I am seventeen years old and I have already held someone’s hand while they died. That is not something I say to be dramatic. I say it because it is the experience that shaped everything I am and everything I am working toward. My grandmother spent her whole life teaching in low income schools, showing up every day for kids the world had already given up on. When she got cancer I became one of her caregivers. I was young but I never considered not being there. I sat with her through the hard nights, held her hand, and learned something that has never left me — the most important thing you can give another person is your presence. She taught me empathy and she taught me to move through this world with love and patience. She is the reason I am going to be a nurse. After she passed I volunteered at a retirement center nearby and got close to one of the residents there. I stayed by her side as her health got worse and I was holding her hand when she took her last breath. Those two experiences back to back made it clear that hospice and end of life care is exactly where I belong. This past year I graduated high school with honors, passed my CNA exam on my first try, and started my first job at Catawba Hospital, which is a psychiatric facility. My patients are people that society heavily stigmatizes and a lot of people are scared to work with them. I have never been scared because my grandmother taught me that every single person deserves to be seen and treated with dignity no matter what they are going through. This fall I am starting my BSN at James Madison University with the goal of becoming a hospice nurse. Outside of school and work my passions are reading, which is pretty obvious from my favorite spot in any bookstore, and music. I have been a heavy metal fan since I was a kid. My dad introduced me to it after my parents divorced and it became the thing that kept us connected. We went to concerts together, talked about lyrics for hours, and leaned on that music through a lot of hard seasons. It taught me the same thing nursing has — that people are more alike than they are different, and that you can find real connection in the most unexpected places. My greatest motivator is my mom. She has spent 16 years working for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs fighting for people who gave everything for this country. She has won awards for her dedication and commitment and she has never once done it for recognition. She does it because she genuinely believes those people deserve someone in their corner. My dad is an honorably discharged Marine. I grew up watching both of my parents pour themselves into serving others and it shaped who I am in ways I am still discovering. Jennifer Kelley sounds like someone who understood that a life well lived is not measured by how much you accumulate but by how much you give. Hard work, creative thinking, and putting others first — those are not just qualities I admire. They are the values I was raised on and the ones I bring to every patient, every shift, and every hard room I walk into without hesitation. Kelley boys never quit. I was raised by people who never quit either. And neither will I.

I did not choose nursing because it seemed like a stable career or because someone told me it was a good idea. I chose it because life handed me moments that made it impossible to choose anything else. My grandmother was a teacher her whole life. She spent decades in low income schools believing in kids that everyone else had written off, showing up every single day with patience and love that never ran dry. She was the kind of person who gave everything she had to others without ever keeping score. When she was diagnosed with cancer I became one of her caregivers. I was young but walking away never crossed my mind. I would sit with her through the hard nights, fix her pillows, hold her hand when the pain got bad, and just be there in the silence when there was nothing else I could do. What I learned in those quiet hours was something no classroom has ever been able to teach me since. The most powerful thing I could give her was not anything medical. It was just making sure she knew she was not alone. She is the one who taught me empathy. She taught me to move through this world with love and patience and to see people for exactly who they are. That is the foundation everything else is built on for me. After she passed I started volunteering at a local retirement center where I got close to one of the residents. I visited her regularly, listened to her stories, and stayed by her side as her health got worse. I held her hand when she took her last breath and made sure she did not leave this world alone. After that moment I knew with complete certainty what I was supposed to do with my life. I have spent the past year turning that certainty into action. I graduated high school with honors and passed my CNA exam on my first try. I recently started my first job as a CNA at Catawba Hospital, which is a psychiatric facility. My patients are heavily stigmatized and a lot of people are honestly uncomfortable around them. But I walk in every single shift and I see people. People who are struggling and who deserve someone to show up for them without fear or judgment. I have never once been afraid because my grandmother taught me that love and patience are stronger than any discomfort you might feel walking into a hard room. This fall I am heading to James Madison University to pursue my BSN with the goal of specializing in hospice care. I want to be the nurse who walks into the hardest rooms without flinching, who sits with patients in their darkest moments and refuses to look away. I want to be the steady presence that says you are not alone and you are not forgotten. I come from a family built on service. My dad is an honorably discharged Marine and my mom has spent 16 years at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs fighting for veterans. Showing up for others is not something I learned from a textbook. It is something I grew up watching every single day. Nursing is how I carry all of that forward. It is how I honor my grandmother, my parents, and every patient who deserves someone in their corner who genuinely cares. That is not just what I want to do. It is who I already am. I found out about this scholarship through an online scholarship search platform (bold.org).

