{"id":5653,"date":"2026-05-12T15:51:38","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T07:51:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/?p=5653"},"modified":"2026-05-12T18:25:31","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T10:25:31","slug":"reach-out-and-explore-new-paths","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/2026\/05\/12\/reach-out-and-explore-new-paths\/","title":{"rendered":"[Northern California] Reach Out and Explore New Paths"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

[Northern California] Reach Out and Explore New Paths <\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\r\n
\"\"

Mentor Ms Nicole Lau (right) and Mentee Nathan Cheng at the HKUAANC Spring Luncheon.<\/em><\/p><\/div>\r\n

Nathan Cheng (BPsych), exchange student in Northern California, \u201cBefore coming to the US, I rarely engaged in networking \u2014 it felt intimidating and transactional. Nicole changed that. She gave me my first taste of how warm and open the US professional culture can be, and her constant push to “make the most of it” turned networking from a chore into a habit of curiosity.<\/p>\r\n

One concrete example: after Nicole reposted my LinkedIn write-up of our meal, an HKU senior in Silicon Valley reached out, and I got a firsthand window into the US tech industry \u2014 what people in AI roles actually do, how teams here often take meetings in the wee hours to sync with collaborators across the world, and how to position my cognitive science background. Through that chain, I was also introduced to another HKU senior in academia, who walked me through the realities of a PhD path, including how few graduates actually land professorships.<\/p>\r\n

Beyond the introductions themselves, Nicole modeled a mindset I’m still internalizing: reach out early, stay genuinely curious, and treat every conversation as a chance to test assumptions about your own future. That shift has made me think much more critically \u2014 and much more concretely \u2014 about which career paths actually fit me, rather than chasing whichever one sounds most prestigious.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

\ud835\uddd4\ud835\uddfd\ud835\uddfd\ud835\uddf9\ud835\uddf6\ud835\uddf0\ud835\uddee\ud835\ude01\ud835\uddf6\ud835\uddfc\ud835\uddfb\ud835\ude00 \ud835\uddf3\ud835\uddfc\ud835\uddff \ud835\udddb\ud835\uddde\ud835\udde8 \ud835\udde0\ud835\uddf2\ud835\uddfb\ud835\ude01\ud835\uddfc\ud835\uddff\ud835\ude00\ud835\uddf5\ud835\uddf6\ud835\uddfd (\ud835\udde2\ud835\uddf3\ud835\uddf3\ud835\ude00\ud835\uddf5\ud835\uddfc\ud835\uddff\ud835\uddf2) \ud835\uddee\ud835\uddff\ud835\uddf2 \ud835\uddfb\ud835\uddfc\ud835\ude04 \ud835\uddfc\ud835\uddfd\ud835\uddf2\ud835\uddfb \ud835\ude02\ud835\uddfb\ud835\ude01\ud835\uddf6\ud835\uddf9 \ud835\udde0\ud835\uddee\ud835\ude06 \ud835\udfee\ud835\udff1, \ud835\udfee\ud835\udfec\ud835\udfee\ud835\udff2 (\ud835\udde0\ud835\uddfc\ud835\uddfb\ud835\uddf1\ud835\uddee\ud835\ude06)! If you’ll be on exchange during the first semester of 2026-27, don’t miss this opportunity to enrich your offshore experience. Apply now and make the most of your international journey!
https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/apply<\/a><\/p>\r\n

Tell us how your HKU Mentorship journey is going! Share your story & photos via the website www.mentorship.hku.hk\/mlogin<\/a> or email us at mentor@hku.hk<\/a><\/strong><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Beyond the introductions themselves, Nicole modeled a mindset I’m still internalizing: reach out early, stay genuinely curious, and treat every conversation as a chance to test assumptions about your own future. That shift has made me think much more critically \u2014 and much more concretely \u2014 about which career paths actually fit me, rather than chasing whichever one sounds most prestigious.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":5657,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5653","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","category-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5653"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5653\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5659,"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5653\/revisions\/5659"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mentorship.hku.hk\/daao\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}