- June 18Drake froze the city. But did he thaw the doubt?
- June 122026 recap: Spring sports highlights
- June 10Bay Area embraces East, South Asian cultures
- June 5Alumni startup founders discuss career advice in panel
- June 4Honors Chemistry students end the year off with a boom during hydrogen rocket lab
- June 2Tasty Tidbits: Leshan Beef delivers authentic Chinese flavors, comforting dining experience
- June 2BTS “ARIRANG” cultivates false hope despite commercial success
- June 1Dream your dreams with Harker Aquila
- June 1Humans of Harker: Laws of life
- June 1Humans of Harker: Value in violin
![“I wasn't discouraged by some of the obstacles we faced. I learned a lot from the leadership. I found that different people need different ways of receiving feedback — you can't [just] tell them to do something and expect the best. [Some] people needed more incentive. A large part of my role was to figure out what worked for everyone and to figure out how to lead all these separate individuals as a team,” Suhana Bhandare (’26) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/SuhanaBhandare_JasmineHansra-1-1200x798.jpg)
![“This is actually from Randy Pausch Randy P. Brick: ‘Walls are there for a reason. You have to show how much you want to overcome them.’ You have to show how much you want something. That's what I've always been able to do with tennis, Link Crew and getting that internship [with Kushy Baby]. It’s important pushing through that — getting around that brick wall, climbing over it or clawing through it,” Yash Sachdeva (’26) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/YashSachdeva_RamBatchu-copy-1200x1002.jpg)
![“[Building nerf blasters] became this outlet of creativity for me that hasn't been matched by anything else. The process [of] making a build complete to your desire is such a painstakingly difficult process, but I've had to learn from [the skills needed from] soldering to proper painting. There's so many different options for everything, if you think about it, it exists. The best part is [that] if it doesn't exist, you can build it yourself," Ishaan Parate said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/DSC_8149-900x604.jpg)
![“When I came into high school, I was ready to be a follower. But DECA was a game changer for me. It helped me overcome my fear of public speaking, and it's played such a major role in who I've become today. To be able to successfully lead a chapter of 150 students, an officer team and be one of the upperclassmen I once really admired is something I'm [really] proud of,” Anvitha Tummala ('21) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Screen-Shot-2021-07-25-at-9.50.05-AM-900x594.png)
![“I think getting up in the morning and having a sense of purpose [is exciting]. I think without a certain amount of drive, life is kind of obsolete and mundane, and I think having that every single day is what makes each day unique and kind of makes life exciting,” Neymika Jain (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Screen-Shot-2017-06-03-at-4.54.16-PM.png)
![“My slogan is ‘slow feet, don’t eat, and I’m hungry.’ You need to run fast to get where you are–you aren't going to get those championships if you aren't fast,” Angel Cervantes (12) said. “I want to do well in school on my tests and in track and win championships for my team. I live by that, [and] I can do that anywhere: in the classroom or on the field.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/DSC5146-900x601.jpg)
![“[Volleyball has] taught me how to fall correctly, and another thing it taught is that you don’t have to be the best at something to be good at it. If you just hit the ball in a smart way, then it still scores points and you’re good at it. You could be a background player and still make a much bigger impact on the team than you would think,” Anya Gert (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AnnaGert_JinTuan_HoHPhotoEdited-600x900.jpeg)
![“I'm not nearly there yet, but [my confidence has] definitely been getting better since I was pretty shy and timid coming into Harker my freshman year. I know that there's a lot of people that are really confident in what they do, and I really admire them. Everyone's so driven and that has really pushed me to kind of try to find my own place in high school and be more confident,” Alyssa Huang (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AlyssaHuang_EmilyChen_HoHPhoto-900x749.jpeg)
![“Most of our entire friend group played basketball in middle school,” Akshaya Vemuri (12) said. “And on one bus ride, we wanted to come up with names for each other that were related to a family. Everyone has their unique identity in the group, and we kind of use their nickname to identify them. [Meena Gudapati (12)] was just writing down a ton of nicknames for me, and she started calling me ‘Akla’ after ‘baklava’ and just shortened it.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/AkshayaVemuri-MK-900x645.jpg)
![“One time, I just went over to [my friend]'s house,” Rishi Iyer (12) said. “I asked him, 'What do you want to do?' and he was like, 'Let's just get in the car and drive around and explore.’ We went into downtown Saratoga, and we took a turn on some random road that looked pretty steep, and we went along it for thirty minutes, and it became this really narrow one lane road going up the mountain, and we eventually just made our way up the mountain, just exploring all these little side roads until we eventually found this little clearing with this amazing view of the entire Bay Area. It was so surreal, just going from being in the house, saying, 'Let's just find something' and just discovering this, just by messing around."](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/RishiIyer-MK-900x601.jpg)
![“[My mom would] take me to different places; she’d take me to a lot of the big cities to where a lot of the fashion designer brands came from," Alan Jiang (12) said. "She would spend hours and hours there — I used to be really mad, because she doesn’t know how to speak English, and we’d stay in the store for four-five hours just to pick one item that she really liked and I had to translate for her, so that’s why I was exposed to a lot of the stuff. Back then, I really hated it — I was really mad at my mom. But afterwards, I was kind of inspired by it.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/AlanJiang-MK-e1526709288176-601x900.jpg)
![“I was kind of obsessed with [iPods]," Kunal Bhandarkar (12) said. "I also kept destroying the ones I had because I always left them in my pocket when they got washed. Eventually, I got interested in the code aspect and started taking classes outside of school. It’s pretty interesting how you can blend hardware and software with robotics and see it come to life just right there in front of you. The feeling you get when it works is the best feeling in the world.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/KunalBhandarkar-MK-1-900x601.jpg)
