what breaks my heart because so much fighting has to be done in order to preserve the habitat these plants reside in. It is precious for us to even have access to view these plants in real life. Realizing this made me empathize deeply with nature conservation workers and inspired me to do my own part in bringing awareness to the environment that surrounds us. So I made these art pieces to show my peers exactly what environmental activists are fighting for and why we should appreciate them so much. I hope that these watercolors not only give an example of what we are privileged to have, but also inspire others to do their part in preserving our small slice of wildlife. Over these past ten weeks, I have learned that I care about nature more than I thought I did, and I am now interested in investigating how I can take part in preserving our natural environment.

Henry Fears

Hello my name is Henry Fears, and I am a DLab student at One Stone. At One Stone we create a T-Popper, and T-Poppers are a visual representation of all of the different things we as students are passionate about. Some of the most important parts of my T-Popper are the things that make up my life. Some of those things include mountain biking, photography, astronomy, and technology. The digital artifact I chose to share relates to my passions for technology. Over the past several weeks I have been working with a 3D modeling software called Blender. I created my artifact in Blender, and it represents solar panels absorbing sunlight and transferring that into electricity to power a car. My artifact means a lot to me because it shows what I am passionate about, and it represents a global goal I would like to help accomplish. I have also been working on a design lab project that is about renewable and clean energy. In researching and working on clean energy problems, I hope to influence others to look at their lives and consider their impact on the world. To me, doing good in the world means putting something out there that has a positive impact on someone or something. I look forward to helping our community take steps towards transitioning to cleaner energy.

Hunter Romano

My name is Hunter. I am a YLab student at One Stone’s Lab 51. I have always loved art. Throughout my life, there are few times that I wasn’t creating something. It has always been one of my biggest passions. One Stone, however, has helped me learn to branch out and find new passions. The most recent of which was Model United Nations (MUN). Because of this, I decided that for my piece I would use art to show my MUN experience, a new passion captured through an old passion. It also aligns perfectly with my Why statement - connection through creation creation through connection - because I connected with people through MUN and created this piece to show that. To me, Being the Good means still being connected and an active community member, even through the current limitations. The piece Itself depicts the day of the MUN conference. In this conference, we were required to dress professionally(dress shirt, tie, and blazer). However, I decided that, as it was online and no one would see my bottom half, I would also be wearing pajama pants. This moment captures this fall term perfectly. Obviously I would never be able to wear pajama pants at an in-person conference, but because it was still offered virtually, I was able to participate and wear pajamas. This term has been a rollercoaster. But through the ups and downs One Stone and Lab 51 has flourished, not just as a “school” but as a community, an army of good for good. Even though there are a lot of limitations right now, there is always a way to connect and to create.

Idris James

I am Idris James, a YLabber who started his One Stone journey last year in 2019. I had come to One Stone with a background in orchestral performance, and I had known that I wanted to take my hobby of music in a new direction at One Stone. The first day of school I knew I was ready start exploring music, but what I didn’t know was that I would be stepping into a new world, my passion. The songs I write represent my thoughts and emotions, and are mostly written in the moment. I find that music has been a great outlet for me to express myself, to speak my mind. For the last year I've been working on songwriting and music production, spending a majority of my time learning each step of the process, finding confidence and happiness through music. I have written a lot this year but the biggest things to come out of this process were these four songs, Friday, Postcard, Goodbye and Room for me. I think these four tracks are a great representation of my development as an artist, a producer and as a person. They not only show a change in style and show my improvement as a producer, but they also show my increased confidence and vulnerability. My songs have gotten more personal as time has gone on and I own it all to the confidence music has given me. I want people to listen to what I make and find joy in it, relate to it, sing to it, find inspiration from it and to create good from that inspiration. I want people to draw creative confidence from me like I do from so many of my peers at One Stone. I want to use this skill that I have to bring people joy, as well as help them create art of their own.

Isobel Wingrove

Hello, my name is Isobel Wingrove, and I am an XLab student at One Stone. Some major components of my TPopper are dance, LGBTQ+ rights and history, and working with kids. My artifact was a slideshow of pictures that show various things that I have gained from working on XLab’s Halloween Xtravaganza. This relates to my TPopper because I was working with kids and dancing the entirety of the Halloween Xtravaganza. 

