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Learn more about Minneapolis Roosevelt High School at the school's Web site.

Click here for information on the College of St. Scholastica's pre-physical therapy program, taken from the school's Web site.

Passion for global affairs, education motivate student

Listen to an audio version of this story.

The way Tenzing Khendu sees it, life is hardly a spectator sport.

The outlook is what’s spurred the 16-year-old’s passion for global issues. It’s what’s motivated her to value education. And it’s what Khendu hopes will serve her in the future.

“I live on this Earth,” said Khendu, a soon-to-be junior at Minneapolis Roosevelt High School. “I should know what’s going on.”

By background alone, Khendu comes by her enthusiasm for global issues and education differently than most. Born in Sikkim, India in 1990, she and her family moved to Minneapolis when Khendu was 7 years old. She’s Tibetan and speaks from the heart about the ongoing conflict with China.

But it’s more than background that drives Khendu to keep an eye on what’s going on in the world – from Roosevelt High School outward. Her mother has a middle school education; her father, a high school diploma. They want Khendu and her brothers – Khesar Wangchuk, 18, and Ongda Dorjee, 10 – to have the chances they didn’t.

That means a lot of involvement from dad – from encouraging to advising to finding ACT-prep classes. With two years left in high school, Khendu already feels prepared for the next step.  

“He’ll do anything for our education,” Khendu said of her father. “With a dad like that, I should be prepared.”

Still, Khendu has faced challenges most 16-year-olds haven’t. When she left India, she spoke only Nepali. But fast forward most of a decade and you’ll find her enrolled in an honors English class, the language barrier that once plagued her gone.

It was her 10^th grade honors English teacher who inspired a love of writing in Khendu. She still has ambitions of becoming a physical therapist and would like to work in global health – but she considers writing a solid back-up plan.      

“Until that, I used to think writing was very dull,” she said of the class and its teacher, Delainia Haug. “Because of my English barrier, I thought I wouldn’t know much about writing.”

As it turns out, Khendu was wrong. Now, if she’s assigned a two-page paper, she’s more likely to turn in five. She admires Haug’s unique teaching style, and the questions she’d ask piqued Khendu’s interest in the whole writing process.

Khendu has high aspirations, but with that, she admits to a fear of not being successful. But she’s working hard and planning for her future. She hopes to attend The College of St. Scholastica in Duluth, Minn.

“You don’t see many Tibetans that are famous doctors or authors,” she said. “I want to raise the name of Tibetans.”

And she won’t be doing it from the sidelines.

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