I moved to Plantation during my freshman year of high school. As I write this essay as a senior who’s spent the most important parts of my life in this city, I reflect on these last four years that I have lived here. I love the city of Plantation. Compared to where I used to live in Miami, it feels much safer, calmer, and more community driven here. What I like most about Plantation is the availability of community engagement events, such as multicultural, holiday and family events being hosted year-round. I believe this is what the city does best- building community- and I believe it is important to not just improve the city in terms of infrastructure but in terms of community as well. To do so, the city of Plantation should implement more community events specifically for the youth, focusing on connectivity and future success. Initiating teen-centered events for social networking and building life skills in Plantation will improve the city’s community and success amongst the youth as well as invest in the future of the city. Firstly, it is important to ensure college readiness events are carried out through these teen-focused initiatives that Plantation should take. My mother works for a non-profit organization called Take Stock in Children that prepares students for college. Because of this, I have more access to information and resources about college that many students in this city may not have. I could not imagine myself being as prepared for college as I am now without this extra help. This is why; in order to benefit the students of Plantation, it is necessary to implement these student-focused events. These events could be, for example, Plantation partnering with local colleges, such as Broward College or FAU to set up college fairs and college preparation events. This would help students learn more about universities in the state, be provided more information on topics such as FAFSA or applying for scholarships and learn skills that will help them with tests such as SAT/ACT. In terms of improving the city, these fairs would do so by using this preparation provided for students to garner higher numbers of Plantation students going to and being successful in college. This will have a lasting effect on the city’s youth and increase the amount of successful people that come from the city, overall enhancing the city. Ensuring student’s success for their academic future is important for boosting Plantation’s success rate and education level amongst the youth, but it is also important to initiate events that focus on promoting sociability and community amongst teenagers. As mentioned earlier, Plantation does an amazing job of focusing on community and family-based social events, and gearing these events towards a teen audience would prove to be beneficial. Teens being able to get together for recreational, sports, volunteer, culture, or arts events can build a stronger community bond within the demographic. As a teen who lives in this city and has actively sought friendships with the teens of my community, I feel that I could definitely be closer to people around my age that live near me. These are people who I may be passing everyday- experiencing the same things I do. Implementing these city-ran social events could help turn these strangers into life-long friends. Promoting these kinds of social events for teens will not only benefit teens’ connections with each other in the city, but it will benefit Plantation’s future by giving the next generation of residents a stronger and more connected community that will help the city of Plantation grow.

My name is Anthony Martinez, and I plan to go to the University of Central Florida and pursue architecture, as I have always loved traveling and seeing the unique architecture of each place I have visited. In terms of community involvement, I have been a long-time volunteer of the organization Take Stock In Children. It is a non-profit organization that helps students with limited finances with college readiness and preparation. I have been a volunteer for many years, with most of my work consisting of office work and event support. Some of the work I’ve done includes helping set up events and fundraisers, filing, mailing, etc. I have also served my community through my church and its many charity events. These events, usually seasonal, have provided for the community by using the money that we have donated to the cause in order to help those less fortunate. Our funds have contributed to everything from clothes, toys, canned foods, and so on. Especially recently, I have been contributing more to these charity events now that I have a job and make my own money. Speaking of finances, as I am now accepted into UCF and ready to pursue my dream major, I’ve realized now more than ever how important finances truly are. I wasn’t provided any scholarships from UCF themselves, which was something my parents and I were largely hoping for. My parents are unsure if they can pay for all of the expenses of UCF alone, which is why I have dedicated my time to both academics and applying for scholarships. I hope that through all of these scholarship applications, including this one, I will make enough money to support my parents enough in their endeavors to get me into this school. When it comes to keeping children safe from bullying, many people assume that there is nothing that they themselves can do in the grand scheme of things. This creates bystanders, people who will see bullying actively taking place yet feeling they are unable to do anything about it. I have always been against bullying, but in the past four years I’ve grown and matured in high school, I feel now more than ever that bullying is something of utmost importance that should be focused on and handled correctly. One of the ways that I’ve stopped bullying from happening to the youth around me is by simply taking action. If bullying happens to be occurring in my vicinity, I’m not afraid to step in to try and ease the situation. Even if I am unsure of whether or not a person is being bullied, I will always ask who I assume is the victim if they are okay, and if not, I handle it by either verbally confronting the bully or simply reaching out to any kind of figure of authority. Not many people realize, but simply taking that first step and not standing by can prevent bullying altogether. When dealing with cyberbullying, you can use the same concept. If someone is being bullied online, reaching out to the victim with a message could help them feel as if someone is there for them. Additionally, reporting people on certain platforms for bullying can get cyberbullies banned from those platforms. Sometimes, cyberbullying may be inevitable due to the ease of bullying someone through a screen. In these cases, I make sure to tell more sensitive people to not be on certain platforms which may be more negative than others. Additionally, I sometimes tell others simply ignore the cyberbully, due to most cyberbullies just reflecting on their own insecurities onto others.