This is the last of 25 profiles about The Gazette’s Best and Brightest Class of 2016.

When Megan Cho was in fifth grade, she spent a school year in Korea where her extended family lived.

“I still remember the very first day. A boy asked if I was American. I said yes, and he replied, ‘Go home to your country.'”

She was devastated. Her parents had come to the U.S. from Korea as graduate students and she was born here. “I thought that I was connected to both cultures. But it made me question myself for a long time.”

She is drawn to endeavors that deal with how people from diverse cultures and backgrounds can connect.

At Pine Creek High School she helped organize a Facebook outreach project called Humans at Pine Creek that promotes inclusiveness by allowing students to tell about themselves.

“Everyone’s lives and circumstances are so different, that we get to know each other and learn from each other,” Cho explained.

Stephanie Cornelio, Pine Creek college counselor, noted: “While some social media can demean, Megan is lifting others up and celebrating their stories.”

She added that Cho is a community builder, “a humanitarian with a profound sense of inclusive leadership, acceptance of others.”

Nowhere is that more evident than in Cho’s volunteer work with Teen Court, a restorative justice program for first-time misdemeanor juvenile offenders. As a student attorney she mediates among parents, defendants and others to come up with appropriate sentences such as community service hours. Cornelio recalled one case where Cho remained calm and professional when a particularly angry parent made a scene.

Cho works with teen defendants from across Colorado Springs. “Their circumstances are all different, and I learn something from each one,” she said.

Even Cho’s love for creating ceramic art builds community. She helped organize a fundraiser that netted $2,100 for the Community Partnership for Child Development Head Start program, which provides underprivileged kids with a preschool education. She and other students created hundreds of ceramic bowls that were sold at the dinner event.

She hasn’t chosen a college, but wants to study international relations and work to promote childhood education.

As for her own bi-cultural journey, she said she now realizes that home is wherever she feels comfortable.

She has come full circle from the days when she felt unsure. On a two-month trip to Korea last summer she used Snapchat to share her experience with others.

“Instead of using lots of words, I used photos to heighten cultural awareness,” Cho explained. “My pictures would disappear after 24 hours ,but the intangible aura of those places will hopefully stay with the friends who saw them. It gave me a way to build bridges and connect with people through the story of my life.”

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