2018-2019 Avatar: Trivan Menezes

Thanks for interrupting your perfectly fine day to read about me. My name is Trivan Menezes, and I’m from La Grange in Oldham County, Kentucky. You’re probably wondering where my heritage lies. Don’t worry, I wondered the same thing for the longest time. Anyways, my mother is from Indonesia and my father is from Brazil, so I guess my family-life is not super American—or it is, depending on how you see it.

I came to Gatton in search of a change of pace. I challenged myself at my former school academically while also pursuing one of my biggest passions—soccer. I typically look over almost everything that I “left behind” to come to Gatton, with the exception being “The Beautiful Game.”

In terms of academics, the rigor is just what I was looking for. It’s refreshing to live alongside students who care about what they’re doing and where they’re going, and I’ve surrounded myself with people who share similar aspirations and outlooks. During my first semester, I scoured around to try to find a feasible and enjoyable research project. I had limited success, but I eventually settled on a mobile app development project with my computer science professor…or so I thought. After my first semester, my calculus professor, Dr. Claus Ernst, pulled me aside and invited me to join his knot theory research project alongside one of my senior Gatton students, Camuel Hart. I dropped everything (a.k.a. my app development project) to join the project, and I have not looked back. Camuel and I made a fair amount of progress in our research back in the spring. It was enough for me to give my first research presentation at a mathematics conference. It’s a bit surreal to think that without Gatton, I would probably be sitting back in the comfortable world of Oldham County taking some AP classes, as opposed to actually making strides in the world of academia.

This past summer, Gatton provided me with the opportunity to continue my research into the summer via their Research Internship Grant awards. My project’s progress continued, but after my seven-week stint of full-time research, I joined my classmates for a study abroad trip to England. We spent three weeks in England, bouncing around from place to place with the goal of experiencing a new culture.

Outside of my classes, I keep myself busy by volunteering each week at a local elementary school with Gatton’s GALE club (Gatton Leaders in Education), attending film club, participating in Student Y, and hanging out with the rich community at Gatton.

The Gatton experience has been full of up’s, quite a few down’s, but an unlimited amount of learning experiences. I appreciate that I was given the chance to reflect on this, at the expense of however long it took you to read these paragraphs full of conceit and self-praise. Anyways, I’ll go back to being an Avatar and fulfilling my duties in mastering all four elements (oh wait, wrong Avatar).

 

Trivan