While balancing academics with extracurriculars can be a formidable challenge, for senior Aaron Chen, it is a well-practiced routine, fueled by his passion for learning and unwavering commitment to his robotics team. His determination and curiosity guides him not only during the numerous hours he spends perfecting his CAD designs, but also through nearly everything he does.

After seeing the intricately designed robots at the club fair as a frosh, Aaron was initially intimidated by their complexity but his curiosity led him to join the team in his sophomore year. Since he wanted to stay committed to robotics even outside of the lab, Aaron initially joined the Mech Mach team but later switched to design due to its adaptability to be practiced anywhere with just a computer. 

Throughout his high school career, Aaron spent considerable time on robotics overseeing and contributing to the creation of 3D models of competition robots. As the current Design Director of the robotics team, Aaron’s work begins at the start of each season, with a rush to design the robot as quickly and thoroughly as possible. He works tirelessly, often dedicating many hours each week during the build season and coordinating with other sub-teams to ensure everything aligns. 

“Robotics definitely helps with high management,” Aaron said. “It just gives you a stress test where you can see if you have techniques that actually work. You’re pulling those insane amount of hours on robotics, so you have to take that time from somewhere else. I’ve learned to be a lot more efficient with everything else and dedicate this like ridiculous amount of time to robotics.”

Yet despite the long hours and occasional obstacles, such as a robot malfunctioning at a competition, his resilience has been a key to his success. 

“Robotics taught me to take the initiative a lot more,” Aaron said. “It taught me that with enough effort, you can basically get anything done as long as you just try, keep trying, and don’t back down. This sense of determination really comes out in other things if you just pick anything and just stick to it until you become really good at it. For robotics, it’s especially special since you also have other aspects like collaboration and managing a large team that you don’t get with a lot of other activities.”

Aaron’s greatest contribution to robotics consists of his leadership skills. For instance, when the design leadership team lost motivation during the 2024 season, Aaron quickly stepped up despite not being a formal design director. He took on additional responsibilities and coordinated with other team members to ensure the team met their deadlines. For Aaron, the reward of participating in robotics lies in seeing his perseverance pay off by watching his hard work transform into tangible results.

“I was able to fairly quickly adapt, and we were able to get it out even though it was a pretty complicated robot design,” Aaron said. “I was pretty proud that we actually managed to pull it off. My favorite part of robotics is when the robot finally works, since you poured maybe 400 to 500 hours into it. All the people next to you have also poured equal amounts of time into it, and it’s the final satisfaction of seeing it actually do the thing you wanted to do and not break apart.”

Robotics director and computer science department chair Eric Nelson witnessed Aaron’s determination firsthand not just through robotics but also as a student in his Neural Networks class. He highlights how Aaron’s responsibility has always set him apart from his peers, from Aaron’s strong performance in the difficult class, to submitting all his work on time.

“Aaron was one of my top performing students in Neural Networks,” Dr Nelson said. “It’s difficult to maintain those high standards across the board with everything that we do in Neural Networks, because it’s not just, ‘oh, yeah, the code has to work.’ It has to be written to my coding standards and there’s a lot that has to be done in order to maintain at that level. Woody Allen said 80% of success is just showing up. And so Aaron’s got that 80% of success down pretty well at an early age.”

Close friend senior Akul Goyal, a fellow member of the robotics team, notices Aaron’s dedication and discipline shapes everything he does. His strong sense of accountability and his thirst for knowledge shines through, whether he’s managing a heavy workload or engaging in extracurricular activities.

“If you look at his academics, his work, extracurriculars or robotics, he’s always on time,” Akul said. “He’s always dedicated, and he puts in a lot of effort and hard work. Having that level of commitment and then being able to handle his emotions and not get mad when things don’t go his way is really critical, and that’s something that nobody else on the robotics team has.”

From an early age, curiosity has been a driving force behind Aaron’s achievements, including learning to ski. Senior Eric Li, a close friend since third grade, admires his resilience, particularly in the ways he approaches challenges.

“I ski with him,” Eric said. “And initially when we started out, I was much better than him, but since he wanted to ski at the same level as I could, he put in a lot of time into that. And there are a lot of other activities that I can see he dedicates a lot of time to.”

Although he acknowledges that he was extraordinarily scared of the harder runs at first, Aaron’s eagerness drove him to attempt them. When others might shy away from difficulty, he constantly steps up, determined to improve. Aaron’s resilience in skiing aligns with his attitude towards robotics and other hobbies, ultimately reflecting his perseverant mindset in whatever he does.

“There’s sort of an evolution in my love for learning, but it’s also inherent. For most stuff that I did, I just got curious and then got more curious, and then got more curious cause it’s been like a pretty big snowball. The stuff that intimidates me motivates me — it’s just the unknown, right? It scares you, but you see you see people doing it, so it’s clearly possible. So I see that and wonder why can’t I do that? If I if I try hard, I can do that, so I just do that to see what it’s like.”