To do good to me is to improve the lives of others. It could be something huge, like paying somebody’s bills, or buying somebody a house, or it could be something small, like offering somebody part of your lunch because they forgot theirs. I was given the opportunity to help teach dance to younger students at my studio, so I took it, and now I help teach three classes on Wednesdays. I was given the opportunity to plan a booth with a team for the Xtravaganza, and I discovered that I enjoy working with kids more than I thought I did. This artifact is reflective of my idea of good because I improved many people’s lives. I improved many kids’ lives by giving them something fun and memorable to do.

This artifact reflects what breaks my heart because the isolation and loneliness during the “quarantine” period from March to May impacted me negatively, so I can’t imagine what it must have been like for younger kids. Given how important Halloween is to me, it must be hard for kids who can’t go out and trick-or-treat. This artifact reflects the good I want to do because we engineered a Covid-19 safe event that was fun and memorable for the kids, and we did it mainly by ourselves. 

This experience inspires others to do good because we saw a problem, and as a team we figured out how to solve some of it. This should inspire other people to do good, because they can see a problem and then come up with a way to solve it. If a group of teenagers can do good, why can’t you do good?

Over these past 10 weeks, I have learned that as a person, I tend to gravitate towards more creative things versus logical and scientific things. I have learned that I like working with kids, and I like solving problems. I’ve learned that I’m passionate about connection during the pandemic. I haven’t learned more about my purpose yet, but I can feel that soon, I’ll discover at least part of my purpose.

Ivy Chen

To me, doing good can mean spreading positivity, educating, lending a helping hand and so much more. Hello my name is Ivy and this is my second year at One Stone. Growing up in Idaho, I've spent a lot of time backpacking and camping with my family and have always cared greatly about animals and nature. My experiences over the past couple of months have given me a chance to connect with people in creative ways and inspired me to want to make a change for the better of our community. I hope to do this by educating people about small-scale environmental change along with encouraging everyone to learn more about the natural world. Spending time outside can do many different things for you. I have personally used it as a way to ground myself, safely spend time with people I care about during the global pandemic, and become more aware of my surroundings and the changes that need to be made to help our planet thrive. I have participated in several One Stone experiences based around the natural environment and applying my passion for art. I love that no matter how much time I have spent in nature, there is always something to learn and something I have never seen before. This ongoing learning inspires me to be the good and do my part to preserve the natural world around me.

Izzy Martin

In my eyes, to “Do Good” means sharing something of yours such as time, affection, resources, or kind words in order to benefit another person. The sacrifice you give, no matter how small, shows that specific person that they are worthy of being loved and cared for. Through learning what breaks my heart, I have discovered how I want to “Be the Good”. This past summer and fall, I have had lots of opportunities shut down. I have felt so much anxiety and uncertainty. I have watched our country’s experience change and conflict. All these feelings were channeled into the song I helped write at my Boise Rock mission lab. The election, racism, changing weather, and depression became a verse, a chorus, and a bridge. I felt my anxious feelings become represented in the lyrics. Feeling trapped in our negative emotions breaks my heart, but through music we can find a form of release. Writing this song has helped me channel my negative feelings, and I hope in sharing this song that it will help others process their own feelings. Maybe this song can “be the good” in more than just my life. Over these past ten weeks, I have learned that I truly do love music. More specifically, I love playing music and creating it with other people. I have really enjoyed bonding with a few friends who participated in this mission lab with me. We had to learn to work together, get over drawbacks, and in the end create something worth sharing. Part of my T-popper was aimed at advancing my passion for music and playing in a band. I also wanted to focus on building relationships and investing in different people in my life. Through this experience, I definitely have done both of those things. I am so grateful for this opportunity, and I hope my artistic expression will continue to do good in the world.

