SNOW HILL – Eighteen-year-old Grant Richardson knows he comes from a small town. He knows he hasn’t seen much of the world. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to.
Richardson believes it’s that desire that helped him earn admittance to Harvard University.
“I think someone from a small area trying to see the world really showed through,” he said. “If I had to guess, I’d say that’s what put me over the top.”
Richardson, a senior at Snow Hill High School, joins an elite group as one of the roughly 5 percent of applicants who are admitted to Harvard each year. While he’s thrilled to have received a letter of acceptance from an Ivy League school, he says he hasn’t decided for sure to attend the Massachusetts institution of higher learning.
“It’s looking pretty likely though,” he said.
Richardson will stay busy in the meantime. An Eagle Scout and a member of the Student Government Association, Richardson also participates on a mock trial team and plays golf and baseball in addition to running track.
Academically, he has a rigorous schedule at Snow Hill High School but is also part of the pre-engineering program at Worcester Technical High School. Teacher Valerie Ziglejeva has worked with him in three classes there. She says his work ethic and ambition make him stand out from other students.
“He takes risks and believes in himself,” she said, “which makes him a great role model not only for his classmates but also for younger students in my program.”
She said he took it upon himself to organize a student group dedicated to SAT preparation.
“This was a great accomplishment,” she said, “especially for the Snow Hill community.”
Ziglejeva was also impressed by the enterprise Richardson showed in finding a free opportunity to study abroad during the summer of 2014. Through the National Security Language Initiative, sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, Richardson earned a scholarship to study Mandarin in China. He spent six weeks attending language classes and taking in the Chinese culture.
“It was a great experience,” Richardson said.
He said that although the initiative offered programs of study in a number of countries, he chose China because of its growing world role.
“I realized how important China is on a global scale,” he said. “I wanted to see what makes this global power tick.”
His time there influenced him so much he decided to make it the topic of his college application essay. And while Richardson doesn’t know exactly what he wants to study in college, he’s thinking about international law or business with a focus on China.
Much of the reason he applied to Harvard, he explained, was the array of opportunities the school would make available to him.
“With a Harvard education, you can go a lot of different ways,” he said.