Passion Led Us Here

Inside the David J. Sencer CDC (Center for Disease Control) Museum, Atlanta, GA Jan 14, 2019

Passion led us here - it was the same title and the same picture from Unsplash I used three years ago I created the predecessor of this website. The old website was using the same domain amber-ed.com, but the scope and depth there were not comparable to what we have today. I later finished the UC Irvine IEC Certificate program and started to practice college counseling with pro bono students in Fall 2019. I hoped a lot for my business and practice for the 2019-2020 school year.

The great outbreak of COVID-19 happened in China when I was traveling to Georgia Tech and Emory for CollegePoint 2019-2020 Midyear Convening. I visited the David J. Sencer CDC (Center for Disease Control) Museum as part of my self-designed Emory campus visit — I am always curious about STEM education, not only in a classroom setting but also in how awareness building for the public is conducted. It was a typical cloudy Tuesday afternoon in the south, a bit gloomy as the daytime was short. However, Nobody could ever imagine how the world would look like in a few weeks.

I remember the day of Jan 17, 2020, a Friday, when I left for home at the Atlanta Hartsfield–Jackson International Airport. I got to know that CDC has just added the entry health screening to this airport starting the next Tuesday. I rushed back home and prepared to celebrate the Lunar New Year. Then the news came that China planned to lockdown during the New Year. The coronavirus then started to travel and impact more people in more regions outside Wuhan, outside China, outside Aisa, till almost every corner of the world.

In the meanwhile, I found myself pregnant. It was a tough time for everyone during the pandemic, let alone a mom-to-be with insulin-dependent gestational diabetes. While I missed my practice so much and felt frustrated about the halt of my business development, I had to press the pause button for a while. It was a girl who was born on the fifth day of Sukkot, and coincidentally the same day two female scientists were shared the Nobel prize. We named her Hannah, a beautiful palindrome name, as we’re both geeky parents.

After the first few weeks as a newborn, Hannah started her first full-time job as the youngest daycare infant. So I was able to take a break and pick up my practice and business I left almost a year ago. I soon noticed that everyone was talking about one topic - the COVID vaccine, and probably the mRNA techniques among geeks around me. It was so exhilarating! We started to see our lives gradually go back to normal with more in-person interactions. More important for me as a college counseling professional, I am so glad to see that more college students will be back on campus in Fall 2021!

The vaccine drastically changed the Americans’ outlook towards their lives and the country. So did it to me. I did my rebranding with a redesigned new website and a revamped business contract module. I am also having more involvement in professional associations, for both branding and learning purposes. And I am about to join some local business network groups as a business owner and start to recruit paid clients. It feels awesome when I am recovering at the same time as the world is!

When I looked back on the past three years, I am grateful for how much I've grown. There were difficult and even desperate times when I was hit by the pandemic, my illness, and the stagnation of my practice and business. Yet there were also sweet and cheerful moments when I become a first-time parent, got recognized by my students and colleagues, and made solid progress on my business. Being an independent educational consultant is my second and most likely last career. I have tremendous curiosity, passion, and enthusiasm for the counseling job itself, for the wonderful students and colleagues; and most importantly, for being a life-long learner to research something I never knew as a first-generation immigrant, the K-12 Education in the U.S. Yes, passion led me here.