I did not choose nursing. Nursing chose me, and it chose me in the hardest way possible — at my grandmother’s bedside while she fought cancer. I was young when she got sick but I never once thought about stepping back. I showed up every day. I fixed her pillows, sat with her through the painful nights, held her hand when the fear got too big for words. What those months taught me had nothing to do with medicine. They taught me empathy. They taught me that the most powerful thing you can give another human being is your presence and your patience. My grandmother had spent her whole life teaching in low income schools, believing in kids the world had already written off. Even in her sickness she was teaching me. She showed me how to move through this world with love and she showed me that people are always worth showing up for, no matter what. That lesson followed me everywhere after she passed. I started volunteering at a local retirement center and got close to a resident there. I visited her regularly, listened to her stories, and stayed by her side as her health declined. I held her hand when she took her last breath. I made sure she did not leave this world alone. After that moment I did not just want to be a nurse. I knew I was going to be one. This past spring I graduated high school with honors, which meant everything to me because I worked hard for it while also preparing for my CNA exam. I passed on my first try. Both of those things happening at the same time felt like confirmation that I was exactly where I was supposed to be. Shortly after I started my first job as a CNA at Catawba Hospital. For anyone who does not know, Catawba is a psychiatric facility, and the patients there carry a stigma that I think is deeply unfair. Before I started I heard a lot of comments from people about what that population is like. But when I walked through those doors I did not see anything scary. I saw people. People who are struggling, people who have been let down, people who need someone to look them in the eye and treat them with dignity instead of fear. That is exactly what I do every single shift. I have never once been afraid because my grandmother taught me that love and patience are stronger than any discomfort or uncertainty. Working at Catawba has made me a better caregiver than I ever could have become in a traditional setting. It has taught me to slow down, and to listen without judgment. Those skills will follow me through every specialty I ever work in. My next step is pursuing my BSN at James Madison University where I plan to specialize in hospice and end of life care. I want to be the nurse who walks into the hardest rooms without hesitation, the one who makes patients feel safe just by showing up. Sara Jane spent 48 years doing exactly that, putting her patients first every single day and pouring herself into a profession that demands everything you have. I want to honor that kind of dedication by living it myself. I come from a family built on service. My dad is an honorably discharged Marine. Serving others is not something I decided to do. It is something I was raised inside of. Nursing is how I carry that forward, one patient, one room, one human connection at a time.

Prompt 1: Personal Inspiration I did not just decide to become a nurse one day. It happened because of things I lived through that I will never forget. My grandmother was a teacher her whole life. She worked in low income schools and believed in kids that most people had given up on. When she got diagnosed with cancer, I became one of her caregivers. I was young but I never thought about not being there. I would fix her pillows, sit with her at night when she was in pain, and just be there even when there was nothing I could do to make it better. What I learned was that the most important thing I could give her was not anything medical. It was just making sure she knew she was not alone and that her life had mattered. After she passed I started volunteering at a retirement home nearby and got close to one of the residents there. I was holding her hand when she died and made sure she was not alone. After that I knew nursing was what I was supposed to do. I want to work in hospice care so I can be that person for others going through the same thing. My dad is an honorably discharged Marine and my mom has worked for the VA for 16 years. Growing up watching them serve others is a big part of why I feel called to do the same through nursing. Prompt 2: The Human Touch I think people act like the human touch is just something nice nurses can add on top of the real medical work. But I think it is actually the most important part. To me it means the moment a nurse stops looking at a chart and actually sees the person in the bed. It is asking someone how they are really feeling instead of just going through a checklist. It is remembering small things, like that the patient down the hall has family coming and that means everything to them right now. It is sitting down when you are busy and making someone feel like they matter. I saw what a difference it makes when my grandmother was sick. Some staff made her feel like just another patient with just another diagnosis. But then there were nurses who actually talked to her, asked about her life, and treated her like a real person. You could see the difference it made in how she felt. It was not a small thing. It was everything. Patients who feel genuinely cared for actually do better and recover faster. But even without the science, it just makes sense. People feel safer when someone treats them like a human being and when people feel safe they heal better. That is what I think Mary Lou Losinger understood across all her years in Elmira. The human touch is not just about having a nice personality. It is a real skill you have to choose every single day with every single patient. It is the part of nursing that no machine can replace and honestly the part I care about the most. I want to be the kind of nurse who walks into a room and makes someone feel less scared just by being there. That is what the human touch means to me and what I plan to carry into every part of my career.

