The project mentioned in my profile, Balance of Power, is what I would describe as the ultimate culmination and convergence of my academic accomplishments, personal passions, and my experiences. Through this project, we aim to better promote the interests of women, people of color, and other communities who tend to be overlooked, especially in the international relations field. I found particular inspiration and desire to pursue Balance of Power due to a class I took during my first MA, which specifically examined international relations and its theories from the non-Western perspective. Despite taking multiple classes on the theory and history of international relations, it was the first time I learned about the racist nature of the field's roots and the atrocious beliefs of those considered the founders of international relations. I learned that IR is a field that does not have space for alternative ideas. One reason for this is that anarchy, the most basic and foundational concept of IR, was formed based on speculation on the structure of and relations between African tribes, without any direct observation. This, along with other foundational problems, resulted in a field that is closed off and does not allow for other perspectives that originate from outside the Western world. I was appalled when I discovered this, especially given that IR has been the focus of my entire academic career and likely will be the course of my professional one. Therefore, when the idea sparked to create this project, I was excited and ready to shape it as an opportunity to look at the world from alternative perspectives and push the importance of learning from and employing expertise from all sources. The wealth of knowledge we can learn from women and minority populations is largely untapped, due to the number of obstacles that prevent our knowledge from entering the mainstream. We are going to change that. While this project is still in its beginning stages, we have many topics planned for publication including the whitewashing of history; why women and minorities support political parties against their own interests; slurs, racism, and ESL; learning about race from media; addressing climate change based on the expertise of minority and indigenous communities; and more. This is a project that is very close to my heart. As someone who has lived internationally and had extensive interactions with people from all over the world, it has not been an easy journey to find my voice and identity as a mixed woman. It has been even more difficult to confront and fight racism from the many different angles I have experienced it, from places of malicious intent to places of pure ignorance and everything in between. Again and again, this journey has emphasized to me the importance of incorporating others' experiences into your understanding of the world, so that you can approach challenges from the right angle and make the difference you want to make. My dream is to develop Balance of Power to the point that we can become a trusted source of information that promotes alternative solutions to the mainstream. Furthermore, to the point that we can hire academics and even interns, allowing them to put their voices forward while also being fairly compensated for their work. This is a project that will take a lot of time and effort, but it is worth every bit of it. However, I do feel the weight of my student loans hanging over my decisions. This scholarship will not pay my loans off, but it will help ease the burden, allowing me to pursue this to its fullest potential.