Whiteland High School Senior Annabelle White presents her summer research at the Indiana Clinical and Translational Science Institute annual meeting earlier this year. White has been selected as a National Merit Scholar semi-finalist, and is awaiting to hear if she will be named a finalist.
After scoring perfect on her PSAT, Annabelle White, a senior at Whiteland High School, was named a National Merit Scholar semi-finalist earlier this semester.
But she says it’s really not that big of a deal.
To be named a National Merit Scholar semi-finalist, a student has to get a really good PSAT score, she said. To be named a finalist, one has to fill out an application that includes a personal essay and list of extracurriculars.
White’s essay focused on her interests in computer science and inclusivity, including a website and app she made called Free Period Products (https://free-period-products.onrender.com/locations).
“It shows locations that give out free period products, and you can search for locations,” she said. “Say I’m at Franklin College, and someone needs free period products for whatever reason — maybe they left them at home or they can’t afford it — so I searched Franklin College and I can see the Johnson County Public Library Franklin Branch is only .55 miles away. So instead of missing class or a presentation, a person could just use the website to find free period products near them.”
White created this originally as a hackathon project, i.e. a software development competition, in March this year hosted by EducateHacks. The website is a crowd source database, which means individuals visiting the website enter the information about where people can go to obtain free period products.
Her love for computer science and technology began when she was really young.
“I am in the 0.0001 percent of high school seniors who knew what they wanted to do since they were three years old,” she said. “I watched ‘Science is Real’ in 2008 by They Might Be Giants, and I decided I wanted to be a scientist. I’m drawn to computer science because it’s so applicable in so many different areas. I feel like if I choose computer science I won’t have to choose an interest because I can do them all through computer science.”
White started the high school’s Girls Who Code club as a freshman, when she took her second computer science class, where she was one of three girls. The club is full of computer-savvy girls who teach elementary school students about computers. The club has grown to four schools, and White has taught about 40 girls over the past three years.
“I think it’s important to have that space for girls to be creative and take risks,” she said. White is hoping to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, but also plans on applying for Purdue University and University of Illinois. She is finishing her college applications.