There is a particular kind of courage that nobody talks about. It is not the courage of battlefields or boardrooms. It is the courage it takes to walk into a room where someone is suffering and make them feel like everything is going to be okay. Not because you can fix everything. Not because you have all the answers. But because you refuse to let them face it alone. That is the courage I discovered young. That is the nurse I am becoming. My path to nursing is inseparable from the two women who shaped me most. The first is my grandmother. She spent her entire career teaching in low income schools, pouring herself into children that the world had already decided were not worth the effort. She believed in the power of education and in second chances with a conviction that never wavered, not even when the system failed, not even when resources ran dry, and not even when the odds were stacked against her students. She showed up anyway. Every single day, she showed up. That quiet, relentless dedication to people who needed someone in their corner is where my own calling was born. Long before I ever set foot in a hospital or held a patient’s hand, I learned from her what it means to give yourself fully to others without expecting anything in return. When she was diagnosed with cancer, I became one of her caregivers. I was young, but I never considered not being there. I adjusted her pillows, held her hand through the painful nights, learned the rhythm of her breathing, and sat beside her in the silence when words were not enough. What those hours taught me was something no classroom could replicate. The most powerful thing I could offer her had nothing to do with a prescription or a procedure. It was the certainty that she was not alone. That she was seen. That every chapter of her extraordinary life, every child she had ever believed in, every classroom she had ever transformed, mattered deeply to someone sitting right beside her. In those moments, nursing stopped being a career option. It became a calling I could not walk away from. That calling grew even stronger when I began volunteering at a local retirement center and grew close to a woman whose spirit was unlike anyone I had ever met. I visited her regularly, listened to her stories, and stayed by her side as her health declined. I held her hand in her final days and was present when she took her last breath. I made sure she did not leave this world alone. And in that moment, I understood with complete clarity what I was meant to do with my life. I am meant to be a hospice nurse. Hospice nursing is widely misunderstood. People hear the word and think of giving up, of defeat, of the end. But I have learned firsthand that it is none of those things. It is about honoring a person completely. It is about walking alongside someone through the most sacred transition of their human experience and ensuring that transition is met with dignity, comfort, and love rather than fear and isolation. It demands a rare combination of clinical excellence and deep emotional strength, and it is one of the most meaningful specialties in all of nursing. My grandmother taught me that the most important work often happens in the rooms the world overlooks. Hospice nursing is exactly that kind of work, and I am called to it with everything I have. I am pursuing my Bachelor of Science in Nursing at James Madison University, and I could not be more honored to be applying for a scholarship that carries such a deep connection to this institution. Reading about Nancy Balmediano Shirley filled me with a sense of recognition I did not expect. Her story mirrors so much of what I have witnessed in my own family. She did not simply choose nursing as a profession. She chose it as a way of showing up for people, in every assignment, every state, every child she ever cared for, and ultimately in the home she opened to the family she loved. She understood that nursing is not confined to a hospital room. It is a posture toward the world. It is the decision, made every single day, to put someone else’s wellbeing before your own comfort. I come from a family that lives that posture. My father is an honorably discharged United States Marine who gave years of his life to protecting this country. My mother has spent 16 years with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, earning numerous awards for her unwavering dedication to those who sacrificed everything for our freedom. I grew up watching both of my parents give themselves completely to something larger than themselves. Service was never a concept in my household. It was the standard. It was the example set before me every single morning. My grandmother set that same standard in her classrooms for decades. She believed that every child deserved someone who refused to give up on them. My parents set it in their careers, standing up for those who had already given so much. And now it is my turn. Nursing, and specifically hospice care, is how I intend to honor every lesson they taught me and every sacrifice they made. I want to be the steady presence in the room that tells a patient they are not forgotten. I want to support families through the kind of grief that changes you forever, the way my grandmother’s passing changed me, and help them find peace in the middle of it. I want to walk into the quiet rooms, the overlooked rooms, the rooms that take a special kind of courage to enter, and I want to make sure that no one inside them ever feels alone. Captain Nancy Shirley spent her life doing exactly that. She lit up lives across every assignment, poured herself into every child she cared for, and gave everything she had to the family she called her own. I want to walk through the doors her legacy has opened, not simply to build a career, but to carry her devotion forward the way my grandmother carried hers, one patient, one family, one final moment at a time.

There is a kind of strength that does not announce itself. It shows up quietly, in the middle of the night, in the middle of a crisis, in the middle of a life that has been permanently changed by illness. I have seen that strength. I have sat beside it. And I have decided that I want to spend my career honoring it. My path to nursing began at my grandmother’s bedside. She was battling cancer, and I became one of her caregivers during her final months. I was young, but I showed up every single day — adjusting her pillows, holding her hand through the hard nights, and learning something that no textbook could have taught me: that the most powerful thing a nurse can offer is not always clinical. Sometimes it is simply the certainty that someone is not going through it alone. That experience changed the entire direction of my life. I am pursuing nursing because I believe care is both a science and a promise. It is the science of understanding what the body needs and the promise that the person inside that body will be treated with dignity, patience, and genuine compassion. Patients living with chronic illness, diabetes, cardiac conditions, or those navigating life with an ostomy often carry invisible weight alongside their diagnosis. They manage not just symptoms but fear, grief, and the daily challenge of redefining what normal looks like. I want to be the nurse who understands that weight and helps them carry it. My planned specialty is in chronic and long-term illness care, with a particular focus on patients whose conditions require ongoing management and lifestyle adjustment. I am drawn to this demographic because these patients do not just need a nurse at their worst moment — they need a consistent, knowledgeable presence across the entire arc of their illness. They need someone who will advocate for them, educate them, and remind them that a diagnosis does not determine their worth or their possibilities. Service has always been the foundation of my family. My father is an honorably discharged United States Marine. My mother has dedicated 16 years to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, earning numerous awards for her commitment to those who sacrificed everything for this country. I grew up watching both of my parents give themselves fully to others without hesitation. Nursing is not a departure from that legacy — it is how I intend to continue it. I want to walk into rooms where people are scared and make them feel less alone. I want to be the nurse who remembers a patient’s name, their story, and what they were fighting for long before they were fighting an illness. That is not just a career goal. It is a promise I intend to keep, one patient at a time.

