Tommy Ngan
Tommy sees a world in which small acts of generosity have positive effects continents away. As a student at Champlain College in Burlington, he has participated in the micro-financing of small Third World business initiatives through the International Development Club, and in one three-day period he helped raise $1,000 to cover the tuition for three schoolgirls in the Sudan.
Though born in America, Tommy lived with relatives for a year in rural China, where he learned about hardship, and about planting and harvesting rice. The experience gave him perspective beyond his years. "In China," he says, "nobody is ashamed about what they don't have. They're grateful for what they do have." He sees himself returning someday to help them.
"I really want to build a playground for the children, with swings and slides and see-saws."
Tommy Ngan's bright outlook is all the more remarkable for the tragedy that cost him the vision in his right eye. At age four, while traveling with his family to a wedding in southern Vermont, their vehicle went off the road, killing his parents, a sister, and a brother. Two older brothers in their early 20s raised Tommy. He attended schools in Chittenden County, where his creative talents blossomed; students at Champlain Valley Union High School still wear apparel displaying the "redhawk" mascot he designed, and he began writing short stories that developed into a full-blown fantasy novel now more than 300 pages long.
Currently a sophomore at Champlain College, Tommy has received assistance from three Vermont scholarships, including one for students who have overcome obstacles. Tommy knows that his father also overcame obstacles. He has written that his father "walked over two hundred miles of mountainous terrain to Hong Kong [to emigrate to the U.S.], with the dream that his children would have the opportunity to have the education he did not have."
Despite a pleasant, even playful, disposition, Tommy takes his education seriously. He believes that the things he will accomplish and the contributions he will make to the world are part of a story that's larger than his own.
"I know my family is still watching over me," says Tommy, "and I do not want my father's journey to be forgotten."