Jack Long

My name is Jack Long, I am in Dlab 2 and I love life. I love you, I love earth, I love me. I have learned a lifetime's worth of knowledge in the last 10 weeks and I couldn't be more grateful. I have learned how to live my life in a way that is fulfilling and radiant. I have learned how to spread my happiness and put my creative energies into many different forms like gardening and writing. I have learned all about nature, geology, and life through the community garden and both the (human nature) and Land+Scape+Water+Color immersions so far. In the second immersion I learned so much about life and how nature is part of us. I have been able to satisfy my curiosity and improve my livelihood because of my learnings. On my TPopper my passions for being in the wilderness, snowboarding, fishing, rafting, and more are what gives me happiness. I have learned so much about nature and its origins, about our origins. I have learned how we humans are a part of a grand ecosystem we call earth and how to save it by altering our lifestyles for the better. When I play music it's an idea coming to life, its thoughts and emotions taking their own abstract physical form. It's a life form that holds inspiration and ideas. And all of my knowledge and insights that I have gained from the last 10 weeks going through immersions 1 and 2 and the community garden are represented in this song. To me, doing good means being present and aware. Be caring and thoughtful to others around you. Love everyone as a whole. Love everything as it is. Live in accordance with the present moment and try to help people see this. I want to have the influences on people that other people have had on me to put me in the position I am in now. This experience inspires others to do good because it is original and relative to what they are doing in their lives. Exploring their passions and learning, which is what I have been doing at One Stone and that's what my music is to me. I have learned that I am passionate about having fun, nature, and learning. I want everyone to be happy like me and so that is my purpose - Helping people become a better person.

Jake Hurst

thank you onestone for showing me how to make greener pastures without expensive machinery!

Jake Hurst My name is Jake Hurst, I’m 17 years old and I live in Idaho. I've always been a lone wolf of a sort, I tend to keep to myself as much as I can. I don't have an issue with socializing with others but I can get more done alone. I am very black and white, there isn't anything really unique about me or the way I present myself, and I like that about me. I don't need any unnecessary attention so I keep things simple. I’ve always loved helping people, even when I was little I would always hold the door open for others and I would always give my all to ensure that others are happy. To this day I am the counselor of my friend group, I have helped others through the darkest pits of life and I’ve always been there for anyone who needs me. I enjoy hard work, especially tree removal. There is something gratifying about doing a lot of work and seeing the good that comes out of it, at the end of the day I may be sore but it is a good burn. My T popper perfectly reflects my personality and interests, as it should. This artifact relates to my T popper because everything on my T popper is about hard work and the outdoors. I only ever get feelings of true joy if I’m outdoors, I guess that’s just how I was meant to be. To do good in my eyes is the art of helping others and taking action to spread joy and to aid the downtrodden. Many people have many definitions, and that is just the way it needs to be. If everyone had the same definition of what it means to do good then we would only be doing good in one area, for me, empathy and labor are where I excel. For others it could be patience and nurturing. Either way there are opportunities for good to be done in every aspect of our lives and there is a plethora of people who can do that good, they just need guidance on how to turn their potential into action. If I am being completely honest the biggest thing that breaks my heart is death, and next to that is lost potential. I wouldn't say that this artifact reflects what breaks my heart. This artifact reflects on the things that fill my heart. I absolutely love helping others, I love the outdoors, I love hard work, and this artifact shows it all. I believe that it's important to focus on what fills your heart before you focus on what breaks your heart, that way you are able to refill your cup if it gets emptied while you focus on sad things. I hope that my artifact can inspire others to get outside and to understand that hard work does in fact pay off. All of the little things that were done at my cabin make huge differences in the way we live our lives up there. We are able to have a good time and to be happy because we put in the work. I hope that others can understand that a good work ethic will propel you so far in life and it will also allow you to help others to a great extent. Over the last ten weeks I’ve realized that doing good comes in all sorts of fashions. I usually show appreciation by helping people with hard work but due to corona and my knee injury, I’ve had to adapt. One Stone showed me that doing good empathetically can be just as meaningful as 6 hours of back breaking work. For example, I wasn't able to see my grandparents for a while because of the virus so I wrote them a 3 page letter to tell them how much they mean to me and how happy I am to have them in my life. My grandma told me that she wasn't having the best day and that when she got my letter it totally changed her mood and made her feel a lot better. She called me in tears of joy to tell me how much it meant to her and that is a feeling that can't be replaced.

