What’s the purpose of friendship? Unfortunately, I was forced to learn this the hard way when I attended the ‘Virginia Aerospace Science and Technology Scholars’ Summer Academy over the summer of my junior year. The experience at the academy was unlike any other, but the challenge to make new friends was the most intimidating there than anywhere else that I’ve visited, especially at my own school. Yet, my school holds many of the common and well known people, such as teachers, that I could lean on for mental support, while at the academy had everything but Franklin County. What I meant by ‘but Franklin County’, I am actually referring to the wide varieties of different ethnicities and educational backgrounds that imploded into one single summer