I did not live in my grandparents' house, but they raised me anyway. My mother was abusive, and my grandparents were the stable ground I stood on. They gave me sanity, which is a strange thing to say about a childhood, and a precise one. My grandfather started law school in his forties. When I was between five and eight, he would play chess with me and argue his cases across the board: here are the facts, here is the rule, what do you think happens next? I did not know I was being taught to think. I thought we were playing. Years later I understood that he had handed a small kid a way to understand a frightening world and a way to be analytical about it: break it into pieces, find the logic, and make a move. Their house had an Encyclopedia Britannica from the 1960s, and one rule came with it: if you don't know it, look it up. I have a master's degree in health informatics and I am working on a second one in health administration, and I can trace both of them back to that shelf of maroon volumes. My grandmother taught me to sew and to cook. She also taught me what devotion looks like. She and my grandfather were devoted to each other and then, without any visible effort, to me. Love in that house was not a speech. It was consistent, quiet, and kind, and it showed up every day. My grandfather died in 2007. In 2019, after a stroke at 97 left my grandmother unable to care for herself, my wife and I moved her from California to North Carolina. Then COVID arrived, the doors closed to visitors, and for long stretches she was confined to her room. So we went to her window. Every day, for many months, my wife and I stood outside, called her on the phone, and talked. We told jokes, made faces, and danced on the lawn. The stroke had taken almost all of her short-term memory, but her personality came through untouched: sharp, witty, and loving. Her missing memory turned out to be a strange mercy. She did not remember that she had been shut in, so every day was a new day to her, and every visit was a fresh surprise. My wife was pregnant then, and my grandmother, who would have been a great-grandmother, got to hear that news for the first time fifty times over. I knew while it was happening that I was being given the chance to give back to her what she gave to me, and I felt honored. She died in 2022, at ninety-nine years and three months. That is the lens I bring to healthcare. I have PTSD, learning disabilities, and a physical disability, and I talk about them openly because I think visibility is a form of advocacy. With a background in healthcare, I spent three months in a mediocre California rehab facility, working from my grandmother's room and helping with her care, and I reported the facility for violations. I know that a patient is never just a chart: she is a whole person whose personality, humor, and dignity can survive things the record says she lost. The systems I want to help design, safer and more humane and built around real people, come straight from a kid at a chessboard and a woman at a window. My grandparents did not raise me under their roof. They raised me in every way that mattered, and I hope I am worthy of it.

I'm building NextGen Young Men (NGYM), a nonprofit platform both online and off, giving teenage boys and young men ages 13 to 25 a real alternative to the online predatory communities recruiting them into hate groups, misogyny, and isolation. I've been working on it for about a year: business plans, rollout plans, fundraising letters and elevator pitches, and a donor-facing site, NextGenYoungMen.com. I'm close to a minimum viable product. Extremist and "manosphere" content spreads because it answers real needs: for belonging, purpose, answers to questions many boys have no one to ask, and the sense that you're special for being chosen. Needs shared by almost every young man. These groups actively seek out vulnerable boys online and are often the first to engage them, gently at first, mentor-like, promising answers and instant community, then slowly pulling them down more dangerous paths. NGYM meets those same needs honestly, with adaptive content pathways for each participant, achievement systems, gamification, and community built around leadership, emotional intelligence, and healing. We provide real answers to those questions and real mentorship instead of anger, resentment, and blame, along with videos of men who've turned their lives around or are simply inspiring. A participant gets matched to vetted adult mentors and moves through skill-building challenges grounded in real behavioral science. Activities include challenges to "rank up," both within the online community and in their own communities, building positive connections and activities offline. The rollout is in phases, so I'm not "waiting on perfect“ to start doing good. Phase one is architecture, initial content, and a small pilot, funded by early grants and donor commitments, reaching real youth while the larger funding case is still being built. From there: a larger pilot, regional expansion, then national scale, each phase built on what actually worked in the last one. The full build is budgeted around $5 million. Even under a very conservative scenario, reaching just 0.25% of our age group, the model shows avoided downstream costs in mental health, justice, and incarceration spending between 440% and 4,000%, based on peer-reviewed data from sources like the Washington State Institute for Public Policy. I've published the full model, along with the program's development and rollout plan, on the site. I'm already in conversation with several state senators about partnering with NGYM, because a platform this size needs a team and champions. My Master's program in Health Administration, along with education in Health Informatics, is where I'm learning the analytics, governance, and accountability structures that let something like this succeed, and survive past its founder. For my community, the impact is direct: fewer boys recruited into spaces that damage them, and a real reduction in downstream human and financial costs unaddressed isolation and confusion can produce. I'm not guessing what boys like that need, because I was one of them. Now I have knowledge and skills to build the support system I never had. This scholarship would let me keep building it, with less worry and more focus on what's ahead.