Jaken Warnke

Hello my name is Jaken and my goal in life is to live in a state of contentment. During COVID I have tried to work on applying my why statement which is, to better myself so that I can be true to others. One of the ways that I have been specifically doing this is through working out with my dad. About two months ago, I created a list of what I needed to do to be the best version of myself. This was during a period of time when I was doing nothing besides sitting on my phone and I wasn’t feeling so great because of that. I finally got tired of it and decided to visualize and write down how I could be better. Since then, I have been able to check off a few things on my list, one of them being working out and accepting my body. I started working out around mid-November and I have noticed since working out, my mental and physical health has gotten much better as well as my relationship with my father. I’ve started to eat more each day which I have struggled with in the past, which gives my dad and me something else we can do together. What I really learned during this time is how much helping and caring for yourself can make a difference with your relationship with others. Because I’m more physically active I am also more alert and attentive. I’m able to identify needs and wants with others more clearly and respond in a better fashion. If I don’t take care of myself, it also has an impact on the people around me. I end up being more on edge and unnecessarily reactive. So, to combat this I try to work on bettering myself and my mental well being. In conclusion, through working out and visualizing how I can be better, I’ve improved my relationship with my father as well as bettering myself. I also have further realized improving the lives of people around you can happen through you improving your own.

James Silveria

The Silveria Story

Hello, my name is James Silveria and I am a first-year DLab student at One Stone. I have been spending the last two years “Exploring the mystery of my future” and this has led me to have some awesome experiences. To do good means to do anything that makes someone or everyone around you feel better, inspired, or hopeful. Even if it is just one single person you are doing something amazing. The single experience that stands out most to me is the cycles of life immersion and the research I did to look into the construction happening on Highway 55. I chose this artifact because it was inspiring to me, it made me start to think about something that would normally be overlooked by most people. I did this project to learn more about this construction and how it will affect the amazing wildlife and beautiful view that I get to see almost every weekend while going to tamarack. I truly don't want to see this area destroyed just so we can have faster speed limits. It truly saddened me to see that because they were so far away from a major city or town that many tests and regulations such as noise and air quality testing were overlooked because it wouldn't immediately be affecting humans. I wanted to raise awareness and let people know that constructions such as these may be amazing for our vacation drives but maybe not as great for the wildlife that makes these drives so beautiful. I hope others reading this see the impact that construction has on our world, and while things like this can and will not stop because the treasure valley is growing so quickly I do hope everyone realizes and appreciates what happens. I also think that all construction should have to go through all of the testing and that it could lead to new tactics for getting the same hard jobs done in a cleaner and more efficient way.

JD Rice

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

Hi, my name is JD Rice, a YLabber here at Lab51. For my summer experience, I wanted to make something that would make an impact on our community and answer the call that others are missing a sense of community and belonging. Using my knowledge and love for serving coffee and loving others, I decided to create a coffee shop to inspire community in a time that is especially tough to feel a part of something. In the One Stone way, I wanted to create a coffee shop with a punny name, so I decided to name it Common Grounds. Common Grounds has been in the works since June and will hopefully roll out after the holiday break. I have been doing lots of research to learn a range of things from whether this coffee shop is wanted to what beans I will be using in the shop. I am so extremely excited about this opportunity and to serve the community around me. Through my time at One Stone, I have found my personal why statement to be “Engage with meaning so that everyone belongs.” Right now times are tough, It may feel difficult to understand where you belong or what you have to be thankful for around you. I have been dealing with all of this throughout my time in quarantine and being away from my in-person community. That breaks my heart that others may be feeling the same. For me, being able to connect with others and be a person that listens in a time that is most needed is vital to building community. I plan on being an additional piece of in-person meetings at Lab 51, and One Stone after school projects. Whether it’s serving the ladies at Empow[HER] or bringing a little caffeine to the early coach meetings, I am pumped to bring people together through something I am personally passionate about. Doing good means that you are being selfless in your acts to the things and people around you, resulting in joy and happiness in others, and even yourself unintentionally. I believe that Common Grounds will reflect “good” because the entire goal of the shop is to bring together others and create joy through the small service of slinging coffee and deepening the relationships that exist through One Stone.

Jillian Howard

My name is Jillian Howard, this is my first year with Lab51. My passions take root everywhere. I take particular interest in technology, medicine, psychology, management, and hands-on activities. This artifact represents my love for technology paired with my passion for medicine. Biomedical technology is a new found interest of mine thanks to the NINDS Biotechnology Essay competition that I competed in this last year. To do Good, to me, means doing your best to benefit yourself, others, or your environment. By exploring biotechnology I am able to continue to open my mind to passions and interests that I otherwise would not have gotten to experience. This artifact represents that by creating an interest in a different topic for me, broadening my perspective of medicine. The experience of writing this artifact represents a real issue in medicine of mental illnesses.This is something that I connect with, and I believe that it is a heart-breaking issue. This experience should inspire others to do research on what they are passionate about and continue to look at their passions, because they are ever-growing. In the past 10 weeks I have experienced some amazing things and topics with amazing people that I hope to work with again. It has definitely deepened my passions for medicine and technology, and brought up some new passions within these fields.

