Finding Student Influencers: Meet Tina Mai, The High School Senior Taking On the Tech Industry
This interview was conducted by TSI Student Ambassadors Hunter Justice and Mari Edler. Students can’t be what they can’t see, so we’re highlighting a student who is already a positive influence and role model. Share this story with your students to encourage them to find and pursue their passions.
Tina Mai is an innovative high school student from California who is making waves in the tech world. As a 12th-grade student, Tina is already an accomplished and self-taught engineer, writer, and website builder.
She is set to attend Stanford in the fall to study computer science, product design, and business. Her focus is on machine learning and artificial intelligence, and she has worked with numerous start-up companies. She recently co-founded an app called VAST, in addition to the three other apps she’s launched and co-founded so far.
Tina attributes her work ethic to the ideas of the “American Dream” that surrounded her while growing up in an immigrant family.
“If you don’t try to do something, you’ll never know if you can actually accomplish it.”
– Tina Mai
Opening a Door for Blind and Hearing-Impaired Youth
Tina is passionate about storytelling and writing and believes every child should have the chance to write and tell her own story. Her inspiration for making writing accessible comes from feeling sad about “how inaccessible writing truly is to a lot of youth.”
Her current project VAST (voice accessible story technology) is a mobile app that uses natural language processing, a type of speech and language AI (Artificial Intelligence) to help blind and visually impaired youth write and tell stories with their own voice. This includes spoken word fiction stories, nonfiction, and poetry. VAST ended up winning the 2021 Congressional App Challenge in California.
Use Your Resources
“I would tell my 12-year-old self not to be afraid to find resources and opportunities online because there is so much out there… our generation has access to more resources and opportunities than any other generation in the history of the world.”
– Tina Mai
Tina learned a lot of what she knows about machine learning and artificial intelligence from teaching herself through online resources. “So many opportunities, competitions, and experiences I stumbled across, I found them by just doing a quick Google search… It has led to more doors opening, more networking, and more experiences.”
Tina suggests that teachers and students who are looking to learn more about technology and web development use these free, online resources:
- Code.org: A very basic platform where users can build basic apps and play around with block code
- Code Academy: Great for learning a full programming language
- Udemy: Thousands of courses on programming language
- Coursera: A variety of courses in many different subjects
- EdX: Free courses from top Universities (Harvard, MIT, Stanford, etc.)
Dealing With Negativity and Pressure
“Don’t take criticism from someone that you wouldn’t take advice from.”
– Tina Mai
As a young person in the public eye, Tina is no stranger to negativity and pressure towards her online. She knows how to handle negativity with grace and any pressure that may come with it, and she is proud of who she is and will not let anyone on the internet define her. She emphasizes how important it is to take a step back and put any negative comments into perspective.
On the flip side, Tina is passionate about doing things for herself and she encourages others to have this same mentality. Making decisions because you want to make them, learning things you’re interested in, and doing things you want to do. Growing up in an immigrant family, she was constantly aware of the expectations to make her parents proud. Despite the external pressures, she is proud of the person she has become and is focused on making decisions that will help her to continue to grow.
Empowering Students
Here at The Social Institute, we are on a mission of supporting students and empowering them to find positive influences like Tina Mai. She is a great example of what can be accomplished when you have the courage to take a leap of faith and put in the hard work and dedication necessary to reach your goals. Her story serves as an inspiration to all of us, especially students who are hesitant to pursue their dreams. Through her example, we can learn that no matter our age or background, we can achieve what we set our minds to.
For more ways on how you can support students to manage social media in positive ways through The Social Institute’s 7 Social Standards, check out this blog.
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The Social Institute (TSI) is the leader in understanding student experiences and creator of #WinAtSocial, a gamified, online learning platform that equips students, educators, and families to navigate social experiences — online and offline — in healthy ways. Our unique, student-respected approach incorporates topics like social media, technology use, and current events that have a significant impact on student well-being. Lessons teach life skills for the modern day to inspire high-character decisions that support the health, happiness, and future success of students, while capturing data that provides insights to school leaders to inform school policy and communications, and enable high-impact teaching and a healthy learning environment. For schools, our turnkey technology allows for easy implementation and a comprehensive game plan to support the well-being of school communities. For schools, our turnkey technology allows for easy implementation and a comprehensive game plan to support the well-being of school communities.