Growing up, my grandfather taught me chess, or that if I had a question, to "look it up" in his old bookshelf of the Encyclopedia Brittanica, and even how to think about legal concepts. He and my grandmother grew up in the Brooklyn projects, second-generation immigrants from Eastern Europe who came from nothing. In the Navy in WWII, after, he became an accountant, then in his mid-40s, went to night school to earn a law degree. He became an assistant attorney general for New York state, in consumer fraud. My grandmother worked retail when she enrolled in that same night school for bookkeeping. That's where they met. Both of them proved to me, before I could even understand what they were proving, that you can always build a better life, at any age, if you're willing to work for it. They were also the closest thing I had to sane, stable adults. My own parents weren't. My grandparents were the ones who showed up, loved unconditionally, and modeled building a better life no matter your age or starting point. But they weren't the ones raising me day to day, weren't in the same state, so I was largely on my own. Because of that, I was a lost boy for a long time, without clear guides most of the time or a name for what was missing, looking for direction wherever I could find it. Some places were good for me. Others weren't. I got lucky more than once. I know plenty of boys who didn't. That's the gap I want to close for others, using the same devotion my grandparents modeled, redirected toward boys and young men who don't have it yet. The day my son Toby was born, things focused fast. Holding him, I understood just how much a child needs stability, love, kindness, and steady guidance just to become himself, and how quickly that could get filled by what's most available, healthy or not. I don't want Toby, or any boy, to have to go through what I did to discover his own path. That's why I'm building NextGenYoungMen.com, a nonprofit giving boys and young men ages 13 to 25 or so, real mentorship, real community, and a version of manhood not built on grievance, sexism, or hate that is so often found online. Too many boys are searching for meaning, belonging, someone to help them know what they can become, and how. But so many groups online and off are already looking to exploit rather than guide them. My vision isn't small. I'm designing a platform using the same behavioral and data frameworks I'm learning: adaptive pathways that meet a boy where he is, vetted mentorship, and community built on trust instead of manipulation. I'm already in conversation with state senators about partnerships and funding, because this doesn't get solved by anyone working alone. It needs infrastructure, funding, and a team willing to treat it as a real public health problem. By 2028, when I finish my MHA, I intend to have NextGen fully piloted and moving toward regional services, with the governance and funding structures in place to survive past me. My grandparents taught me that reinvention is possible, at any age, to anyone willing to commit. But I also know that comes with a caveat: you have to know it's an option. I want to make sure others can learn that lesson far sooner and far easier than I did, knowing they have a place in the world that's safe to help them launch their lives and make their own differences.

