Erin Ye is one of Huntington High School’s high-powered incoming seniors. The teenager has succeeded at everything she has tried over the past three years and she anticipates her senior year will be the best one yet.
“I’ve had a very productive and fulfilling summer,” Ms. Ye said. “Since May, I’ve been working on a machine learning project with researchers from Stony Brook University and Boston College. We’re studying belief and sentiment in English, Spanish and Chinese texts. It’s been a super rewarding experience and I believe it’s an amazing project with huge real life applications. It’s definitely provided me with insight on what I want to do career wise in the future.”
The teenager said she has also been devoting many hours to a part-time job and to planning and hosting events for the organization, Linguistics League, “which aims to provide more learning and collaborative opportunities for high schoolers interested in language and linguistics,” Ms. Ye said.
The summer hasn’t been all work. “The rest of my time has been spent with friends and family,” Ms. Ye said.
The Class of 2022 member enters her final year at Huntington High School with high hopes and enthusiasm for a challenging slate of classes, sports, clubs and elected student government office.
“I’m really excited for senior year and to take full advantage of the time I have left at Huntington,” Ms. Ye said. “I plan on continuing to compete on the cross country and track teams, which have definitely been a highlight of high school and through which I’ve met some of my best friends.”
The dynamic teenager said she is also “excited” to continue as editor of the high school’s student newspaper, The Dispatch and “hopefully get more people involved with working on it,” Ms. Ye added. “Finally, being a senior class officer means that I’ll be spending a lot of time planning for prom, homecoming and other events for the student body and the Class of 2022.”
Ms. Ye said her schedule of classes “looks really promising” and she is “especially excited” to be taking Advanced Placement Psychology with teacher Peter Crugnale and AP Physics with Stacey Byrnes, “since both are classes I’ve wanted to take since I was a freshman,” she added. “I’m continuing into AP Latin with Mrs. [Kristin] Fortunato, Science Research with Mrs. [Lori] Kenny and Symphony Orchestra with Mr. [James] DiMeglio, all of which have been favorites of mine these past few years. I’m also taking Discrete Math, an online college course through SUNY Empire State College and I feel ready for the learning experiences and challenges that lie ahead with that.”
The Huntington senior said she is looking to major in linguistics and/or cognitive science in college, “imagining a career in something like research, curriculum development or artificial intelligence, but I don’t really have all of that figured out,” Ms. Ye said.
The teenager has been reflecting on various college possibilities, too. “I know I’m looking for somewhere with a vibrant student body and lots of opportunities for research and studying abroad,” Ms. Ye said. “My list is rather long, but some schools that have stood out include the University of Michigan, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.