For as long as I can remember, my family consisted of me, my mom, and my grandma, who was "sick." Despite the fact that I was told that she was "sick" with breast cancer, I feel as though I never saw her being sick—she even beat breast cancer twice! My grandmother was just full of life. She was always laughing and talking to me any time I was around. As a young child, I remember spending the day at her house while my mother was at work. I would reach into my playbox and pull out a book, then I would climb into her lap, and she would read it to me. She lived with breast cancer for 13 more years after I was born and sadly passed away when I was in the 7th grade, but she will always remain with me in my heart and mind. Despite being adopted and without knowing any hereditary predispositions to breast cancer, I became engrossed in this research as a teenager as a kind of coping method. During my endeavors, I discovered a lot of useful knowledge. For instance, avoiding cancer and detecting it early both lower the chance of developing a serious disease and enhance the results of therapy. Numerous dietary and health-related changes might help with this. Eating healthily comes first. Consume a diet high in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and fiber-rich antioxidants to reduce your risk of cancer. In some instances, exercise also aids in the prevention of breast cancer. Exercise, even for only 30 minutes a day, may reduce the risk of breast cancer. It is a well-known fact that lowering exposure to dangerous chemicals, including environmental pollutants and occupational carcinogens, may lower the risk of cancer. Early cancer detection may also increase the effectiveness of therapy. Screening tests are necessary to identify cancer early on. For high-risk people, screening mammograms should start at age 40 or earlier, but it's preferable that some women are starting to have them at age 25. It's recommended that everyone inspect their skin for moles or new growths, and women may even self-examine their breasts for lumps. In reality, I attended an all-girls school, Elizabeth Seton, in Bladensburg, and during my first year of high school, I learned how to do this in my health class! Even more, my instructor had us all lie down and go through the motions. Moreover, it is vital to maintain keeping an eye on one's health and seeing a physician for peculiar or enduring problems. Examining lumps, erratic bleeding, digestive anomalies, or unexplained weight loss is recommended. Last but not least, by identifying individuals with BRCA1 and BRCA2 gene mutations, which raise risk, genetic testing has significantly improved breast cancer prevention and early detection. Those who have these mutations may be screened, have lifestyle modifications made, or have prophylactic surgery to reduce their risk. Early genetic predisposition detection improves results for at-risk individuals by enabling more prompt and individualized interventions.By following these guidelines and being careful while seeking an early diagnosis, one may significantly lower their chance of developing cancer and improve their prognosis. I believe that I am deserving of this scholarship because I am a focused and diligent student, not because my grandmother passed away from breast cancer. I'm now pursuing my elementary education degree at Towson University because I really want to assist my future students in becoming the greatest learners and individuals they can be by being the best teacher I can be.

Have you ever watched Amy Sherman-Palledino's hit show, Gilmore Girls? Having a single mother of my own, my experience is similar to that of Rory Gilmore, except I don't have insanely rich grandparents who offered to pay for my college in exchange for weekly appearances at dinner. Despite this fact, I managed to come out pretty well. While my mom was growing up, her parents always pushed for her to have the best opportunities possible at the time, and likewise, my mom is doing the same for me now, and I have to commend her endless and herculean efforts that it took for her to get me to where I am today. My mother has worked tirelessly to make sure I had the greatest upbringing and education possible. She ensured that I was always socialized, had tutors when I needed them, and even became the tutor herself during late nights, not to mention how many times she rushed me to the store after I announced a project that happened to be due the next day with very short notice. Although all the things that she would do for me, and still does, require her to go out of her way, she never stopped doing those things once, even when she was tired, because she knew that it mattered to me. I will never forget the time that I had just started at a new school—a small Catholic school. It was a K-8 school, and I transferred in during the beginning of the 7th grade, so one might imagine how difficult it was to fit in where most of the students had known each other since they were little. I somehow came to the conclusion that if I ran for student president in the Student Government Association and won, I would become well known and respected, so that's what I did. Making a campaign poster was part of the running process, and I was so excited that I asked my mother to take me to Joanne's to get some art supplies, and the two of us spent nearly all night on my poster; I was sure I would win. Orange, yellow, and white, with little bells and pom-poms on the corners—that's exactly how my poster turned out, and I couldn't be any happier with my flashy little poster. I hung it up that week, and by the next week the results were announced, and I lost, of course. After school, I trudged to the car and flopped into the back seat, humiliated. My mom saw her work was not done, so she took me to 7-11 for my favorite snacks and said, "I'll show you how to throw a pity party!" Her slightly morbid but comforting advice brightened my evening and gave me the courage to show my face the next day after my devastating loss. Even now, my mom always tries to give me her all because that's just who she is, and she did it all with nary a hand to help her, which still amazes me to this day. Now, I'm in college, and I'm studying to be an elementary school teacher. My sole hope is that I will be able to demonstrate to my students the same level of love and unwavering dedication that my mother has shown to me throughout my life. In the same way that my mother helped me become the best version of myself, I will attempt to help my future students become the best versions of themselves as well.

The characteristic in myself that I value most is my ingenuity. Humans are naturally social creatures who will prioritize their own survival before everything else. By following the crowd, we are fitting in and practicing strength in numbers, which leads our brains to believe that we are heightening our chances at survival. However, when does following the crowd go too far? In today's society, two words I hear a lot are "Cancel Culture". Cancel Culture, according to the Webster Dictionary, is "the practice or tendency of engaging in mass canceling as a way of expressing disapproval and exerting social pressure". This practice is very popular among a lot of people in Generation Z. Having said that, I do not believe that engaging in this behavior is beneficial to one's health. I am of the opinion that everyone should arrive at their own judgments based on the reasoning and evidence available to them, rather than relying on the opinions of others or hearsay. Too many times have I been accused of supporting some proposterous scandal just because I was caught red-handed with a bag from a fast food brand that was 'canceled'. I think that everyone, in some way, is supporting some 'proposterous scandal' whether they know it or not, but everyone is afraid of being pointed at, so they decide to do the pointing first. For example, if someone uses a smartphone or wears clothes from popular brands, they are inadvertently supporting sweatshops in China, yet they will accuse another person of supporting the latest canceled artist. The level of hypocrisy involved here is simply too humorous. In today's world, the ability to remain unswayed by rumor and popular opinion is a skill that is increasingly difficult to find. Even though it is beneficial to fit in with the crowd to a certain extent, I believe that it is always beneficial to have a solid understanding of who I am and what I believe in. A person who is easily swayed in any direction is a person who does not have a lot of self-confidence in themselves or their ability to think intellectually. As a young woman, my originality and ability to think independently and have self-assurance is something that is extremely important to me. It is unnecessary for me to rely on rumors or speculation that I find on the internet because I am confident in my ability to draw my own conclusions based on facts and research.