Jessica Ngok

KIPP Northern California Public Schools

Jessica Ngok, a senior at KIPP King Collegiate High School in San Lorenzo, California, is an emerging environmental scientist and the daughter of deaf parents, for whom she has served as a linguistic and cultural bridge her entire life. She also helps care for her grandparents at home. Her research journey has taken her from a Stanford biogeochemistry lab to the glaciers of Alaska, where she was selected as one of just eight students nationwide for a 14-day mountaineering and research expedition. A captain of her school’s varsity cross-country team, she has logged more than 1,000 community service hours across habitat restoration, medical supply distribution, and Asian American and Pacific Islander advocacy.