When the COVID-19 pandemic started to take over I was a sophomore in high school. To show how long this has been going on I will graduate high school this May. COVID-19 completely wrecked my 2020 WinterGuard season. We had already competed in multiple competitions and were doing very well. We had plans to take home the gold at the state competition, however two competitions before state the season had been canceled due to the upcoming pandemic. This was devastating to my team and myself as well. However, I decided to make the best of this horrible situation and to be thankful that myself, my friends, and my family were all safe and healthy. This had proved to be the most difficult situation I had ever been in before. I went from getting to see my friends every day and going to school to being stuck at home. Even though this was an extremely weird and sad time I learned to make the best of it. Seeing that many people lost their loved ones to COVID-19 made me appreciate being at home with my family. At first, I was very upset about having to stay home since I am a very social person and love to go and do things. During my six-month "summer" as my friends and I called it, I took up many new hobbies. I started my very own garden which turned out to be very successful, and I started to paint. One of the things I am most proud of doing during the summer of 2020 was that I began taking dual credit courses online. Due to this I now have thirty college credits completed, which will give me a head start in finishing college and will help with the overall cost. With the COVID-19 pandemic, I made the best of a difficult situation by spending valuable time with my family. This pandemic made me look at the simpler things of life like my family and nature. Now that in my area COVID-19 transmission has significantly gone down I still try to spend as much time with my family as I can. The pandemic was a huge eye-opener to me to love and spend as much time with my family as I possibly can. The past almost two years have been the most difficult situation I have ever been through, but I learned to make the most of the circumstances and push forward and keep my head focused to reach my goals.

I come from a small town in Texas where there is nothing to do. For fun we walk around walmart, visit our dead mall ten minutes away, and hand out in a sonic stall. Hanging out with my friends is fun, but I hope one day to bring the fun back to my town. My dream is to attend Sam Houston State University to study business. After I complete my degree I plan to search for a business management job and work there until I have enough money and knowledge to start my own business back home. I plan to open a "nightclub" for teens. I imagine the place to be packed every Friday and Saturday night and double as an after-school hang out during the week for fun after-school activities with a yearly premium or a new wrist band every day. The only way I can see this dream coming true is by not having to take out massive student loans, so I am applying for every scholarship I see so I can make this dream come true one day.

As a child, I was so ready to become a grown-up and not have to go to school anymore. I thought that once I became an adult I would no longer have to learn any more or have to listen to people. However, my perspective on this quickly changed. In my freshmen year of high school, I took a finance class. This class taught me so much about how important it was to take charge of my finances before it was too late; this stuck with me forever. So, I took another finance class my junior year because I was eager to learn more. I learned much more and now have a better understanding of how money works. I still felt that I needed to learn more, so this year, my senior year, I signed up for two finance classes. In my financial math class, I am learning a lot about college and how to pay for college. One of the main things that have stuck with me is student loans. Student loans are something I do not want to have. Learning about student loans has completely changed my perspective on my future education and how I plan to pay for it.

Many people believe that if they have everything they want in life that they will have joy, however, that is not the case. True joy comes from relationships, experiences, and selflessness. There is not a specific definition of joy, but I do have my own. What joy means to me is going through life without being angry. I am guilty of getting upset at every little thing sometimes. I feel that joy is not something one experiences, but however a state of mind. Someone that has a joyous state of mind is one that finds the good in everything and makes the best out of difficult situations. A few ways I seek out joy in my life are by looking at a situation and still being thankful for what I do have. If something bad happens to me I choose to feel joy in what I do have and what is going right in my life. Another way I seek out joy in my life is by helping others. Several times a year I go to my local women's shelter and donate food and see if there is any other work that they need help with. Knowing that my help can benefit someone in need makes me feel true joy that I can make someone's day or life a little bit easier.

August 30, 2021, the worst and most heartbreaking day of my entire life. My best friend Elizabeth passed away. She and I had a special bond that was unbreakable and still is. We did absolutely everything together we even had the same exact schedule for our senior year. One Monday morning she passed away unexpectedly and it changed my life forever. This was truly the most difficult thing I have ever been through and I am still mentally recovering from it. I thought to myself will I ever return to school or will I ever be happy again? At first, those things seemed impossible to me, however, I persevered. I knew she wanted me to continue going to school and reach my goals even if she was not physically there to cheer me on. I set goals for myself to graduate, get accepted to college, and become successful. I will continue doing my best to reach these goals even though what has happened. My goal is to attend college with little to no student loans and winning this scholarship will help me towards that goal.

Growing up I had groups of friends that were always worried about themselves. Slowly I started turning into one of them and I often thought the world revolved around me and me only. However, deep down inside I knew I was not one of them because every time I put someone else down for my own gain I felt bad inside. In my freshmen year of high school, I decided that enough was enough and that I need to not focus on myself so much and that is what I did. I started seeing other people's needs and helping them out instead of indulging in myself. For example, I was at Walmart one day before a winter guard competition and one of my teammates called me asking if I could get her a pair of eyelashes while I was there. In the past I would have just told her I did not have time and that she should have taken care of it herself. Instead, I thought to myself maybe her mom was upset this morning, or maybe she did not have the money to buy them herself. At that moment I chose to help out my teammate instead of being super early to get ready for my own personal gain. She was extremely thankful because her dad did not have the time to stop at the store to get them for her. Ever since that experience, I committed myself to be a selfless person instead of being willingly selfish.

Throughout my childhood and early teen years, I was constantly bullied. Bullied for my clothes, the way I looked, and where I lived. The things the other children would say would make me feel unloved. Throughout growing up I realized that the things other people said ultimately said did not matter and that I would always be loved. Ever since I have overcome the bullying I made it my mission to make every single person around me feel loved and accepted. Many people do not realize a small compliment to a random person could turn their whole day around, or even turn their life around. We never know what is going on in other people's lives, so we should all strive to make everyone around us our brothers and sisters. A few things I do is make sure people know that I am there for them. Whenever I know someone is going through a rough time I always personally let them know that I am thinking about them and that I am there for whatever they may need. This makes that person feel loved, wanted, and cared for. Even if I am not close friends with that individual I make sure they know that I care for them. Another thing I do is compliment people whether it be on their appearance or if they did something well everyone should know they are doing well in life and it also makes them feel loved.

Financial freedom is something I dream of having when I have a career someday. My parents have always been in a tremendous amount of debt while I was growing up. From not being able to go on vacations to not having amazing Christmas like the other kids my age. All of these things pointed back to the tremendous amount of debt my parents had acquired. They were always working just to pay all the car notes and credit cards we never did much as a family. What financial freedom means to me is being able to not feel physically tied down to your job and bills just to make it month by month. I feel financial goes hand in hand with not living paycheck to paycheck. Financial freedom is something that must be worked for it is not something given. One must work for their financial freedom by not taking out necessary credit cards, not living within their means, and being irresponsible with their earned money. One thing I plan to do in the near future to help build financial freedom is not buying everything that I want. Since getting a job I have realized that I do have food at home and I have plenty of clothes and shoes as well. Greed now will cause even more greediness as an adult. In my financial math class at my high school class, we learned that many college students will take out more loans than their actual tuition and spend the rest of it. I definitely do not plan on doing that at all since a part of financial freedom is not being tied down to your student loans forever. How I plan on achieving financial freedom in the near future is by applying to as many scholarships as I can to help reduce the amount I will need to borrow for my education. I also plan on getting a part-time job in college to avoid the temptation of getting a credit card and to save up to pay as much of my loan down as I can. Just like Dave Ramsey said, "Live like no one else so one day you can live like no one else." That is something that I agree with and in college, I plan to live cheaply so one day I can have a nicer car, a nice house, and designer clothes that everyone is raving about but can not afford.

I have been fortunate all my life to have attended a properly funded school district. I know just miles away there are kids my age that do not have access to the same academic resources that I do. Something has to change. Educational inequity is something that we should all stand for because there are amazing minds that are being downgraded due to not having the proper resources to advance their education. We should all stand for this because one child in a less fortunate area still deserves to receive the same educational opportunities that children in better economical areas have access to. The teachers teaching the next generation are teaching the future doctors to cure cancer, to uncover the existence of an unknown planet, etc. If our young children are not receiving the same opportunities some of these full potentials may never be seen.

Throughout high school, I have taken several financial classes. During these four years and four financial classes I have been given so many do's and don'ts when it came to my financial future. There were a few that stood out to me such as investing, paying cash for a car, and avoiding the headache of student loans. However, the most important piece of advice I have been given is to have a strong emergency fund. As a teenager, I was told to have a five hundred dollar emergency fund, and as an adult to have three to six months of income set aside. I never realized what could happen as an adult if I did not have this amount of money set aside in case something happened. Of course, I always knew it was extremely important. However, I did not see how not having an emergency fund could have an effect on the national economy. One example we have all seen recently is the pandemic. Many families were left jobless, forced to live off on unemployment, and unable to pay their bills. The obvious conclusion I came to was having a strong emergency. Those that did not have three to six months of emergency funds were a lot worse off than the families who did have money saved up. The main thing I have learned from seeing this happen to the people around me is to start saving for a rainy day because it can quickly turn into a rainy year.

