Music
My name is Tim Schowalter. I’m 17 years old and I’m a junior at Mass Academy of Math and Science. For me, coming to Mass Academy was a way for me to branch out, push my horizons, and grow both personally and academically, so I can’t wait to experience all this school has to offer. I grew up in the neighboring town of Holden, Massachusetts, where I attended Wachusett Regional High School. I have a variety of extracurricular interests, which you can read about below.
I’ve been playing music for about 10 years, starting with piano and later switching to trumpet in 5th grade and finally French horn in 6th grade. Music has been one of the most important constants in my life and I’ve had numerous memorable experiences in band, including my participation in the Central Districts and All State festivals last year. I hope to be able to participate in these festivals again in my remaining years of high school.
Another instrument I enjoy playing is the guitar, which I’ve played on and off since 7th grade. In 10th grade, I formed a rock band with two of my friends, in which I play guitar and sing. We played our first show in June and I look forward to performing more in the future.
Karate has been my longest-running extracurricular, with me beginning to take classes at Sterling Martial Arts in kindergarten and remaining my primary sport ever since. Karate helped teach me about discipline and respect throughout my childhood, while simultaneously providing me with a fun way to exercise, an outlet for competition, and a means to improve my leadership skills once I began taking an assistant teaching role last year. I remain incredibly grateful for the unique role karate has played, and continues to play, in my life.
My greatest source of community service during junior year has been the Loaves and Fishes food pantry in Worcester. Loaves and Fishes distributes food to those in need once per month, and I have volunteered during these distributions making personalized bags of food and bringing them to clients' cars, as well as helping set up the food pantry on nights before distributions, throughout the school year. In total, I spent 20 hours volunteering at Loaves and Fishes this year, and I plan to continue to do so. In addition to providing my time as a volunteer, I am also working on a web application to improve the operation of Loaves and Fishes for clients, volunteers, and administrators. You can read more about my app on the CS page of my website.
My other significant source of community service during junior year was participating in STEM week at Abby Kelley Foster Charter Public School. STEM week is a program that promotes STEM education for elementary- and middle-schoolers. Along with several of my Mass Academy classmates, I helped prepare engaging and interactive STEM lessons for fifth- and sixth-graders at Abby Kelley. We gave these lessons on October 16 and 23, 2023. It was such a rewarding experience to see the students having fun learning about biology and engineering. In total, I spent 13.5 hours preparing the lessons and materials, practicing, and giving the lessons.
The biggest academic projects I’ve taken on in the past have been my independent research projects in my science classes. In my freshman year, I completed a project about the impact of different ingredients on the density of pizza crust. Then, in my sophomore year, I researched the effectiveness of two different sustainable fertilizer alternatives on plant growth, which won 1st place at my school science fair and advanced to Worcester Regional Science and Engineering Fair. Ultimately, both of these projects failed at answering the research question they sought to investigate due to procedural mistakes I made in the process, but they both taught me a lot about the scientific method and I look forward to using those lessons to succeed in my STEM I project this year.
Other projects I’d like to mention are a constructed language called Skingenske’, which I created independently using my knowledge of and passion for linguistics, and a website that I created last summer during the WPI Frontiers summer program. All these projects can be found linked below: