We are ecstatic to welcome another awesome human to the Words Alive team: our new Page Turners Intern, Julie Chen! Read on to learn more about Julie!
Julie’s belief and motivation to make a positive impact through literacy and learning stem from her love of reading and her college journey. Before transferring to University of California San Diego (UCSD), Julie attended De Anza College in her Bay Area hometown where she witnessed secondhand the struggle of learning English as a second language as an English tutor. Wanting to pursue a major that would allow her to directly help others, Julie switched between English Literature, Business Psychology, and Education Studies majors throughout her college career before settling on a Psychology major with a Global Health minor. As a former English Major and now Page Turners Intern, Julie believes that reading is crucial not only for encouraging us to explore different worlds and empathize with the different experiences of others, but also for allowing us to feel less alone as we relate to characters whose worlds are similar to ours.
Additionally, as a second-year transfer student and current senior, Julie is set to graduate this Spring 2022! In her personal time, Julie is a self-proclaimed grandma at heart who loves knitting, embroidering, and hand weaving macrame pieces. She also enjoys researching and studying the craft of coffee-making due to working as a barista for the past six years! You might also catch her playing video games with friends or going on hikes as well.
Now, here’s a few words from Julie!
How did you discover Words Alive? What drew you to interning here?
I discovered Words Alive through a student organization at UCSD. I heard about the internship position during an orientation and decided to take the opportunity to learn about nonprofit work since that’s something I’m thinking of pursuing in my future. I was also drawn to the mission of spreading diversity and working to reduce the literacy gap in school children today.
What is your favorite aspect of the work you do? Do you have a fun memory that exemplifies this?
I love all the researching I do for my internship—mainly researching books. I didn’t realize how many books existed in the world until I started researching them (my list of books to read has reached new highs)! One of my best memories of working here was the first time I came to the office and got to browse the large inventory of books we have. I felt a sense of absolute amazement for the stellar work of our staff and volunteers after seeing those and the boxes of kits for the Read Aloud Program. Being able to see all their hard work in front of my eyes made me realize I truly found myself a spectacular program to be a part of.
What book or story has had a big impact on you?
For some reason I’m blanking on stories that I read and really left a big impact on me recently, but I guess the series that had the biggest impact overall was the Percy Jackson series by Rick Riordan. This series was what really captivated my love for reading when I was a child. It also ignited my love for Greek Mythology, and my imagination in the belief that demigods really do exist in our world.
What is your favorite recent read and quote?
“The internet is the flattening of time. It is the place where the past and present exist on one single plane. But proportionally, because the present calcifies into the past, even now, even as we speak, perhaps it is more accurate to say that the internet almost wholly consists of the past. It is the place we go to commune with the past.”
Currently I’m finishing Severence by Ling Ma. It’s a fun version of an apocalyptic world but not super dramatized like how it normally is in books or shows like “The Walking Dead.” It also jumps between pre- and post-apocalypse, so we get a glimpse at the main character’s life before the everything occurred. But the main reason why I’m really enjoying it is because the main character is a Chinese American girl living in New York in her early twenties and I resonate with a lot of the emotions she has being in that confusing age. It also has moments with profound philosophical thoughts of what it means to exist during a worldwide apocalypse, which is something we all can definitely resonate with at this time.
Can you share a photo of something you love?
Here’s my dog, Ellie and cat, Boba!
