Kampton Kam, W’26, is running his own race. And by all metrics, he’s winning.
As a high jumper on Penn’s Track & Field team, Kam is a First Team All-American. He has broken the Singapore National Record six times, is a back-to-back Penn Relays champion, and is a three-time Ivy League Conference champion. He achieved all of this while recovering from a collapsed lung he suffered in 2022.
Kam is also, in true Wharton fashion, very good at finance. While practicing for more than three hours a day, managing coursework, and breaking records, Kam also found time to seek a career in investment banking. He now holds a return offer from Morgan Stanley’s Mergers and Acquisitions department after completing a summer internship last year.
In other words, Kam is living the dream — and he’s not ready to wake up. With his current performance, the Wharton senior has a strong chance to join Team Singapore at the Los Angeles 2028 Summer Olympics, with the potential to win the island country’s first-ever high-jump medal.
There’s only one complication.
To train full-time in preparation for the Olympics, Kam would need to delay his offer from Morgan Stanley. But to remain in the United States after graduation, he needs to find a firm to sponsor his visa set to expire 90 days after he graduates.
From the outside, it’s a textbook career-versus-dreams dilemma that mere mortals like you or I might find overwhelming or frustrating. But Kam doesn’t see the choice quite that way. To him, the situation is simply the result of the extraordinary opportunities that Wharton has opened over the past four years.
“I’ve had [access to] people and resources and, quite frankly, the chance to be part of something that’s bigger than myself,” he says, smiling. “Coming to Penn has been the best decision of my life.”
Navigating tradeoffs is nothing new for Kam. After completing high school and mandatory military service in Singapore, he was determined to continue high jumping while also pursuing academics. As Kam explored his higher education options, he realized that schools in the U.K. and Australia would force him to choose between his goals, with expensive training and coaches separate from academic institutions.
Penn shifted the paradigm: He could seamlessly transition from classes in Huntsman Hall to practices at Franklin Field, with professors and coaches in the same university system. At Wharton, Kam could pursue a world-class business education while simultaneously receiving world-class training with the track and field team.
Opportunities at Wharton also allowed Kam to discover and follow his passions for private credit and venture capital. Kam joined a business fraternity and several clubs while cultivating connections with upper-level students that ultimately led to his third-year internship with Morgan Stanley.
“At Wharton, it’s easy to be immersed in finance, given the abundance of clubs, chances to get involved, and the large proportion of students here interested in it,” he says. “I was fortunate enough to get internships that allowed me to explore my curiosities in venture capital, private credit, and investment banking. This would not have happened if I didn’t have this network of peers, faculty, and friends who were also equally — if not more — passionate about it.”
To contribute to the community of mentorship that helped him throughout his time at Penn, Kam created academic and career files for the track and field team, trying to instill the same 100 percent dedication to both academics and sports that has dominated his life since elementary school in Singapore.
“I know I’ve been helped before,” says Kam, “If I can make their life a little easier so that they can focus, I will do it.”
In some ways, Wharton is to blame for Kam’s current conundrum: Access to training through Penn’s track and field team ensured he could continue toward his goal of competing in the Olympics, while exposure to finance and community enabled him to begin building a career in investment banking. But the solution to the dilemma might also lie with access to Wharton mentors and industry connections.
Inspired by his determination to follow his dreams, some Wharton faculty have helped him explore whether there is a potential path that, once again, challenges the notion that he must choose between the two.
“The fact I’m having a conversation with Morgan Stanley about this is because I have this institution backing me,” Kam said. “My friends here, the faculty here: They’re all seeing me chasing this dream, and then also helping me. It’s a privilege to represent Wharton.”
— Alan Li, W’28
Posted: May 4, 2026
