This story is part of an annual La Vista tradition called Senior Goodbyes. For the last issue of each school year, La Vista’s seniors reflect on their years at Costa in the Opinion section. For more senior goodbyes, see here.
By Jackie Lee
Web Editor-in-Chief
Thank you, Mira Costa, for giving me four unforgettable years, caring teachers who value dreams and opportunities to mold a beautiful future.
Mira Costa has given my family the world. Both of my older sisters, Connie and Karen Lee, and I have smiled, laughed and cheered our way through school spirit days. Mira Costa is a school that cultivates its students, letting them choose their own path and decide their own future.
My living room wall bears flags from Brown Medical School, Duke, Columbia Law School and now the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. My parents have a dream for my sisters and me: to become a triangle of power with a doctor, a lawyer and a businesswoman.
This dream is the hope they carried in their hearts as they delivered flowers at 4 a.m. Christmas Day for 30 straight years, saving every penny for the education they planned on giving my sisters and me.
We have internalized this wish and have chosen our own separate career paths. Even though Costa is a public school, it has given us even more skills than any private school could.
I have had four absolutely marvelous years at Costa. There are times when studying steals my sleep, and times when my peers behave less than admirably. These times have tested my endurance and my view on life.
At the same time, English teachers have taught me the art of expression, Spanish teachers have taught me to love other cultures, history teachers have taught me to widen my horizons, and math teachers have taught me systems and patterns that define the universe. However, I have also learned outside of classes.
La Vista has also been hugely important to me. Production weeks (full of midnight snack runs, pounding music and “cupcake baseball”) have implanted a wish to leave my mark on La Vista. This aspiration led me to create La Vista’s first website.
I am beyond euphoric when I think about what next year’s web editors will achieve. In advance, I’d like to thank these brave souls for taking on the daunting task of creating an entire web section of La Vista, and I encourage them to make a mark and be proud of it.
I embark on this next chapter of my life happy to leave Costa, not because I am running away in disgust or with regrets, but because I believe Costa has fully prepared me to take on fellow Whartonites at UPenn next year.
The best advice I can give is this: Take on high school with a mind to succeed and plan on leaving high school with only pride and no regret.
This June 24, watch me, for I’ll leave Mira Costa with a smile and a grateful heart.
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