I learned devotion by watching my grandmother spend years caring for my grandfather with MS, never once treating it as a burden. When she had a stroke in 2018 and needed family, I flew to California and stayed three months, working from her facility during visiting hours every day. When I found the facility understaffed and her care slipping, I stepped in myself, reporting them to the state board, which resulted in a $10,000 fine and a mandated corrective plan. I later moved her near me and stayed close through hospice, until the end. That devotion, hers first, then mine, is the same instinct behind everything else I build. That instinct is why I'm building NextGen Young Men, a nonprofit to give teenage boys and young men ages 13 to 25 a healthier alternative to the online spaces currently recruiting them into hate groups, misogyny, and isolation. This isn't a side project I'm hoping to do someday. It's active. I'm in ongoing conversation with state senators about supporting the program. It's designed using the same behavioral and data frameworks I learned in health informatics: adaptive content pathways, mentorship networks with vetted adult mentors, and community structures built around graduated trust and responsibility rather than algorithmic outrage. The goal is to reach a boy exactly where the hate groups find him first: searching for belonging, purpose, and answers, and give him something real instead of something corrosive. I built the plan believing this problem is solvable at scale, not just at the level of one caring adult reaching one kid, and not on hope alone, but on evidence from other programs I studied. Funded fully, the three-year build is budgeted at roughly $5 million and phased deliberately: platform architecture and a small pilot first, regional expansion once the pilot proves out, then national scaling. I'm not waiting for the full number before starting. Early grants and small donor commitments fund the first phase, so real boys will be reached while the larger funding case is still being built. Why this, specifically? Because I know what it feels like to search for belonging in the wrong place, and I know how much a single door opening in the right direction can change a life. I've been that "lost boy." NextGen exists to be that door that opens before a worse one opens first. I don't think community impact has to mean a soup kitchen or a single grand gesture, though I respect both deeply. Sometimes it means building the infrastructure so that thousands of boys who will never meet me still get access to mentorship, community, and a version of manhood that isn't built on grievance or hate. This isn't about me. It's about them and the community. Even under a very conservative adoption scenario, reaching just 0.25% of youth ages 14 to 24, avoided mental health, justice, and incarceration downstream spending alone would return roughly 440% to 4,000% on a $5 million, three-year investment, based on peer-reviewed cost data from the Washington State Institute for Public Policy and the Justice Policy Institute. I've published the full model at nextgenyoungmen.com/roi. My graduate work in health administration isn't separate from this either. It's where I'm learning the governance, budget oversight, and accountability structures that let a good idea survive past its founder and actually reach the scale the problem requires. Service, to me, isn't a resume line. It's my grandmother teaching me, without meaning to, that showing up for someone consistently is the whole job. I'm just applying that lesson to a much larger family than the one I was born into.

In 2018, my grandmother Matilda had a moderate stroke while living alone in California. She became delusional, paranoid, and I felt helpless. So I flew out and stayed across the country in California for three months, staying at her convalescent facility during visiting hours every single day while working remotely from her room or nearby when she was sleeping. The staff were mostly kind people, just badly overwhelmed by ownership that kept staffing levels as thin as they could get away with. When help was slow to come, I used my CNA background to change her briefs, help her go to the restroom, and feed her myself. Eventually, I reported the facility to the California Board of nursing facilities. They were fined $10,000 and required to submit a corrective staffing plan. The people on the floor weren't the problem. The people cutting their hours and staff were, and the residents deserved better than being ojectified as maxium profit. When she was well enough to leave the facility and go back home, I stayed there, I packed up her apartment and moved her near me, partly to get her better care, and partly to get her away from my mother, who I knew would be emotionally abusive and take her money. I managed that quietly, telling my mother she already had enough health problems of her own to handle, so she wouldn't feel shut out and my grandmother wouldn't feel guilty. Protecting someone sometimes means managing the people around them too, without having anyone feel like the villain in the story. The assisted living facility I found here actually took good care of her, though at a steep price. More to do with an industry that knows families will pay almost anything to keep someone safe and taken care of. Yet that was the going rate, even here in North Carolia for a decent place. I couldn't fix that industry. I could only make sure she felt cared for inside it. When COVID hit, she was confined to her room for most of a year. Her short memory, which had always felt like a loss, became an advantage for her: she didn't fully register how long she'd been alone or in her room. But three times a week or more, my wife and I went to her window and called her, sang, danced, and acted ridiculous until she laughed, for the thirty minutes or so we could manage each visit. When we could finally see her outside a year later, I visited almost every day, and always for Friday services. Near the end, my wife got pregnant. Because of her memory, Matilda got that news for the first time roughly fifty times. Every time, she lit up like it was a breaking news flash. When she reached hospice, I spent most of my working hours there as well. On her last day, she died not long after I left. I hadn't even gotten home: the facility called me on my way. I've always believed she waited until I was gone. Selflessness, to me, isn't a single dramatic act. In fact, I learned it from her devotion to my grandfather who had MS. It's showing up every day for years, even when no one's keeping score, and being willing to make noise on someone's behalf when they can't do it themselves. I carry that instinct into NextGen Young Men, the nonprofit I'm building to give 13-25 year old boys a better answer than the hate groups currently recruiting them. Different person, same instinct: show up, protect, don't look away.

