Aiming High to See More in Life

What is education? 

One might say, it is the journey from: giving one a fish so they could eat today, or teaching one to fish, which will benefit them for a lifetime. 

What is medical science? 

Is it just about diagnosis and treatment? Or is it also providing an improvement in the quality of life? 

It may be hard for us to see the connection between the fields of Education and Medical Science. However, this Dulwich High School student has already developed insight into the inherent similarity and connection between these two industries. Sticking to his original aspirations, this young man has chosen his pathway for the next phase of his life ahead.

Louis is a well-known straight-A/A* student at Dulwich Zhuhai. Among all the offers he has attained by far, two are from Imperial College London and University College London, both Top 10 schools by QS World University Rankings. He has also been awarded scholarships by Imperial College London, Hong Kong University, University of Toronto and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

However, Louis is not the kind of student who engages himself only in books without paying attention to what is going on in life. Instead, he has experienced ups and downs that his peers may have never been through.

Before joining Dulwich Zhuhai, Louis used to study for very long hours every day in a public school, "I usually woke up at 6 o'clock in the morning and kept studying until 10 o'clock in the evening." He recalled that every one of his classmates was focusing on only one thing – the National College Entrance Examination, and their daily schedule was always fully packed. Whereas he prefers to have some free time to develop his personal interests while pursuing academic achievements.

Studying at Dulwich Zhuhai has hit the nail on the head for his school life.

The international curriculum offers students opportunities and resources to discover and develop their own interests and expertise, as well as their abilities in active learning and independent thinking. Louis believes in Knowledge Change Destiny, and is always keen to devote himself to in the education industry. Leveraging the co-curricular activities (CCA) at Dulwich Zhuhai, Louis and one of his schoolmates co-founded a Volunteer Teaching club, and finally stepped into the field where his passion enlightens.

Together with his Dulwich schoolmates from different year grades, Louis has been to Yunnan (China) and some rural areas in Thailand and Indonesia to teach voluntarily. Given the truth that he is doing very well at science subjects, he also has great passion for teaching Chinese literature. Apart from being an English teacher, Louis also taught the young kids how to write poetry in Chinese, and other Chinese literature courses.

"Most of them never had a chance to leave the village, but I hope to help them learn and picture what the outside world looks like." He further added, "Life is like climbing a mountain, the higher you reach, the more scenery you will be able to appreciate." 

There has always been an impulse in Louis, to wipe out the fear from ignorance and innocence in those children, by sharing the gift of education. It also enabled him finding his way out and moving forward in a later accident.

In Year 12, Louis was very ill and was misdiagnosed with lymphoma. He suffered a lot both physically and mentally from the misdiagnosis. However, at the same time, a new dream began to take shape.

Not long after being discharged from the hospital, Louis participated in a biological engineering project conducted by the Research Institute of Tsinghua University in Shenzhen. During the internship, he learned about diagnostics for the first time - a subject that combines the knowledge of biology, engineering, physics and computer science in disease diagnosis. He immediately related it to his own experience, "People always think that treatment is more important than diagnosis, and they search for medicines aimlessly and inappropriately, which is putting the cart before the horse. As the saying goes, 'to suit the remedy to the case'. An accurate diagnosis can lead to the most effective treatment. This is what Biomedical Engineering means to the world."

Louis then started to pay attention to the information about biomedical diagnostics subjects and university options, and submitted his application. He explained that the development of biomedical engineering will greatly promote the accuracy of medical diagnosis, which saves a lot of effort and time spent unnecessarily, and increases the cure rate.

He then explored the connection between diagnostics to education, "Diagnostics provides patients with accurate pathological information and corresponding treatment, transfers scientific knowledge, and eliminates patients’ fear of unknown diseases. To a certain extent, it is also the core meaning of education. There is no difference between the two."

Louis has now received several conditional offers from his top options and is about to embark his journey in diagnostics. "But at the same time," he emphasised, "I will stick to my passion for education, which complements my school life in some way. It is also an extraordinary thing I will see myself keep doing in the future.