!["During summer, I had an internship in [San Francisco], and I brought my junior mentality with me, so I was trying to be perfect and I was stressed about everything," Preethi Madabusi (12) said. "The manager sat me down and we had a performance review, so he was analyzing my performance and he said that I was a really hard worker but there was one thing I needed to fix, and that was that I needed to calm down. He said that I tried to be perfect and no one can be perfect. That's when I realized if other people can notice that about me, that's something I should really change."](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/PreethiMadabusi-MK-900x601.jpg)
!["In Spain, I took this picture of this street musician. It was in the night, and it was super grainy and really dark," Neeraj Aggarwal (12) said. "But when I increased the exposure and everything was still grainy, you could see a really big smile on his face and [he was] holding his guitar. There were two children next to him. This picture, to me, is not something I could blow up and print, but that's one of my favorite pictures just because of the moment that I captured... two kids enjoying the musician's music and the musician enjoying the fact that the kids were there."](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/NeerajAggarwal-MK-1-628x900.jpg)
![“One of our players, Floyd [Gordon (12)], made a touchdown during the game, so we were playing some crazy stuff, and then he got injured like on the next play," Bobby Schick (12) said. "So I just got up and started playing ‘Lean On Me’ because I knew how to play it on piano, and I put on saxophone for a second. I started playing it, and our entire section started humming along as they carried him off the field. That was one of those moments where I was like, ‘Wow. Okay. I realize what you can do just by playing a song.’"](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/DS6_2396-e1519703335484-601x900.jpg)
![“A lot of people are skeptical of [my startup] idea; they're not too sure whether it's going to work or not,” Nirban Bhatia (12) said. “They don't necessarily support me in trying it out, and they find ten flaws that people have already told me about. They’re trying to almost pull me down just because they feel it’s something that’s really not going to work. I’ve just got to learn how to take everything with a grain of salt, so I can continue to push forward and make my idea a reality.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/NirbanBhatia-MK-e1510282605351-601x900.jpg)
![“My dad is very curious,” Neelesh Ramachandran (12) said. "He is an engineer, so he obviously knows about electrical engineering and fiber optics, which is what he does, but if you ask him about whatever happened in the War of 1812, he can give you a sort of concise response. The way he thinks is by connecting broad principles, and that’s the way I try to approach learning as a whole. Nobody learns biology and only uses biology, because inherent in biology [are] concepts in chemistry and concepts in physics, so you have to look at everything. Especially this is true within STEM and outside of STEM—you have to be looking at the broader picture and [know] how to combine different domains, different aspects in science. That’s where the power really comes through.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/NeeleshRamachandran-MK-e1510024134433-601x900.jpg)
![“The kids that look up to you matter the most,” Jenna Sanders (12) said. “Sometimes, they’ll just try to be your best friend. It’s important for me to be not only a friend but a teacher for them. When they had trouble reading, I [don’t] just read to them, but help them how to do it independently. It is really cool to figure out a balance between being a friend and being a teacher.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/JennaSanders-MK-e1508980713130-601x900.jpg)
!["What I really eventually hope is that in clinical practice one day, some of the [research] work that I've done will be incorporated to help someone somewhere either get an earlier diagnosis or understand their situation at a better level than they would have before, so my ultimate goal is really just to find a way to use the resources that we have as privileged students of The Harker School to make a difference in someone's life who might not have the same opportunities," Manan Shah (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Screen-Shot-2017-05-06-at-8.20.13-AM.png)
![“On my wrists, I have sayings on it, I'll have my favorite quote, which is actually my senior quote on it, and on the left wrist, I'll have [the names of] everyone who's injured on my team, their numbers on my wrists, so in a way, I'm playing for them," Saketh Gurram (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Screen-Shot-2017-04-24-at-7.47.55-AM-900x598.png)
![“My friends often describe me as a typical Indian auntie or uncle. I do [agree], a lot of my mannerisms are like an Indian auntie or uncle. My ideas and beliefs are much more modern,” Ashwin Rao (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Screen-Shot-2017-04-15-at-8.29.44-AM.png)
![“Right now [I like] chemistry. It’s really fun. I like to see all the molecules work together. Before sophomore year, I hated chemistry, and then I took AP chemistry and it was really fun so now I like it. It was easier and more fun plus we got to blow things up," Judy Pan (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Screen-Shot-2017-04-03-at-8.57.16-PM.png)
!["Sure, it's nice to have results and your final shiny paper, even if it takes so many hours of just struggling and terror, but really, I love [research] because of the monotony of it in very specific moments, where I'm sitting on a plane for like ten hours and I happen to be stuck there just working with my computer. It's a very important, kind of determined feeling that you get when you're really in the zone and working on something that you've been working on for so long and you will continue to work on for so long. I like that monotony,” Antony Sagayaraj (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Screen-Shot-2017-03-24-at-7.41.07-AM.png)
![“[Acting] is just storytelling. Everyone loves telling stories. We tell each other stories at in the lunchroom. We tell each other stories in the classroom. Everywhere we go we are telling stories. This is just a bigger way to tell stories," Nikhil Manglik (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Screen-Shot-2017-03-21-at-12.49.53-PM.png)
