With a high school degree and unstable income, my single mother jumped every hurdle to make sure I would attend college. In Kindergarten, my mother entered me in the Open Choice lottery for the opportunity to get a better education than the one the Bridgeport Public System offered. In first grade, I started my journey in the Westport Public School System. Although my mother has struggled financially for my entire life, she worked so hard to hide it that I thought my life was exactly like all of my friends’. But it wasn't, and it isn’t. When I was 9, every girl in my fifth grade class had a pair of UGG boots: the tan ones with the three buttons on the side. I wanted them so badly that I begged my mother without knowing we couldn’t afford them. For my tenth birthday, my family helped my mother buy me the exact pair of UGG boots I coveted, which I still wear to this day. I tell this anecdote not to sidetrack but to strengthen the point that, as any mother would do whatever they can to please their child, my mother will do it tenfold. Her work ethic and utter selflessness has molded me. It pushes me to work as hard as I can so I can one day repay her for the sacrifices she has made for me. After my tenth birthday, my mother lost her job and I began receiving free/reduced lunch. I am extremely lucky that the Open Choice program paid for field trips to ensure that the students in the program had a similar experience as the ones outside it. Having grown up around upper-middle class all of my adolescent life, I never understood why it was I couldn't sign up for PAL cheerleading or girl scouts, but as I've grown older I've begun to see her sacrifices for me. In between unemployment checks, we'd share McDonalds meals and slept in the same bed until I was 14. The one bedroom in the second apartment we moved to after receiving Section 8, was given to me, and my mother slept in the living room. We've now moved up to a complex where we both have our own rooms. My mothers' sacrifices will never go without gratitude, as there was never a time where I didn't have clothes to wear or food to eat. The light bill may not have been paid, but I looked like the girls I went to school with. She always made sure I looked the part, and through uncertainty and economic insecurity, helped me tour colleges. Without a college degree, she couldn't do much to help me in this sector of my life so I've learned everything I can with the help of the people in the community I went to school in. As theatre became my escape from my reality, It also became my safe haven. It is a place where I am seen and heard for not what I am, but who I am. I am pursuing a career in the arts, despite knowing the income instability is inevitable, because every aspect of performing aids in telling a story. Storytelling is inherent to our nature; being able to help tell these stories gives me a purpose in life. Some days it helps me forget the troubles I may be having and other days it reinforces the good I contribute to society. I am passionate about the arts and would love to give even a sliver of that feeling to anyone who sees my work.

As an Afro-Latina woman of low-socio-economic status, ironically, the theatre has given me a space to feel seen. A career in the arts would give me the opportunity to give other people like me that same feeling. Having a career in the arts is important to me because I want to create art that changes people and theatre that makes people question the meaning of everything around them. Theater allows me to do the work I love. With a career in the arts I could dedicate myself to representing the unheard and pushing those who are consistently heard to think. I would be able to provide a space in which every voice feels represented. It would allow the audience to let go of their struggle for at least an hour and change at least one person's perspective. The arts, specifically a career involving them is important to me because of the community. As a member of multiple underrepresented groups, I want theaters to be as diverse as the communities they are built in. My career in the arts would allow young people to see people that look like them telling their stories. Art is meant to reflect the worlds we live in and I believe that theatre is meant to tell stories that everyone can relate to. The world is immensely diverse, so why is it that more often than not, minorities are unequally represented? I am pursuing a career in the arts to share my passion. I have hopes and dreams that at some point, my career in the arts will influence at least one child or family in the same way theatre arts transformed my life. I was brought to shows from a young age, at a cabaret theater in my hometown. When I was older, I was given opportunities from the community where I attended school, to participate in theatre, dance, and music. I want audience members to be touched by the events taking place in real time. For just a moment, to feel the love for theatre that I feel, and every performer and creator, feels. A career in the arts is the only way I can tell my story. It's the only way I can tell OUR stories. I want to create experiences for others to understand that passion felt for things like this can be translated into any and everything else that you do. A career in the arts is important to me because at its core, it is doing what I love; it would ultimately allow me to be heard, and in turn help me help others to feel the same way.