My painting is a Brady Bunch opening theme card style fanart rendition of the YouTube series Sander's Sides by Thomas Sanders. It displays each character in their own box portraying their personality and interacting with the other characters to create "The Sanders Bunch." It was painted using a combination of watercolor and acrylic paints.

Throughout my educational career, many of my teachers have impacted me greatly, especially in the aspect of assisting me in my journey to find my passion in history, but also in a way that helped me personally find myself. Considering all of the wonderful teachers that have helped me to become who I am today; one stands out more than most: my high school English teacher. Coming from an atypical situation, my high school merging with another in the area after my freshman year, I ended up having the same English teacher for my freshman, junior, and senior years, being his first and last class of freshman that he had ever taught. Even so, I would never have wished the situation to have gone differently, except to have had him as my sophomore teacher as well, which in a way I did, being that he is also my Academic Team coach. Knowing this particular teacher continuously over my four years, made it evident that he knew me better than the rest of my teachers did, but he always went out of his way to get to know his students at a personal level so that we felt that his classroom was a safe environment if there was ever anything that we needed to talk about. While I did know my English teacher my first two years of high school, it was my junior year that it became evident that he would have a huge impact on my life. I had recently changed my personality and style from a stereotypical country to a punk and emo look, which made me more comfortable in who I was, and my teacher completely supported me, saying that the only person whose opinion mattered when considering who I want to be was myself. He also went out of his way to make sure that I was mentally okay, considering it was such a drastic change. There was one specific moment that I will never forget which has continuously helped me get through rough times. I went into my teacher’s room during study hall for extra help understanding sonnets. As I was taking out my computer, he told me to close the computer and said, “How are you?” and as I was responding with the usual “I’m fine,” or “I’m okay,” he said, “No, seriously. How are you really?” I almost cried when he asked me this because I knew that he actually cared how I was doing, which at the moment, I was struggling, and he wanted to make sure my well-being was a higher priority than a grade on a sonnet quiz. After going over a few sonnets, he eventually told me that I had the skills to understand them; my only problem was my confidence in my abilities. Every time since then that I have a test or am struggling with something, he always tells me that he knows I can do it and believes in me which helps to boost my own confidence in myself. Over the four years that I have known him, my English teacher has become more of a role model than a teacher and someone that I can look up to and trust. Whether through serious conversations which I have started calling therapy sessions or telling him about my favorite band or how I still do not have a driver’s license and being as my teacher says, “trolled” for it, I know that he will always support me in my academic and personal endeavors as well as someone that I will admire for the rest of my life.

When I was in eighth grade, I was very close with one of my friends and her family. I even went on vacation with them once. I knew all her brothers, but Jack had acted like an older brother to me on that vacation. On March 17, 2017, my friend and I were assisting at our parish’s fish fry. I went home that night, thinking everything was normal, but it was not. While everyone was out that day, Jack, a high school senior, had hanged himself. He had been trying to get over his depression, but that day, it was too much. I spent the following weeks helping the family as much as I could and attempted to show support and empathy as much as possible. I tried to hide the fact that I was also hurting to stay strong for my friend. I knew Jack better than the rest of my friend's brothers; he had always looked out for me. He put himself before others and had been one of the kindest people that I have ever met. After his passing, I was given a purple rubber bracelet that has his name, his hockey number, and his senior retreat name: Team Fearless on it. I haven’t taken it off in four years; it reminds me of the pain and suffering that some people go through. The bracelet reminds me that even the liveliest people are hiding pain to be the light for others. For years, I tried to hide from the reality of what had happened to Jack. I made sure everyone knew not to mention suicide or hanging, and I even walked out of a class watching Mrs. Danver’s death scene in Rebecca. Eventually, something clicked inside of me. I knew that I needed to stop hiding and begin advocating for mental health and suicide awareness. I have attempted to make people aware of my story: that people who aren’t the closest with the victim will still be affected. I talk about how people with mental illnesses cannot help how they feel. It is a chemical imbalance in their brain, and it is just as much a health concern as the flu or a heart problem. Unfortunately, it is a health concern that most people overlook, and it goes untreated. I want to be able to help organizations focusing on mental health awareness and suicide prevention such as the National Suicide Lifeline and Padalecki’s #AlwaysKeepFighting campaign to help those who feel like giving up. I dream to support organizations that help people who need therapy and cannot afford it. I want to make a difference in mental health advocacy and help families from being torn apart by mental illness. I strive to be able to make sure that friends and families are “okay,” knowing that people put on façades for others. No one should go through the pain of losing someone to mental illness; no one ever deserves to feel like they are not enough to be alive.

I spent most of my high school career trying to decide ‘what I wanted to do when I grow up’ which was a very difficult question when it was asked. For a while I wanted to be a museum curator because I work at the Behringer Crawford Museum in Covington, Kentucky and found collections and history fascinating, but eventually decided that the job market and pay for a curator was not the best and moved on. Of course, the most logical thing after a curator is a chemist, which is exactly what I wanted to do for about two and a half years of my life. After my second year of a chemistry class, I realized that as much as I loved the periodic table of elements, chemistry was not what I wanted to do with my life. Eventually during my AP United States Government and Politics class, I finally decided what I aspired to achieve. I want to be a constitutional lawyer and uphold the values of our country that the founding fathers created back in 1787. I had always loved historical documents, especially the Constitution which I gained an affinity for in my seventh-grade history class. I have always admired John Adams both as a founding father and as a person, especially for his inability to give up what he believed in and everything that made him who he was. I also found a love for the Federalist papers and all of the overlooked achievements of Alexander Hamilton after watching Hamilton this summer. I had previously considered being a lawyer because of my talent to argue for everything I believe in, but never truly considered it until I realized that I could make a career out of my love for the Constitution.