How Curiosity Can Turn Into Creativity by Esteban

How Curiosity Can Turn Into Creativity by Esteban - October 2026 Scholarship Essay

When the pandemic started back in 2020, I was one of the many stuck at home with nothing to do but waste time laying around. I would spend most of my days watching or playing video games like many other 10 year old kids. Video games were always cool to me because they were my escape into a different world. I loved all types of games but my favorite kind are always ones packed with action and hidden details. Ever since I was really young, video games have always interested me. All the intricate mechanics they have would always have me puzzled and kept me interested in how something so awesome could exist.

Eventually, after months of being quarantined the school told us that we would be able to return to school in a hybrid format near the end of 2020. This meant we would be in school some days out of the week and the others would be online. Even though it wasn’t the same as it was, it allowed me to make new connections as an incoming middle school student with all my new teachers. Thanks to the hybrid format I was able to be physically introduced to the world of coding.

My 6th period class was coding and I loved every second of it. At first, we started with simple projects that helped introduce me to the basics of coding. It was on the first project that involved me making a video game where my curiosity spiked. This happened around the time that we would be dismissed for winter break for about three weeks. Before going on break, I had already finished the project and turned it in early because I had so much fun making the game that I decided to make it at home. Right before we went on break, the teacher introduced me to the next project which was making a space invaders game by yourself.

Me being me, I was overly excited to work on this project because I wanted to make the game and play it for myself. So when I started working on it I ran into some issues while coding each individual sprite to do its designed function. Instead of giving up like any normal 10 year old would do during their winter break I decided to continue trying to figure out a way to make each sprite work correctly and do their intended purpose. After hours of hard work, I finally managed to make the game work properly. I finished the project that the class hadn't even begun during my winter break. I felt so accomplished with my new found knowledge and I couldn’t wait to share it with my teacher.

That time period between me finishing the project and school starting back up again felt never-ending. So much so that I would end up making a couple other small projects on my own just for fun and expanding my knowledge of coding into another level. When school finally started and I showed my coding teacher my project he was impressed with my dedication to his class and told me he’s never had a student be so invested in learning coding before which made me feel rewarded for the amount of hard work that I put into the project. I decided to then input this positive energy I received from making the project into more projects independent from the class. I made multiple more projects during the rest of the year and exercised my creativity and combined it with inspiration from games I have played since I was a little kid.