Positioning the right side of his body to face me, Daniel McGarry sat answering my questions about his life.

McGarry is a senior studying Biomedical Engineering and, like everyone, he has a unique story that distinguishes him from the blue and white masses yet adds to the campus’s story at the same time.

Since he was young, McGarry has had trouble hearing in his left ear.  For a long time, he was in and out of hospitals receiving surgery, trying to remove the cholesteatoma tumor in his ear.

The constant surgeries and the loss of hearing led to difficulty in school as well.

“I think there was a strong sense of hopelessness at certain points because it felt like they had to go back and do the same thing over and over,” Mcgarry said.

However, each time he pushed through because, “as a kid who doesn’t understand it that well,” he just focused on getting through it and healing so he could get back in time for middle school basketball season.

Eventually the surgeries did come to an end, and Mcgarry said those surgeries shaped who he is today.

“Having to overcome those struggles that existed pretty much my whole life made me a stronger person and taught me a lot about persevering through tough situations,” McGarry said.

He also thinks the surgeries are responsible for his interest in the medical field and, although he can’t hear in his left ear, it doesn’t seem to impair him since he’s four years into a biomedical engineering degree.

Throughout the time McGarry was traveling in and out of hospitals, he lived overseas and attended an international school in Belgium, which he said also helped shape who he is today.

Living in Belgium and going to an international school afforded McGarry many opportunities he might not have otherwise had. He said he went to a great school, had the opportunity to travel a lot, received a great education at a great school, and was exposed to many different cultures.

“I would say that I do most likely have a better understanding of people who are different from me just because I was exposed to different types of people my whole life,” McGarry said. “Also, I’m able to adjust to new situations well and have good adaptability.”

He had to show this adaptability when he moved back to the United States in eighth grade.

While he had always considered the United States home, the reality was that he hadn’t actually lived there for the majority of his life.

His first year back was a stressful one. Not only did McGarry not know what it was like to live in the United States, but middle school kids are also not always the most welcoming, and he was leaving all his friends behind.

However, McGarry said that he doesn’t think the transition was that much different from a kid transitioning to a new school within the United States.

“Even though I lived overseas, I was very Americanized at heart,” McGarry said.

After finishing middle school and high school out in America, McGarry began applying to colleges. He finally narrowed his choices down to three schools—Penn State, NC State, and Pitt. In the end, the level of academics, the location and recommendations from other people convinced McGarry to choose to be a Nittany Lion.

While he was at Penn State, McGarry experienced one of his proudest moments.

He and a team competed in the Rube Goldberg competition his sophomore year. In this competition, the teams had to create a machine which would complete a simple task in a roundabout way.

That year, they had to zip up a zipper, and it took them a couple of weeks to finish the machine. McGarry led the team through the Engineering Leadership Society.

The night before the competition, the team was up all night in Hammond completing the project, but they had two perfect runs and won Penn State Regionals. They were then sent on a free trip to Ohio to compete in the national competition.

Now, after four years at Penn State, McGarry has many experiences with Penn State beyond this one and has had several seasons in the football stands yelling “We Are!”

To him, the “We Are” is a good way to embrace the culture of Penn State and the cohesiveness of the community.

“While we’re very diverse in our backgrounds, we have different types of students, despite the fact that we’re a big school, we’re still united as a people,” McGarry said.

McGarry said he feels like he’s part of this community and that he’s benefited from it, but he also sees some hypocrisy behind it.

“It’s supposed to say we’re a strong community, yet every two weeks I’m getting a text on my phone saying there’s a sexual assault two buildings down from me,” McGarry said. “Things like that seem to break down a community.”

However, it’s encouraging, to me, at least, that there are people like McGarry and the others I’ve interviewed that are adding to the story of the community in a positive way. With all these leaders in the community, maybe one of the ones you read about here will be the one to solve the problem.

But, no matter the flaws he sees in the system, McGarry is always glad to return to Penn State.

While working a co-op in Cincinnati during the Fall 2015 semester, he would drive 6.5 hours to come home to Penn State on some weekends.

“It always felt really good to be reunited those weekends with my buddies,” McGarry said. “Those are just some of the good memories I have at Penn State.”