By: Georgia Kaufman and Dana Hathaway

Opinion and Editorial Editors

If LGHS senior Julia Kiplinger could describe herself in three words, they would be empathetic, intellectual, and caring, “Caring in a way that means I care a lot about the things I do.” Whether she’s speeding down Lexington Reservoir with Los Gatos Rowing Club (LGRC) or tackling her mountain of AP homework, Kiplinger’s passion for what she loves shines through all that she does. 

Kiplinger started rowing in eighth grade after close friend and fellow LGHS senior Alex Iversen persuaded her to give the relatively obscure sport a chance. Since that initial introduction to rowing, Kiplinger has been hooked. She explained, “[I love] all of the people there, the team culture, and the competitive aspect of [the sport]…During COVID, it gave me something to look forward to and to plan around.” 

Planning around training is more complicated than it sounds. The athlete explained, “We practice six times a week, and it’s about three hours each time. So that leaves me with only a few hours in my evening, which I usually spend doing homework.”

Kiplinger attended the Youth National Championships (YNC) in Sarasota, Florida, in both the summers of 2021 and 2022. She admitted that for the 2021 competition “[LGRC] had no expectations since we were just coming out of COVID.” Despite this, Julia and her fellow crewmates competed flawlessly, placing fourth in the nation in the U17 4x category. In the 2022 YNC, Kiplinger qualified two boats for the LGRC Varsity Women’s team. She is consistently part of boats entered in more prestigious regattas, including the two national boats and Head of the Charles two years in a row.

While crew is an intense time commitment, Kiplinger certainly puts the student into student-athlete. She is currently taking three AP classes — AP Spanish, AP Statistics, and AP Environmental Science. Furthermore, she takes two classes through the LEAD program, Gov/Econ and English 12. 

When asked about her hobbies outside of rowing, Kiplinger continuously brought up two subjects: art and spending time with her friends and her mom. The senior shone with joy when talking about the activities that she and her mom do, which include binge watching TV shows together and visiting San Francisco. Kiplinger explained, “I like hanging out with my mom. We are good friends. We love to chit chat.”

In terms of the future, Kiplinger aspires to go to a university on the east coast. She mentioned that she is “looking forward to college, but [she’ll] just be happy with whatever [she] ends up doing.” She hopes to study either psychology and elementary education or environmental urban planning. When asked about her interest in elementary education, she replied, “I want to make things easier for kids who have trouble with school. I’ve struggled with ADHD and trying to get through school with that…and I’d want to help somebody kind of figure that out at a younger age.”

There’s a bright future ahead of Kiplinger, and her passion and ambition for all she does helps her to continue down this path with ease.