There is a kind of strength that does not announce itself. It does not wear a cape or ask for applause. It wakes up before everyone else, holds everything together with quiet hands, and goes to bed last — usually without anyone noticing. That is my mother. And everything I am is because of her. When my parents divorced, my mother did not have the luxury of falling apart — even though she had every right to. My father’s battle with addiction had run our family financially into the ground. The stability we thought we had was gone almost overnight, and my mother was left standing in the wreckage with two children. She chose to show us strength. Not the kind that pretends everything is fine — but the kind that says, this is hard, and we are going to be okay anyway. She works fifty hour weeks. She runs an entire household by herself. She has never once stopped to ask what she needs because she has decided, without hesitation, that my brother and I are her entire focus. She has not remarried — not because she could not, but because she has chosen to pour every ounce of her love and energy into raising us well. I have never once questioned whether I was loved. I have never once wondered if someone was in my corner. My mother made sure of that. But here is what people do not see — I have also watched her cry. I have watched her sit at the kitchen table after a long week, completely exhausted, and let herself fall apart for just a moment before pulling herself back together and getting up to do it all over again. Those moments did not frighten me. They taught me more than any classroom ever could. They taught me that strength is not the absence of breaking down — it is the decision to get back up. Every single time. My mother has also worked for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs for 16 years, dedicating herself to serving veterans who sacrificed everything for this country. She gives at work and she gives at home, and somehow she never runs empty. I do not know how she does it. I only know that watching her do it has permanently shaped the woman I am becoming — someone who believes that love is not a feeling you wait to have but a decision you make every morning, especially on the mornings when it costs you something. She shielded my brother and me from the full weight of what divorce and addiction can do to a family. She absorbed the hardest parts so we did not have to. And in doing so, she gave us the greatest gift a parent can offer — the unshakeable belief that we were worth sacrificing for. I am pursuing nursing because I want to show up for people the way my mother has always shown up for us — without conditions, without resentment, and without ever making someone feel like a burden for needing care. I want to be a nurse who understands what it means to carry more than your share and keep going anyway. My mother taught me that love does not just survive hard things. When it is real, it rises because of them. She is the reason I believe in people. She is the reason I believe in myself. And she is the reason I know — without any doubt — that I am ready for this.

I know what it looks like when a person is losing a battle they never asked to fight. I have seen it up close — at home, watching my father wrestle with something bigger and more relentless than anything his Marine training ever prepared him for. My father is a United States Marine. Honorably discharged. One of the most resilient human beings I have ever known. He is also a man who spent years in the grip of alcohol addiction — a battle that did not begin with weakness but with pain. Childhood trauma that never healed properly. Military service that added layers of darkness onto wounds that were already deep. And somewhere in the middle of all of that, alcohol became the thing that made the noise quieter. I understand that now in a way I could not as a young child sitting in the backseat, watching my father make choices that scared me. He got DUIs. There were nights I did not know what version of him would come home. There were moments our family felt like it was held together with nothing but prayer and sheer determination. My brother and I grew up navigating a reality that no child should have to navigate — loving a parent fiercely while also being afraid of what his disease might take from us. But here is what I also know. My father is seven years sober. Seven years of choosing differently. Seven years of waking up every single morning and deciding that the fight is worth it. He tells my brother and me that we are the reason he stays clean — that when the temptation gets loud, he thinks of us. I do not take that lightly. I carry it with me every single day as the most sacred responsibility I have ever been given. Being someone’s reason to keep going is not a small thing. It is everything. Deanna Ellis gave to others regardless of what she was going through. That kind of selfless, persistent love is something I recognize deeply — because I watched my father practice it in reverse. Even in his darkest seasons, he loved us the best way he knew how. And even in our hardest moments as his children, we loved him back without conditions. That is what this experience taught me about human beings — that struggle does not make a person unworthy of love. It makes them more in need of it. That truth is the heartbeat of my nursing career. My compassion extends fully and without reservation to every patient battling addiction and substance abuse. I refuse to be the kind of healthcare provider who looks at a person’s chart and sees only their worst decisions. I have lived inside the story that those decisions come from — the trauma, the pain, the desperate search for relief — and I know that judgment has never once helped anyone get better. What helps is presence. What helps is consistency. What helps is someone looking at a person in their most broken state and saying — I see you, I am not leaving, and you are worth fighting for. My father fought his way back to us. Seven years later, he is still fighting. And every single day that he chooses sobriety, he is teaching me exactly the kind of nurse I want to be — one who believes in people not just when it is easy, but when it is hard, and when everyone else has already walked away. I will not walk away. I never have. And I never will.

