On July 15, Pengfei Chen moved from “a town with many houses and nice people” in China to California. A month later, he was starting high school at Armijo. How different are the countries? China has about 1.4 billion people while the United States only has just over 325 million (according to www.worldometers.info/world-population).

But it wasn’t just the population that drove the Chen family to the United States. “My dad wanted to give me a better learning environment,” he said. It meant that he and his younger brother would travel to the other side of the world with Pengfei’s parents. It also meant that he would have to leave his girlfriend behind.

Since it was educational opportunities that his father had in mind, Pengfei is hoping to attend either Stanford or Harvard University. His goal is to major in science so that he can eventually become a scientist.

Armijo is a good fit for him. “All the teachers are nice,” he said. He also said that he is involved, or hopes to be, in sports and extra-curricular activities.

While he may be far from China now, he does plan to go back to visit over summer vacation.