MAYA GANESAN

With two parents who have backgrounds in computer science and a sister currently studying in the field in college, science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) is a big part of Maya Ganesan’s family.

But it wasn’t until she chose to attend Tesla STEM High School when it opened in unincorporated King County near Redmond three years ago that Ganesan really learned what these areas could offer. Prior to attending STEM, she said she had received a strong humanities-based education in middle school. She chose to apply to STEM — a choice school in the Lake Washington School District (LWSD) — because she thought it sounded interesting.

She was not disappointed.

During her time at the school — which came to an end Wednesday evening as she, along with her 110-plus fellow seniors became the first graduating class for the relatively new school — Ganesan said she learned that the fields in STEM are more than just writing code.

“You get in there, get dirty,” she said about the hands-on experience the school emphasizes. “That’s the part of STEM that really appealed to me.”

It was through this hands-on work that Ganesan, 17, said has her considering studying something in the field when she enters Stanford University this fall.

Despite her interest now in these areas, Ganesan admits her main interests growing up veered more toward the humanities.

“For someone who went to a STEM school, I really like to write,” she said with a laugh.

Ganesan has been writing poetry since she was 4 and has been attending local poetry readings for several years. She even published a book of poetry — “Apologies to an Apple” — when she was 11.

Ganesan said one of the things she enjoys about writing is how you can use words to convey a unique human experience, but when shared with others, those words can represent something completely different but still be quite meaningful.

“They have a different point of connection with (different people),” Ganesan said.

Other things she enjoys outside of school include playing the piano — which she has done since she was 5 — skiing and singing.

Ganesan said one of the reasons why she will be heading to Stanford next year is because the school offers interdisciplinary majors that allow students to combine different areas of studies, such as computer science and English or computer science and history (two combinations Ganesan is considering).

Ganesan is still unsure about her career plans, but she knows she would “like to do something good for the world.”

After spending three years with her classmates and teachers and forming a “quirky” and “tight-knit family,” Ganesan said, “it’ll be hard to disband that family.”

But for her, she said college will be an opportunity to meet more people to add to that group.

CHRISTOPHER YU

Christopher Yu has always been a fan of the outdoors.

From hiking to backpacking, the 18-year-old Redmond resident just enjoys being outside. And come fall, he will have the opportunity to experience the outdoors on the other side of the country as he is headed to Dartmouth College in New Hampshire.

For Yu, who also graduated from STEM on Wednesday, that love of the outdoors translated academically to a fondness for science as his interests in biology and environmental sciences grew.

It was this fondness that led him to apply to attend the school.

Yu, who is also interested in medicine, said he is not sure what he wants to study at Dartmouth yet but knows he would like to stay in the STEM field. This being said, he does know one area he probably won’t be pursuing.

“I’m not much of a (computer science) guy,” he admitted, explaining that while computer coding can lead to many interesting things, it is just not appealing to him.

With a senior class of a little more than 110, Yu described the high school as a weird family as the student body is so diverse. However, he said, it is all of these differences that have bonded everyone together.

Yu said one of his favorite memories at the school was when the school entered its first competition: Imagine Tomorrow, a Washington State University contest for high-school and middle-school students that is focused on problem solving. This was during the school’s first year, when Yu was a sophomore, and he said everyone buckled down and got to work and then just came together as a school. He added that STEM — an underdog school no one had heard of before this — made its mark at the competition and that created this communal feeling of belonging to something more than just a school.

Yu said one of the reasons he chose Dartmouth was because the school is very open to allowing students to explore before having to declare a major. He said he wants to be able to learn about different things in different fields of study and to meet and learn from different people.

He visited the East Coast campus earlier this school year and said it was a lot of fun and the people are great. Yu described the atmosphere as laid back but still driven — which is an environment he is used to.

“It’s kind of like STEM,” he said.