I did not grow up with faith as a concept. I grew up with it as a compass. In my household, faith was not something we practiced once a week and set aside on Monday morning. It was the foundation underneath everything — the reason my father could survive what he survived, the reason my mother could pour herself into serving veterans day after day without losing herself, and the reason I could sit beside my dying grandmother and find the strength to stay when every part of me wanted to fall apart. Faith was not the absence of hardship in our lives. It was the presence of something greater than the hardship — a quiet, unshakeable belief that we were held, that our suffering had purpose, and that we were called to something bigger than ourselves. That belief has shaped every meaningful decision I have ever made. When I became my grandmother’s caregiver during her battle with cancer, it was faith that kept me steady. There were nights that were unbearable — nights where I did not have the right words or enough strength or any idea how to make her feel better. And in those moments, I did not reach for certainty. I reached for trust. Trust that showing up was enough. Trust that love, even imperfect and exhausted love, was exactly what she needed. My faith taught me that we are not called to have all the answers — we are called to be present with one another in the questions. That same faith is what sent me to volunteer at a retirement center, where I sat beside a woman in her final days and held her hand as she took her last breath. Some people would find that experience devastating. For me, it was holy. My faith frames death not as an ending to be feared but as a transition to be honored — and that perspective is precisely why I feel called to hospice nursing. I want to be the nurse who walks into the hardest rooms with peace rather than panic, who helps patients and families find grace in their most sacred and difficult moments. I want to be living proof that faith in action looks like showing up with compassion when the world would rather look away. Patricia Lindsey Jackson and Eva Mae Jackson understood something that I am still growing into — that excellence and integrity are inseparable, and that true leadership is rooted in serving others rather than elevating yourself. Eva Mae devoted her life to inspiring students. Patricia raised her children to be good stewards of this world. Their legacy is a reminder that the most enduring impact we can leave is not found in titles or accolades but in the lives we quietly and faithfully pour ourselves into. I want to live that kind of life. I want to be the nurse who prays over her patients when medicine has reached its limit. I want to be the student who pursues academic excellence not for personal gain but because knowledge is a gift meant to be given back to the world. I want to honor my father’s sacrifice, my mother’s dedication, my grandmother’s perseverance, and my own faith by becoming someone that Patricia Lindsey and Eva Mae would recognize — a person who leads with integrity, serves with her whole heart, and never stops believing that one life, faithfully lived, can change everything. Faith is not something I have. It is something I live. And it is leading me exactly where I am supposed to go.

Most people learn about mental illness from a textbook. I learned about it from watching my father. My father is a United States Marine — honorably discharged, and one of the strongest people I have ever known. He is also a man who has fought a silent, relentless battle with depressive disorder for his entire life. His illness did not begin with the military, but his service made it heavier. The trauma he carried as a child found company in the things he witnessed in uniform, and together they created a weight that no amount of strength or discipline could simply overcome. I have been there for the big swings — the highs where he feels like himself again and the lows where he disappears into a version of himself I barely recognize. I have sat in the uncertainty of not knowing which version of my father would walk through the door. I have watched what happens when he stops taking his medication and witnessed our entire family quietly brace for what comes next. Living inside that reality did not break me. It built me. It gave me an emotional literacy that I could never have developed any other way — an ability to recognize pain that people are trying to hide, to sit with someone in their darkness without trying to rush them toward the light, and to advocate loudly for people whose illness makes it hard to advocate for themselves. Mental health is not a peripheral issue to me. It is personal. It is my father at the kitchen table on a hard day. It is the veterans my mother serves through her 16 years at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs — men and women who came home from war carrying wounds that never made the news. It is my future patients, many of whom will arrive at my bedside not just with physical ailments but with anxiety, depression, trauma, and grief layered underneath. As a student and aspiring hospice nurse, I advocate for mental health awareness by refusing to participate in its stigma. I speak openly about my family’s experience when others might stay silent — because silence is what allows shame to grow. I have had honest conversations with teammates, friends, and peers about the reality of living with someone who has a mental illness, normalizing those discussions in spaces where they are rarely welcomed. I check on the people around me who seem okay but might not be. I have learned that the most radical act of mental health advocacy is simply making another person feel less alone in what they are carrying. The Learner Mental Health Empowerment Scholarship speaks directly to everything I believe — that mental health must be part of the conversation, that stigma is dismantled one honest dialogue at a time, and that students who have faced these challenges deserve to be met with compassion rather than judgment. I have grown up navigating the complexities of a parent’s mental illness while maintaining my academic standing, my volunteer commitments, and my unwavering focus on becoming a nurse. My father’s struggle did not define our family. How we loved him through it did. And that love — patient, persistent, and unconditional — is exactly what I intend to bring into every corner of my nursing career and every conversation I have about mental health for the rest of my life.

I have never been the kind of girl who needed to be told she could do something. But I have lived long enough — even at eighteen to understand that not every girl gets told that. And that is exactly why I am not just pursuing nursing. I am pursuing it loudly, intentionally, and with the full weight of every woman who was never given the chance. My decision to pursue healthcare was not made in a guidance counselor’s office or during a career aptitude test. It was made at my grandmother’s bedside, where I served as her caregiver while she battled cancer. I was young, but I was present — adjusting her medications, holding her through the hard nights, learning what it truly means to put someone else’s comfort before your own fear. In those moments, I did not see a little girl playing nurse. I saw my future. I saw a woman who was built for this work, shaped by love and loss and an unshakeable belief that every human being deserves compassionate care. That belief sent me to volunteer at a local retirement center, where I built real relationships with residents who simply needed someone to see them. I grew especially close to one woman and stayed by her side through her final days. I held her hand when she took her last breath and made sure she did not leave this world alone. Those experiences confirmed what my grandmother first planted in me — that I am meant to be a hospice nurse. That I am meant to be the steady, loving presence in the room when everything else feels like it is falling apart. I also grew up watching women lead with quiet, fierce devotion. My mother has spent 16 years working for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, earning numerous awards for her commitment to veterans who sacrificed everything for this country. She never sought recognition. She just showed up, every single day, because the mission mattered more than the applause. I watched her and learned that women in healthcare do not just fill roles — we redefine them. We bring an emotional intelligence, an intuitive compassion, and a relentless dedication that transforms not just individual patient outcomes but entire cultures of care. Healthcare needs more women in leadership. It needs more women at the bedside who are unafraid to advocate loudly for their patients. It needs more women who understand that inclusivity is not a courtesy — it is a clinical necessity. Diverse perspectives save lives. Compassionate leadership changes systems. And women who have been underestimated, overlooked, and told to be smaller have a particular fire that this field desperately needs. I am going to be a hospice nurse who advocates for every patient’s dignity in their final chapter. I am going to mentor younger women who feel called to healthcare but wonder if there is space for them. I am going to lead not by pushing others down but by reaching back and pulling others forward — the same way my mother has done her entire career. Women have always been the backbone of healthcare. It is time we are also recognized as its future. I intend to be part of that future — boldly, compassionately, and completely unapologetically.

