Teen ready for ‘opportunity of a lifetime’
Published 9:47 pm Monday, June 7, 2010
MUKILTEO — Alex Larkin knew he wanted to learn about foreign relations when he went off to college.
He just didn’t imagine he would be able travel halfway around the world on a full scholarship to get that education.
Yet that’s exactly what the recent Kamiak High School graduate is poised to do next fall. He’s one of 150 members of the inaugural class at New York University Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. Abu Dhabi is the name of the Middle East nation’s largest emirate and its capital, a modern, growing city of skyscrapers.
“It’s the opportunity of a lifetime,” Larkin said.
It’s also a leap of faith from the quiet life of Mukilteo. Thousands of high school students around the world applied for the chance to open a new campus, a dream of NYU President John Sexton that has the financial and political backing of Sheik Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi.
“We are provided the building, rooms and teachers,” Larkin said. “What the 150 of us have to do is make it work. What we are coming into now is a bare-bones university.”
Any concerns about committing four years of his studies to a start-up campus so far away evaporated when he made an all-expenses paid visit in March. He savored the warm breeze atop a sand dune at night and “the strange and beautiful” sounds emanating from a mosque.
He also was struck by the international backgrounds of the students applying to the university and was delighted to put his four years of high school Russian to the test with potential classmates.
“When I heard about it, it was like this would be an amazing experience and I’m going to apply if there is a remote chance to get in,” he said.
Kamiak staff predict Larkin will fit in fine.
“He is a student with remarkable skills and talents,” Kamiak Principal Mike Gallagher said. “My sense is he will adjust extremely well. He has an intellectual curiosity, an interest in people and there is a certain amount of humbleness. He certainly embraces the unknown and he does it with excitement.”
An actor in Kamiak drama productions, Larkin attributes part of that adventuresome spirit to attending an international school in the Philippines during his childhood.
Since his visit to Abu Dhabi in March, Larkin learned he will get the full scholarship, including two round-trip flights home every year, and a stipend for books and other expenses.
Some day, Larkin hopes to go to law school in the United States and work for the United Nations or a world aid organization.
“I have this love for travel,” he said. “There is just something about being in other counties.”
Eric Stevick: 425-339-3446, stevick@heraldnet.com.