Joe Gilroy carried an index card in his shirt pocket every day. Me? I have a Google Docs checklist and update it daily, too. My goal is to build a platform called "NextGen Young Men." This nonprofit gives teenage boys and young men a healthy alternative to the online places recruiting them into hate groups, misogyny, and isolation. I'm building it into a self-sustaining organization with the goal of real, measurable effect. It started as an idea during school and has already grown into an early beta website, a project information and fundraising site (nextgenyoungmen.org), and dozens of planning, budget, and content documents. I'm in active conversation with three state senators about partnerships. The plan runs in phases. This year, I'm finalizing program designs using the same behavioral and data frameworks I’ve learned, formalizing governance and funding infrastructure, finishing the minimum viable website, and growing contacts who can help make this a full-scale reality. The full organization is budgeted at roughly $5 million, split across technology (30%), content (20%), personnel (25%), mentorship (10%), and research/evaluation (10%). But I'm not waiting to start. Phase 1, architecture, initial content, mentor recruitment, and a small pilot, runs on a fraction of it, funded by early grants and small donor commitments. From there, a pilot with a small cohort refines it based on what actually works. Phase 2, Improve our programe as our pilot phase indicates, and expand regionally. Phase 3, Expand nationally. Each phase is gated by its own budget and a clear go/no-go checkpoint. If major funding stalls early, the plan shrinks rather than collapses: a smaller, locally-run pilot with the same core of real mentorship and real community is still a better answer than what hate groups offer. As it gains more proof of effect, then we seek further fundraising again. NextGen and my graduate work aren't really the same philosophy applied at different scales. My current health administration and previous health informatics schooling is about governance, systems thinking, and prevention: building structures where the right thing happens reliably through planning and structure, not by luck. NextGen is just that, but focused on youth instead of hospitals. The degrees aren't a detour from the nonprofit; it's where I'm learning to build it properly through budget oversight, KPIs, accountability structures, and succession plans. My currently small solo business, DadWillFixIt, exists for a more pragmatic reason. I was laid off in the worst job market I've seen in my life. After a year of 1,000 resumes five interviews and no offers, I stopped waiting to be hired and hired myself instead. So, how do I manage all this? Planning and organization. I don't split my attention evenly, I order it. Each piece is defined and sequenced. The degree builds the skills and credibility, the business funds day-to-day and part of school, but NextGen is the mission. Each week's plan gets built around what that mission needs next. This isn't a hypothetical. It's the plan I'm already living. Joe machined parts: precise pieces fitting exactly right or everything fails. As a former mechanic, I appreciate that. I'm working on something less tangible but just as dependent on precision: getting the funding, the timing, the relationships, and the design to fit together so that a kid looking for answers finds them here instead of somewhere that will hurt him. I don't have Joe's index card. But I have the same habit: write the plan, work the plan, rewrite it when it's wrong, and keep going until it's done.