There is a particular kind of courage that nobody talks about — the courage it takes to walk into a room where someone is dying and make them feel like living was worth it. That is the courage I am chasing. That is the nurse I am becoming. My passion for nursing was not born in a classroom. It was born at my grandmother’s bedside, where I sat as her caregiver while she fought cancer with every ounce of strength she had. I was young, but I showed up every single day — adjusting her pillows, holding her hand through the painful nights, and learning the profound difference between simply being present and truly being there. What I discovered in those quiet, sacred moments was that the most powerful medicine I could offer her had nothing to do with a prescription. It was the assurance that she was not alone. That she was seen. That she was loved. That her life — every chapter of it — mattered deeply to someone sitting right beside her. That same conviction followed me to a local retirement center where I volunteered and grew close to a woman whose spirit was as bright as anyone I have ever met. I visited her regularly, listened to her stories, and stayed by her side as her health declined. I held her hand in her final days and was present when she took her last breath. I made sure she did not leave this world alone. And in that moment, everything became clear — I am meant to be a hospice nurse. Hospice nursing is not about giving up on a patient. It is about honoring them completely. It is about walking alongside someone through the most sacred transition of their human experience and making sure that transition is filled with dignity, comfort, and love rather than fear and isolation. Beverly J. Patterson devoted her life to nursing because she understood that this profession is not just a career — it is a calling. It opens doors, yes, but more importantly it opens hearts. Her legacy is a reminder that the nurses who change lives are not always the ones in the loudest rooms. Sometimes they are the ones in the quietest ones, holding a hand, speaking softly, and refusing to let go. I come from a family built on service. My father is an honorably discharged United States Marine. My mother has spent 16 years with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs fighting for those who sacrificed everything for our freedom. Service is not something I learned — it is something I inherited. And hospice nursing is how I intend to honor that inheritance. My goal is to become a licensed hospice nurse who specializes in end of life care — advocating for patients, supporting grieving families, and creating an environment where dying is not something to be feared but something to be met with grace. I want to be the steady presence in the room that says — you are not alone, you are not forgotten, and everything you were and everything you gave to this world was enough. Beverly Patterson spent her career touching lives and growing through every door nursing opened for her. I want to walk through those same doors — not just to build a career, but to carry her devotion forward, one patient, one family, one final moment at a time.

I did not choose nursing. Nursing chose me — in the quiet, unglamorous, sacred moments that most people never talk about. It chose me the first time I watched my grandmother wince in pain and realized that the most powerful thing I could offer her was not medicine or expertise — it was my presence. I was young, but I became her caregiver. I learned how to anticipate her needs before she voiced them, how to adjust her pillows just right, how to sit beside her in silence without making the silence feel heavy. I learned that caring for someone is not a task you complete — it is a posture you carry. A decision you remake every single morning to show up, even when it is hard. Especially when it is hard. It chose me again at the retirement center where I volunteered, where I met a woman whose eyes lit up every time I walked through the door. She saved her best stories for me, and I saved my best listening for her. When her health began to decline, I did not pull back — I leaned in. I held her hand in her final days. I was there when she took her last breath, and I made sure the last thing she felt in this world was that someone genuinely loved her. That moment is permanently woven into who I am. It is the moment I stopped wondering if nursing was right for me and started wondering how fast I could get there. I also grew up watching service lived out in the most real and personal ways. My father is a United States Marine who was honorably discharged after sacrificing several years of his life for this country. My mother has dedicated 16 years to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, earning numerous awards for her commitment to those who have given everything for our freedom. I was raised understanding that service is not something you do for recognition — it is something you do because it is right. Because people matter. Because every single human being deserves someone in their corner who refuses to treat them as anything less than whole. That is the nurse I am going to be. I am not pursuing this degree for the title or the stability — I am pursuing it because I have seen firsthand what it means to have a compassionate presence in your most vulnerable moments, and I have seen what it means to face those moments alone. I refuse to let my patients face them alone. As a nurse in my community, I hope to be known not just for my clinical skills but for my humanity. I want to advocate for patients who are too exhausted to advocate for themselves. I want to sit with families who are scared and make sure they feel supported. I want to specialize in end of life care — to be the steady, loving presence in the room when everything feels like it is falling apart. I want to do for my patients what I did for my grandmother and what I did for that sweet woman at the retirement center — I want to make sure that when they close their eyes for the last time, they do not feel afraid. They feel loved. Nursing is not what I want to do. It is who I already am. This degree is simply how I make it official.