Josh Backer

My name is Josh Backer, I’m a YLab student at One Stone’s Lab51. My personal why statement is “inspire others through what I do so they can find their potential.” I think that my artifact ties really well into that, because I think that I have had such amazing opportunities that other people probably won't get to have and I almost feel like it’s my duty to try and pay it forward as much as I can with my skills to help inspire and encourage others to try and reach their full potential. I think that my experience going to Idaho city perfectly reflects my why. I was able to hopefully help those students be more inspired and encouraged to pursue game development in the future if that’s what they want to do.

I think that it’s really important to do good in the world. I think doing good in my own personal way is extremely important, in a day and age where it’s becoming so easy to just settle for what’s easy and be discouraged by the success by everyone else compared to themselves, it just breaks my heart to think of how many people just give up when they are capable of such amazing things but just couldn’t reach them for one reason or another. I want to be able to help those people. I want to be able to lift those people up and show them that they’re capable and that they could be doing such great things in the world and that they should be doing those things. My hope is that if I’m able to bring other people up and elevate them, it will trigger a ripple effect and the people I elevated will elevated others until theres not a single person on this planet that settles for less.

Having the opportunity to help with that workshop was amazing. With all the skills that I’ve gained over the past year I had almost kind of lost sight of why I wanted to do what I wanted to do. After doing this workshop it reframed my view and realigned my goals and I couldn’t be more grateful for having the experience.

Kaleb Churchwell

While growing up you never realize how important your view of yourself can be. I always knew I liked being a certain way, and that I was good at doing certain things, but me? I didn’t know how to view myself. Throughout my time at One Stone I have been pushed to ask that question many times, and I will never know if I am right but at least I tried. I have a sense of self that I never had before. My name is Kaleb Churchwell, I am a student attending One Stone’s Lab51, I am an artist, a people person, a sister, and a friend. I work to see others as they are and who they want to be, highlighting friendships, and working to push the boundaries of my creativity. Here is my vision statement: a way for me to guide myself with my morals and true intentions throughout my time on this earth. This statement reads: “Serving with passion. Leading with promise. Loving with purpose.” In my opinion, to be able to do good in your community you also have to do good for yourself. This can be small, impact seems like such a complex feeling to inflict, but even a smile can have an impact. We live in a world where you have to share what you did, where it has to be big, blingy almost to seem important, but I don’t believe in that. Doing good for yourself impacts others, taking time to share your passion, doing what you believe in, letting your moral guide you, that can be your way of “doing good.” The artifact I chose to share is an essay I wrote for the NIH Brain Initiative Competition: Considering Ethics During Brain Technology Development. I chose this because even an opinion, a chance to share your side of the story can make an impact on how the world evolves. A lot of people feel like they will never be able to have an opinion on such a complicated issue, but I said “Why not? What's the worst that could happen, they don't agree with what I said? Well at least I made them think.” Sometimes that's all you can do, the more questions you ask, the more chances you have to make a difference. The way you do good should never be put in a box! Explore your passion, share your voice, and make people think.

Kayla Klein

The past few months have been some of the most eye opening times I have ever had. Applying to college has truly been an emotional rollercoaster. I anticipated it would be easy and quick, but instead I have spent countless hours reflecting on who I am and how my high school experiences have shaped me. This process made me appreciate One Stone even more than I did before… which I thought was impossible. Never in my life I have felt so lucky to be a part of something until I fell in love with OS. I have made contributions to my community that I never would have otherwise and have been shown what it means to be believed in. Because of One Stone I have grown into the young woman I always dreamed of being. While I am excited to start a new chapter in my life, it also brings me great sadness to think I will be moving on from what I have now. I wish that I could stay here forever. But I can’t. I know that the future has so many good things in store for me, and I will be ready to embrace them along with the challenges of life. I know that I am ready for anything because the One Stone community has prepared me for the road ahead and for that I am forever grateful. After taking these couple months to look back on my time and experiences at OS, I am overwhelmed with all of the things I have contributed to my community and all of the GOOD I bring to each and every experience. This college essay is representative of the idea of “Be the Good” because it shows how I have embodied that through hard work and grit over time.