Maybe a teacher. Or maybe an education policy reformer.

Andrew Zonneveld sees teaching as the most important job in the world.

“Doctors are great. But doctors are only doctors because they had great teachers,” said the first-generation college student from North Carolina.

Zonneveld ’26, a government concentrator with a secondary in education studies, is attending Harvard College on full financial aid. Graduating debt-free means he can prioritize public service.

“I would love to be a public school teacher for a few years,” said the Leverett House resident.

“He talks a great deal about going back to North Carolina and helping the schools there,” said his mom, Jennifer Eirich. “I think it has a lot to do with the strong connections he formed with the teachers he had as a kid. But I guess I think there’s something bigger out there for him. Maybe he’ll go and change the educational system for the whole country. Maybe he’ll go into politics.”

Zonneveld, who grew up on a military base and counts many servicemembers in his family, has been interested in the intersection of education and policy from an early age. He recalled pitching an elementary school teacher on forming the school’s first student government.

“I won president in third grade or fourth grade,” he said. “In my speech, I promised the principal would kiss a pig if we raised enough money through Box Tops — remember those?”

Entering Onslow Early College High School — where students work toward their diplomas while earning free credits from Coastal Carolina Community College — provided Zonneveld with his next opening. He spent the summer before ninth grade drafting a constitution for the student government association he later helped launch at the newly opened public high school.

“I could tell from the beginning how motivated he was,” remembered Hannah Padilla, a former guidance counselor there. “Within a week or two, he had come out of his shell and was just unapologetically Andrew: a dedicated student who knew exactly what he wanted from life.”

The Class of 2022 valedictorian assumed he would attend North Carolina’s flagship public university. The school offered him a generous scholarship. “But it was still going to cost me 15 or 20 grand per year,” Zonneveld said.

Opening an acceptance letter from Harvard College was a tearful occasion — and a total surprise after applying on a last-minute whim. “Not in a million years did someone from our county think something like this could happen,” Eirich said.

The family had been concerned about covering college costs, so the University’s offer came as a big relief.  “Financial aid is really the only reason I’m here at Harvard,” he said. “It’s the only way I can afford it.”

The support also means Zonneveld’s attentions are no longer so splintered. He had trained as a lifeguard in his early teens, and sometimes worked full-time at area pools while attending high school.

At Harvard, Zonneveld has continued teaching aquatics at the Malkin Athletic Center. But only because he still enjoys passing on his knowledge. “I don’t have to work crazy hours,” he said.

Help from Harvard also made other opportunities possible. Zonneveld was able to complete an internship last summer at a research institute in Berlin with the support of the Government Department. He also traveled to Thailand and Vietnam with Harvard Model Congress to teach high schoolers about policy and public speaking. Over spring break, he helped the organization run a government simulation with teens in Brussels.

“Financial aid didn’t just bring me here,” Zonneveld said. “It allowed me to travel the world, to go home and see my family during breaks. It allowed me to have access to opportunities I would have never had anywhere else.”