On August 30, 2021, my best friend Elizabeth passed away. We did absolutely everything together since we were freshmen. I did not know how I was going to go on with my life and continue to be successful without my best friends by my side. Since this tragedy has happened to me I have decided to have a growth mindset. I could lay around and be sad all day or I could pick myself up and make myself and her proud. Having a growth mindset is not only a mindset those that have experienced hardships should have, but everyone should have a growth mindset. A few things I have done in the recent months to keep a growth mindset is by setting goals for myself. Whether my goal is to read a book this week or go out of my way to give compliments to people I see to make their day I know that setting goals are an extremely important part of growth.

There is nothing worse than someone that changes themselves for people to like them. I used to be one of those people. Growing up I was severely bullied. I always thought if I changed myself then the other kids would like me better. Well, it worked for a short while, until they no longer liked me. That day I decided to just be myself. Staying true to myself is one of the best things I have ever decided to do. I feel like I finally know myself. A few things I do to stay true to myself is by not being what we call a "people pleaser" I now do things to make myself happy and not only things that make everyone else happy. Another thing I do to stay true to myself is not changing my opinions to fit in. If I feel strongly about something I am not going to change what I think to gain a few people in my circle. Right now in life, this is the happiest and truest I have ever felt, and it is the best feeling.

At my previous job I was an evening shift supervisor; along with that title came with many responsibilities. Some of these included: training new employees, closing the store, and dealing with difficult customers. Once I became a supervisor I realized every new employee was going to learn at a different pace and have their own strengths and weaknesses. I would get frustrated when I was always being paged to the counter for reasons that I thought were ridiculous. My attitude completely changed once I realized that what if that was me? I would want my manager to be as helpful as they possibly can be when it came to my training. I then decided that my patience was a key role in my job when it came to new employees. Patience is important because it keeps people motivated and not feel discouraged. the last thing you want is someone you are supposed to mentor to be scared of making you upset.

During my time in high school, I have taken four financial classes. I have learned many things such as how to save money, how to buy a house, and most importantly how to invest. I think it is important to invest mainly because you can still earn money as inflation rises rather than leaving your money just in a typical savings account. One thing every single one of my financial teachers has given me is the same advice. One of my teachers even invited a financial advisor to give us a presentation. They all had one thing in common they said to start early. The way that starting early has been harped on me has stuck with me. Many people wait too long to start investing their money, and could possibly be in a bind when it comes to retirement. I have two main goals for the near future: pay for college in scholarships and cash and start my first investment account once I turn eighteen.

One thing I do to improve the lives of elderly people in my community is by cards. When I was a child my church would visit the nursing homes during Christmas, valentines day, easter, and grandparents day. As a child, I saw how happy these elderly would be to get some love on these holidays since many of them did not have regular visitors. As I got older my church stopped doing this, so I do it myself now. Even though I do not physically go see the elderly at the nursing home I do put cards together a few times a year for the nurses to pass out. I know this small task impacts the elderly in my community immensely by making them feel special. Many families bring their elderly family members to the nursing home and just forget about them, so bringing them loving cards a few times a year can make their day or even week.

Throughout high school, I have taken a total of four finance classes. I have learned many important things about finance. The one that has stood out to me the most is saving money. Everyone knows it is important to have money saved for a rainy day, but what about a rainy year? I have learned to keep about three to six months' worth of income in my savings account. Some may say that is a lot, however, if you look at the current economy with covid many people did not have their emergency fund built up to support themselves and their families during this time of economic hardship. Seeing this on the news and in my community really opened up my eyes to the true importance of being financially prepared for whatever life throws my way. With earning this and many other scholarships I will be able to start building my emergency fund for life after college, rather than having to worry about how I am going to pay off pesky student loans.

In my small town of Lumberton, Texas we have one charity organization. I have volunteered at Caring Hearts since 2018. In the past three years of volunteering there, I have earned over twenty-five service hours. I helped the older ladies clean and rearrange the facility two times a year. Before the school year starts I volunteer my time to put backpacks together with school supplies for those who cannot afford school supplies. I also make time to help set up and clean up their annual garage sell they do to raise funds to do more things in our community. Due to COVID, I have not been able to helo out as much but I did find a way around it. Since I can no longer volunteer my time; once a month I buy non-perishable food items to donate to their facility. I know my volunteer time at Caring Hearts benefits many of the less fortunate citizens of Lumberton and surrounding areas.

The number one thing that motivates me on a daily basis is my goals. Whenever I feel lazy or tired and do not want to get out of bed and go to school I remember what I need school for. Without school, I will not be able to go to college and reach my goals. Whenever I do not feel like going to work I remind myself that if I do not go to work that I may not be able to go to college without student loans, and that is one of my biggest goals for my education Another thing that keeps me motivated is my family; without them, I would not have been able to hold myself to a certain standard to reach my goals. I feel that by keeping myself motivated I am sure to do amazing things in my life and continue to have a bright future.