Earning the Congressional Award Gold Medal

What the award is

The Congressional Award is the United States Congress’s award for young people. There is no competition and no grade requirement: you set goals in four areas — voluntary public service, personal development, physical fitness, and an expedition or exploration — log the hours with an adult validator, and move up through Bronze, Silver and Gold as the totals grow. The Gold Medal requires at least 400 hours of service, 200 hours each of personal development and fitness, and a self-planned expedition of several days.

How the hours added up

The Gold Medal submission went in on 28 January 2026. Each area had one goal, and each went past the minimum.

Voluntary public service: 641 hours. All of it was Sympify: running free public sessions on describing symptoms clearly and preparing for appointments, putting together patient resources like symptom logs and question guides, and building the volunteer base that keeps the project going. 144 of those hours were indirect, the organising behind the sessions rather than the sessions themselves.

Personal development: 380 hours. The goal was to take a band from nothing to a released album. That meant songwriting, rehearsals, recording, editing and production, and live performances with Post-Credits. The part I did not expect to learn was the business side: budgets, schedules, deadlines, and keeping a band pointed at the same release.

Physical fitness: 464 hours. The targets were a 52-second 100-yard freestyle and a 2:05 200-yard butterfly, worked toward through swim training, strength and mobility work. 96 of the hours were meal planning and nutrition management, which is where the nutrition coaching certification came in. The rest was time in the pool and the gym.

The expedition

The expedition was five days in Taiwan over the 2025 winter break, planned end to end: flights into Taoyuan, the high-speed rail down to Taichung, and an itinerary that worked through Fengjia Night Market, the Taichung Confucius Temple, Painted Animation Lane and Miyahara, a day trip to Lukang for the Tianhou Temple and the old street, Rainbow Village on the way back, and then the train up to Taipei for Ximending, Ningxia Night Market and a last day at the National Palace Museum. A separate list of Taichung milk-tea shops ran to thirteen entries, which says something about the priorities.