Some movies entertain you. Others find you at exactly the right moment and change the way you see the world. For me, that movie is “The Fault in Our Stars” (2014). I was not just watching a love story — I was watching two teenagers face the reality of dying with more grace, humor, and honesty than most adults ever manage. And somewhere in those two hours, I found a clearer picture of exactly who I want to be. Hazel Grace Lancaster is a sixteen year old living with terminal cancer. She carries an oxygen tank everywhere she goes and has spent so long thinking of herself as a grenade — someone whose inevitable end will destroy everyone around her — that she has nearly forgotten how to truly live. Then she meets Augustus Waters, who does not look at her diagnosis before he looks at her. He sees her. Fully, completely. And that changes everything. I first watched this movie while I was caring for my grandmother as she battled cancer. I was young, sitting beside her through the long and difficult nights, holding her hand and trying to be strong when everything in me wanted to fall apart. Watching Hazel navigate that same impossible space — loving someone deeply while also facing loss — made me feel less alone. But more than that, it showed me what genuine compassion looks like in its most honest, unpolished form. It is not always pretty. It does not always have the right words. But it shows up. It stays. There is a moment in the film that I have never forgotten. Augustus, despite facing his own declining health, uses his one dying wish not for himself but to give Hazel an experience she will carry forever. That single act of selfless love wrecked me completely — because it was not dramatic or showy. It was just one person deciding that someone else’s joy mattered more than their own comfort. That is the kind of human being I want to be. That is the kind of nurse I am working to become. The Big Picture Scholarship speaks to students who are driven to expand their knowledge and evolve — not just for themselves, but for the communities they serve. This movie expanded something in me that a classroom alone never could have. It taught me that education is not just about degrees and credentials. It is about developing the emotional depth and human understanding to truly serve others. Hazel and Augustus taught me that the people in our care are not their diagnoses. They are not their limitations. They are full, complex, beautiful human beings who deserve to be seen and loved right up until their very last moment. I have volunteered at a retirement center and sat beside a woman in her final days. I have held my grandmother’s hand through cancer. Every single time, I have drawn from what this movie planted in me — the courage to stay present in the hard moments, the refusal to look away from someone’s pain, and the deep conviction that how we care for people at the end of their lives matters just as much as how we care for them at the beginning. “The Fault in Our Stars” did not just impact my life. It clarified my purpose. And that purpose, shaped by story and loss and love, is driving me toward a nursing career where every patient I serve will know — without question — that they are seen, they are valued, and they are never alone.

"Kindness in Action" For several years, I competed as an All-Star cheerleader — a world that looks glamorous from the outside but can be ruthlessly exclusive on the inside. One season, we had a base on our team who had Asperger’s. She was talented, hardworking, and showed up every single practice giving everything she had. But instead of being embraced, she was shunned. Girls would whisper, roll their eyes, and deliberately leave her out. I watched it happen and knew I had a choice to make. I chose her. I made it a point to talk to her every practice, compliment her basing skills — because they were genuinely impressive — and include her in our group outings. I invited her to my birthday party. When our team traveled to Disney for our end of year competition, she came with our group. I also had honest, uncomfortable conversations with my teammates about their behavior, because silence is its own form of cruelty. She never asked for her disability. She just wanted to be part of the team — the same thing every single one of us wanted. Those small gestures cost me very little, but I could see in her eyes that they meant everything. Ava Wood carried stupendous love into every room she entered, and I understand now what that kind of love actually requires — it requires action. It requires noticing the person being left out and deciding their belonging matters. As a future nurse, I will carry that same commitment into every patient room I enter, making sure that every single person feels seen, valued, and worthy of care — because they are. "Boldly, Unapologetically Me" There is nothing cool about standing up for the girl everyone else has decided to ignore. I knew that then, and I did it anyway. In the world of competitive cheerleading, social hierarchies are real and unspoken rules are everywhere. When my teammate with Asperger’s joined our squad, the unspoken rule was clear — keep your distance, go along with the group, protect your social standing. Conforming would have been easy. It would have been invisible. But every time I watched her sit alone or overheard a cruel comment, something in me refused to shrink. I was raised in a family built on service and sacrifice. My father served as a United States Marine. My mother has dedicated 16 years to the Department of Veterans Affairs, honoring those who gave everything for this country. I was taught early that doing the right thing and doing the easy thing are rarely the same — and that your character is defined by what you do when no one is rewarding you for it. So I chose the hard thing. I spoke up to my friends even when it was awkward. I extended the invitation even when it felt risky. I refused to let someone feel invisible just to make myself more comfortable. My faith also grounds me in this — I genuinely ask myself what Jesus would want, and the answer is always to do better and be better. Ava Wood lived boldly and authentically, choosing love over fitting in. I want to honor that legacy — in cheerleading, in life, and one day at the bedside of every patient who needs someone brave enough to truly show up for them.

