Hi! I'm Kevin, a second-year at the University of Chicago intending to pursue joint degrees in Economics, Political Science, and International Relations. Inspired by my parents, now-naturalized American citizens who immigrated from China, I have a strong personal interest in promoting free speech and democracy, and—conversely—a strong academic and research interest in the internal functionings and rules of authoritarian regimes, especially with respect to their legal systems.At the University of Chicago, I have furthered my academic interests by taking multiple graduate-level classes in my first year, including a class on Chinese Politics and one on Comparative Legal Institutions. For the Comparative Legal Institutions course—a class for law students directly offered by the University of Chicago Law School—I authored a 7500-word research paper (available upon request) entitled “‘Judicial’ Review with Chinese Characteristics: the Normative State as a Tool for Resolving the Principal-Agent Problem,” which (1) detailed the evolution and use of the “recording-and-review” [备案审查] process over time by the Legislative Affairs Commission of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress of the PRC, and (2) analyzed the effects of such a development on the principal-agent problem within China through the lens of Ernst Fraenkel's Dual State framework. My paper was ultimately described as “first-rate” by Professor Tom Ginsburg of the University of Chicago Law School, who has written extensively on topics relating to Chinese politics in the past.I hope to eventually pursue a career in law, and, as a result, I worked as a judicial extern to a federal judge at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California this past summer, where I helped draft judicial orders and legal memoranda. Moreover, in 2022, an article I authored on the applicability of the First Amendment in public schools placed first out of over 800 entries in the Ninth Circuit Civics Contest, resulting in me being able to speak on a panel at the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference that year.Please don't hesitate to reach out to me at kevin.guo@uchicago.edu, and thanks for reading to the end!