In this blog post, I’ll summarize how my academic habits, extracurricular activities, and collaborative experiences during high school influenced my career choice and preparation in the fields of semiconductors and robotics.
Academic Experiences and Reflections
As a high school student, I chose to meticulously divide my time to develop consistent study habits. I broke each day down into one-hour blocks to create a schedule and disciplined myself to stick to it. At first, there were more days when things didn’t go according to plan, but as my efforts to stay on track accumulated, the number of days I fully adhered to my schedule gradually increased. By my senior year, I found myself naturally following my study schedule without having to force myself to set aside time.
My specific daily routine began with waking up at 7 a.m. and arriving at school by 8 a.m. I planned in one-hour increments to allow for flexibility in responding to any unexpected situations that might arise during my studies. After arriving at school, I would review the day’s lesson content and textbook before 9:00 a.m. and prepare any study materials or assignments.
During class, I didn’t take separate notes; instead, I listened to the teacher’s explanations and wrote directly in the textbook, consolidating all information into a single volume. After classes ended, I would create summary notes in the afternoon to organize the day’s material; having these summary notes made it much easier to review during exam periods. From Monday through Thursday, I mainly devoted my time to organizing my notes, while on Fridays, instead of previewing or organizing notes, I watched online lectures to catch up on any missed material and focused on solving math problems.
I also established a fixed evening routine. After 9:00 PM, I would preview the next day’s material using a study guide, and from 10:00 to 11:00 PM, I would read and listen to English conversation exercises simultaneously. From 11:00 PM to midnight, I would read English-language books or classical literature before going to bed. Through this regular routine, I felt that I developed not only good study habits but also a generally healthy and disciplined lifestyle.
Major School Activities and Reflections
While attending Meister High School, I was able to experience hands-on, practice-oriented classes and explore various fields of engineering. I found computer science, semiconductors, and robotics particularly interesting, and I learned a great deal by personally assembling components and operating equipment during lab sessions. Among these, the mechanical lab was where I spent the most time.
When I arrived at school, I would first go to the lab to review the projects I had built the previous day and gather with my classmates to discuss our production plans. It was part of my daily routine to stay in the lab during every break, designing new projects and continuing my research. In the beginning, I focused on basic component fabrication and establishing wireless connections between laptops and machines, and I learned how they worked by observing and taking apart equipment built by upperclassmen.
When assigned a project, my goal was to solve the problem and produce a finished product. While it was easy to run into difficulties when working alone, having friends to collaborate with allowed us to exchange ideas and solve problems together. For parts I didn’t understand, I would first look them up in books or online, and if that didn’t work, I’d seek help from the technology teacher to work through the issue step by step.
The field I was most passionate about was robotics. After watching a robot soccer tournament in my hands-on class, I was deeply inspired and became fully immersed in building robots. Watching regional and national competitions, I saw many student teams participating with great enthusiasm, which sparked my competitive spirit; among these, I decided to take on the challenge of building a “MyroSot,” a micro-robot category.
To build the MyroSot, I visited exhibitions to take photos and ask questions to identify the necessary parts. After gathering the parts by referring to the assembly manual, I joined forces with my friends to begin the assembly. We set up a playing field in the lab that complied with the competition rules and regulations, and we used an orange golf ball as the game ball to mimic the actual competition specifications. We controlled the robot wirelessly via a laptop, and I felt a great sense of accomplishment when the robot we’d built worked properly.
Examples of Consideration, Sharing, and Cooperation, and My Reflections
The experience that best exemplified cooperation and consideration during our robot soccer activities was when we showcased a robot soccer match at the school festival. We had originally planned a simple exhibition, but a friend from our lab suggested that we demonstrate our efforts in the form of a match at the festival. While the proposal was feasible, we had only about a month to prepare, and at the time, we had only one robot ready.
We recruited volunteers and established a collaborative structure within the lab, then prepared the match to the best of our ability within the limited timeframe of one month. We already had a playing field and a ball, as well as a basic system, so we determined that the demonstration would be possible if we could just secure additional personnel. While building a few more robots, we decided to utilize image processing devices and purchased color CCD cameras to connect to the vision system.
We covered part of the cost of the cameras out of our own pockets, and the main computer processed the positions of the robots and the ball to formulate game strategies. Due to time and technical constraints, it was difficult to transmit all commands wirelessly in real time, so we ran the competition by applying pre-programmed strategies instead. During the actual competition, the operators only performed simple tasks such as stopping and starting the robots, but thanks to everyone faithfully fulfilling their assigned roles and helping one another during the preparation process, we were able to successfully showcase the competition at the festival.
Through this experience, I learned the value of cooperation and the importance of making practical judgments for problem-solving. I learned how to set priorities and achieve the best possible results within available resources when faced with limited resources, and I developed trust and a sense of responsibility by respecting each other’s roles and completing our assigned tasks. Furthermore, the experience of investing in a common goal—even while taking on personal burdens when necessary—deepened my understanding of the true meaning of teamwork.
Efforts and Preparation Related to Motivation for Application and Career Plans
My hands-on experience at Meister High School solidified my interest in the intersection of semiconductors and robotics. Building on the foundational knowledge of assembly, design, and production I acquired in high school, the experience of building and improving equipment in the lab motivated me to pursue deeper study in college. In particular, I developed a strong interest in the role robots play in semiconductor processes, and among these, I focused specifically on robots operating in vacuum environments.
Many processes in semiconductor manufacturing require vacuum conditions. Since a vacuum environment is a specialized state with virtually no external substances, equipment is susceptible to damage, and robots are used to safely transport wafers in place of humans. Because these transport robots must safely move thin and fragile materials such as wafers, they must possess high precision and durability.
Currently, the vacuum robotics field requires cutting-edge technology, so the industry often relies on foreign-made equipment rather than domestic alternatives. I aim to gain in-depth knowledge of semiconductor manufacturing processes and the design and fabrication of robots for vacuum environments during my time at university, and to accumulate research and practical experience with related equipment—such as transfer chambers—so that I can develop the capability to produce such equipment domestically.
In the long term, after establishing a solid academic and practical foundation at university, I intend to found a company specializing in tool automation to contribute to the self-sufficiency of the domestic semiconductor equipment industry. To this end, once I enter university, I plan to focus on semiconductor process labs and robotics courses, while actively participating in related projects and internships. I hope that these efforts will eventually lead me to my goal of directly designing and manufacturing the vacuum robots needed in the industry right here in Korea.