Prince once said that “compassion is an action word with no boundaries.” I did not fully understand what that meant until I watched my grandmother take her last breath — and realized that the most powerful thing I had done for her was simply refuse to leave her side. My grandmother was diagnosed with cancer when I was still young enough to be the one who needed taking care of. But life does not always follow that order. I became her caregiver — showing up every day, helping her get comfortable, holding her hand through the hard nights, and making sure that when she opened her eyes, she saw a face that loved her. I was not a doctor. I could not cure her. But I could stay. And staying, I learned, is one of the most radical forms of compassion there is. That experience permanently changed how I move through the world. It sent me to a local retirement center to volunteer, where I met a woman whose spirit reminded me so much of my grandmother. She was sharp, funny, and full of stories that deserved to be heard. I made sure she knew someone was listening. As her health declined, I kept showing up. I was with her in her final days — holding her hand, speaking softly, making sure she did not face that transition alone. In those quiet, sacred moments, I understood that compassion has no boundaries. It does not stop at a job description. It does not clock out. It shows up even when it is hard, even when there are no words, even at the very end. When I learned about Philippe Forton — a husband and father who spent years navigating the complexities of life after a heart transplant — I was moved by what his family noted made the greatest difference: compassionate nurses. Not just skilled ones. Compassionate ones. Nurses who saw Philippe as a person, not just a patient. Nurses who understood that their presence in his most vulnerable moments was as important as any medication or procedure. Philippe passed away in 2022, but the nurses who stood beside him with genuine care left a mark on his life that his family still carries today. That is the kind of nurse I am determined to become. My military family taught me that service is a calling. My grandmother taught me that love shows up even when it is inconvenient. And Philippe’s story reminds me that compassion — real, boundless, active compassion — can change the entire experience of someone’s hardest chapter. I want to be that change. I want every patient in my care to feel what Philippe felt — that they matter, that they are seen, and that they are never, ever alone.

Service is not just something my family does — it is who we are. My father is a United States Marine who was honorably discharged after dedicating several years of his life to protecting this country. My mother has spent 16 years working for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, earning numerous awards for her unwavering commitment to those who have sacrificed everything for our freedom. I was raised in a household where service to others was not optional — it was a way of life. And somewhere between watching my father carry the quiet weight of a veteran and watching my mother fight every single day to honor that sacrifice, I found my purpose. When I learned about Evan James Vaillancourt — an Airborne Combat Medic who spent his days on duty healing others and his days off still pouring into the people around him — I felt like I already knew his heart. Because I was raised by people just like him. My understanding of what it means to truly care for someone was also shaped closer to home. My grandmother fought cancer, and I was her caregiver. I was young, but I showed up — helping her get comfortable, sitting beside her through the long nights, making sure she never felt alone. That experience cracked something open in me. I realized that the most powerful thing one human being can offer another is presence. Not just treatment. Not just medicine. But the kind of care that says — I see you, and I am not going anywhere. That same conviction led me to volunteer at a local retirement center. I built real relationships there, especially with one woman whose smile could light up an entire room. I visited her regularly, listened to her stories, and stayed by her side as her health declined. I held her hand in her final days. I was there when she took her last breath. In that sacred, quiet moment, I understood my calling completely — to help people leave this world with dignity, with peace, and with someone who genuinely cares beside them. I believe that is exactly the kind of nurse Evan was on his way to becoming. The VA’s mission is to care for those who have borne the battle — honoring the men and women who gave this country everything. I grew up watching that mission lived out through my mother’s dedication and my father’s sacrifice. Now I want to carry that same spirit into nursing, just as Evan did. He did not wait until he had a nursing degree to start caring for people — he did it every single day, in every room he walked into, with a smile and a heart full of love. That is the nurse I want to be. This scholarship would not just help me pursue my degree — it would allow me to carry Evan’s legacy forward, one patient at a time, making sure that no one ever has to face their hardest moments alone.

Growing up, I watched my grandmother fight cancer with more strength and grace than I thought one person could carry. As her caregiver, I was there through the hardest days — helping her get comfortable, sitting beside her when the nights felt long, and making sure she always knew someone was there. I was young, but I understood that what she needed most wasn’t just medicine or treatment. She needed presence. She needed love. She needed someone to remind her that she was not alone. Caring for her through that battle was one of the hardest things I have ever done, but it also revealed something in me — a deep, unshakeable calling to care for others. That calling led me to volunteer at a local retirement center in my community. I walked in nervous, unsure of what to expect, but I quickly found my place there. I spent time with the residents — playing games, sharing meals, listening to their stories, and simply keeping them company. What I discovered was that so many of them just needed someone to see them. Not as patients or residents, but as people with full lives, rich histories, and so much love still left to give. I grew especially close to one woman there. She had the warmest smile and always saved her best stories for when I visited. Over time, I watched her health decline, and I stayed by her side through it all. I was with her in her final days — holding her hand, talking softly, making sure she felt peace. Being present during her last moments on this earth was the most sacred experience of my life. She did not leave this world alone, and I believe that mattered more than words can express. It confirmed everything I had felt since caring for my grandmother — that helping someone transition from this life with dignity and love is one of the highest forms of service a person can offer. These experiences are the foundation of who I am and who I am working to become. As a future nurse, I want to drive change by bringing that same compassion into every room I enter. I want to advocate for patients who cannot speak for themselves, comfort families in their hardest moments, and make sure that every single person in my care feels seen, valued, and loved until their very last breath.