Aloha my name is Avery. I live in Hawai'i and I am a junior-year nursing student at the University of Hawai'i at Hilo. I have always liked the idea of working in the medical field but my uncle showed me why I wanted to be a nurse. He regularly volunteered with Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) and always brought back stories of helping people in the countries that he was able to go visit. Hearing about how it is possible to make such a difference at home and abroad in life quality was the main reason that I decided that I wanted to be a nursing major. In my home state of Hawai'i unfortunately there is a large divide in the healthcare system. Indigenous Hawaiians as well as other minorities such as African-Americans, Marshallese, Filipino, Tongan, and Samoan members of the population do not have the same access to healthcare as the Caucasian people who have immigrated to this state. Unfortunately, many are unable to attend medical appointments and even more are unable to afford their medical expenses. I want to obtain my nursing degree to be able to volunteer and help these marginalized populations on my island. There are not enough people caring for the locals of this land and the healthcare system here in general lacks nurses, doctors, and dentists. After graduating with my bachelor's in 2024 I plan to attend a Doctorate of Nursing Program. With that degree, I will be able to practice as a primary care provider in the state of Hawai'i. As such I will be able to do at-home visits and travel to visit patients that are unable to physically make it to the hospital or the doctor's office. I'm hoping that by doing this I can help diagnose and limit the spread of avoidable diseases to better improve the health condition of the local population here. Additionally, I plan to do medical volunteering with MSF after my graduation. I have studied the French language since my freshman year of high school to be able to better help this group with their outreach programs. They specifically need more assistance covering regions of Western Africa, an area in which many members of the population primarily speak French. I'm hoping to be able to provide people in as many places as possible the care that they need since health care should be considered a basic human right. This scholarship will help me towards my goals by providing funding to pay for my school expenses. Since entering nursing school, there have been many unplanned fees throughout the program such as recurrent ATI fees, paying for equipment, and buying required supplemental learning materials for my courses. This scholarship will help to ease some of the burdens of those expenses so I can focus more directly on my schoolwork. Unfortunately, finances have played a large role in my education and the less debt that I graduate with, the easier it will be for me to pursue my doctorate in the future. Thank you for taking the time to read my application, I truly appreciate it.

Aloha, my name is Avery. I am currently a junior-year nursing student at the University of Hawaii in Hilo. To be completely honest I wasn't sure initially whether or not I wanted to go into nursing. I knew that I had a passion for biomedical sciences and that I loved volunteering and helping people in need. But, I thought that I wanted to be a psychologist. Mental health always fascinated me and I liked the idea of being able to help people suffering from mental illnesses. What changed was when my grandmother for the first time in over two decades was hospitalized in a psychiatric ward at the hospital in my area for her bipolar disorder. Despite being scared by the whole situation what stood out to me was how supportive the nurses were, not just for her, but for our whole family. They gave us resources to look into to educate ourselves and provided advice on how to best take care of her. The nursing staff made us feel heard and that our opinions mattered. It showed me the large differences between the two roles and I knew that I wanted to go into nursing. Over the next few years, my grandmother was diagnosed with Type-II diabetes and stage III lymphoma. Attending medical appointments with her showed me more and more competent nurses who were devoted to providing patient care and I knew that I wanted to be like them. I believe that there is no better way to help someone than to show them that they are cared for, safe, and healthy. Nursing provides a wonderful opportunity to care for people who truly need it. It is important to me because it provides a chance to give back to my community in the best way possible. I want to use my skills as a nurse to help both my local community and abroad. After graduating in 2024 I plan to pursue my Doctorate In Nursing which in my state will allow me to work as a PCP. Many people in my area struggle to get to their medical appointments at all. I want to be able to provide in-home visits so I can help these people in the best way possible. Nursing is so important to me because without nurses my grandmother would not be alive today and that is something that I am forever grateful for. Nurses have saved countless lives ever since the start of the profession and it is a career that I am proud to soon be a part of. It provides not only a pathway for me to support myself financially, but a way to care for my family members, and a way to help others get the need that they deserve. Overall, nursing is a very important speciality that I hope more people consider entering in the future.

Aloha, my name is Avery. I come from a multicultural African-American family that immigrated to Hawaii from Chicago in the early 1970s. My family left the area because they wanted to live in a place that was more welcoming and accepting to people of various backgrounds. As a result, I've grown up in Hawaii and California. I am currently in my junior year of nursing school and I will graduate in 2024. I want to eventually obtain my Doctorate of Nursing Practice and use that degree to work as a primary care provider for low-income individuals who struggle to obtain adequate medical care. I have volunteered at homeless shelters and workshops throughout high school but in my opinion, no volunteer work can compare to helping people feel safe, healthy, and cared for. One of the biggest obstacles that I faced recently was last year. Since my family does not have a lot of money for my education until this past week, I commuted two hours each direction to school from the Kona side to the Hilo side of the island of Hawaii for school. While doing this, living with my parents, and working, my grandmother got diagnosed with Stage 3 lymphoma. She and my grandfather were care-taking for my great-grandmother who is 94 and has severe dementia. To get the treatment they needed, my grandparents went to California and asked me to care-take for my great-grandmother for the then foreseeable future. I had a hard time caring for my great-grandmother because it was difficult to see her losing more and more of her independence. It was a hard struggle to provide the best care for her even though it was not what she had wanted. She wanted to go back to California, be able to drive, and eat foods that interfered with her medications. Unfortunately, I could not allow her to do those things because it would endanger her and other people around her. I tried my best to show her the respect that she deserves while also keeping in contact with my grandparents. While I was at school my mother or my aunt who both lived nearby would take shifts caring for her until I got back. This experience, though difficult proved to be a major learning opportunity. I learned to cultivate a degree of patience and stress management that I never had before. I learned to remind myself that the way that she treated me wasn't because of who she was but rather due to her medical condition. I learned to reduce my procrastination tendencies and form better time management skills to ensure that I was able to finish my schoolwork, work shift hours, and provide my great-grandmother the best care that I was capable of doing. However, the most difficult thing that this experience taught me was that it was okay to ask for help. I kept pushing myself to do more, and more. And when I didn't accomplish everything that I wanted to I was hard on myself. But learning that everyone needs help is a valuable skill. It isn't a sign of weakness, rather it is a sign of strength to admit that help is needed to get things done. It not only shows that there are support systems out to help, but that nobody has everything perfectly together. Fortunately, my grandmother was able to finish her chemo, and now my great-grandmother has a full-time caretaker. The entire experience allowed my entire family to draw closer and form a stronger bond.

In my lifetime the biggest experience that I've had that has shaped me was my time in Africa. We had spent hours traveling across the desert to meet with a local tribe over my summer break in 2018. While there I met a polygamous family who lived in one small mud hut. Despite having so little they had given me a necklace and invited me in to eat with them. I saw that many of them were sick and asked about medicine and care. They had told me that they didn't have any access to medical professionals or medicine. Even something as minor as diarrhea or a broken bone regularly led to death. I was shocked. I had heard of situations like this before but nothing compares to seeing people suffering first-hand without any practical help. I was grateful for the kindness and hospitality that this family had shown me but was also concerned about their situation. Once I returned home to the United States I began researching medical opportunities in Eastern Africa and found relief groups that have begun to travel across the plains to help with local tribal families. After being in Africa I knew that this is what I wanted to do. I am now going to nursing school with the plan to graduate in 2024. Upon graduation I want to volunteer with either Medecins Sans Frontiers, Volunteer Base Camp, or Go Volunteer Africa.