
ATLANTA — Ethan Munji built his first computer when he was 11. The Presidential Scholar said he learned a lot about the process by watching YouTube videos, and after three days of building, he pushed the power button. Nothing happened.
He began rigorously testing everything until he found the problem: The power button wasn’t connected to the motherboard. He fixed the issue, and when the computer booted up, he sighed in relief.
“Now, it’s what I check every time I build a computer,” he said.
Munji is currently a first-year Computer Science major at Georgia State.
“I’m a problem-solver, and a lot of computer science is taking complex problems, breaking them into smaller problems and solving them one by one,” he said. “My brain really likes that feedback loop.”
In addition to building computers for himself, family members and friends, he stayed busy in high school playing soccer and performing with his school’s symphony as a violinist.
He also worked as an after-school tutor in his junior and senior years for students in first through sixth grade. He found he was able to connect with the students since he wasn’t that much older than them.
“It was a personally rewarding experience that really got me passionate about education and student success in the future,” he said.
It’s part of what drew him to Georgia State.
“Georgia State is growing, and it’s growing in a way that is meaningful to student success. I felt like other universities wouldn’t have had the same stake in my success as they do here,” he said. “And I really wanted to be at a place that’s changing and growing because I think that’s when you’d have the most opportunity to make a real difference.”
To learn more about the Presidential Scholarship, visit honors.gsu.edu/the-presidential-scholarship. Students can now apply to both the Stamps and Presidential scholarships, the university’s premiere academic awards, with one application.