THE CHALLENGE: DID THEY REALLY DO THAT?? Let's be honest: Love Island is at its crazy best when trust is papercut-thin and everyone's spiraling into a hysterical black hole over a half-second glance at someone else. So here's a challenge designed to turn even the most solid couples into viewer-gripping emotional wrecks: "Did They Really Do That?" THE OVERVIEW: The Islanders are brought to meet with Ariana one by one, and shown short, dramatic video clips of their partner doing something, shall we say, "sketchy": kissing someone, making out, trash-talking, flirting way too hard. Some of these clips are real. Some aren't. The fake ones are, well, deepfakes, probably taken at nighttime, so they can be grainy and shadowy, making the deepfakes indistinguishable from real footage. But no one knows which is which; not the audience, not even Ariana or Iain. And deepfakes get better every year. THE SETUP: Each Islander gets their own clip, customized for maximum emotional drama. These clips, whether real or fake, look completely legit. Real lighting, real angles, real faces. Just enough ambiguity to make everyone question what they're seeing. THE RULES: NO TALKING, JUST REACTIONS: Right after watching the clip, the Islanders aren't allowed to talk to their partner. At all. They're taken straight to the Beach Hut to record a raw, off-the-cuff reaction: whatever they're feeling at that moment about what they saw and heard. Then, and here's the truly twisted part, that reaction video gets played in front of the entire villa, including their partner. So even if the clip was fake, now everyone's dealing with the fallout of what that person thought happened. This keeps everyone guessing, even the partner. The Islanders watching have no context for what they just saw, or for what the person saw, only how they felt about it. So whatever reaction they have (crying, screaming, cursing, freaking out, etc.), their partner and the entire villa can only imagine what happened. Probably, of course, the worst. This fuels paranoia, encourages gossip, and forces everyone to face emotional insecurity, but without any solid facts. DECISION TIME: After watching their partner's reaction (or non-reaction), each Islander has to make a public call: "I believe that actually happened" or "I don't believe it." No sitting on the fence. Everyone has to take a position. Once the reveal happens, if any Islander had guessed wrong: - They lose immunity - Their partner gets a free date with a new bombshell - The villa votes on whether they overreacted or under reacted. THE REVEAL: The producers open a classy-looking folder, leather-bound or woven, or some similar classy look, and for the first time, everyone gets to know which clips were real, and which were fake. Cue complete chaos, crying, apologies, and a lot of awkward "I didn't mean it like that" conversations. Big-D Drama, aka pure, undiluted Love Island fuel. WHY THIS WORKS: Love Island already runs on paranoia and perception. This challenge just weaponizes both, forcing Islanders to choose between what they saw and what they feel, with zero facts to lean on. It's dramatic, meme-worthy, and would 100% ruin at least three couples in one episode. In short, a perfect episode.

When I first heard “The Grudge,” I wasn't thinking about a breakup. I was thinking about my mother. “I hear your voice every time I think I'm not enough” is the line that began it all. Hearing someone's voice in your head every time you doubt yourself, years later, is one of the most accurate descriptions of the lasting effects of childhood abuse I've ever heard. And it came from a song about a terrible boyfriend. My mother was cruel and unpredictable from day one; decades later, she still sometimes lives rent-free in my head. What the song gets right, and what took me years of therapy to understand, is that this kind of anger doesn't resolve just because you want it to. “I said I don't care, that I've let it go. But you know I can't let it go. I've tried. I've tried for so long.” That’s the trap I lived in: insisting I was over it while clearly still (dis)organizing my life around the damage. You can't logic your way out of damage that deep. I know, because I tried… for so long. “The arguments I have won against you in my head” were years for me. Arguments rehearsed, things wished to have been said, victories never gotten out loud. “I try to understand why you would do this to me” and “I doubt you ever think about the damage you did” are best friends: I spent years trying to find a way her cruelty made sense. Eventually I got it: Extreme narcissism and violence don't consider anyone else. “Trust that you betrayed, confusion that still lingers” I didn't have language for until much later. It's not just anger; it's the disorientation of trust destroyed by the person who was supposed to be safest. Nor for the world in general. No one explained it. I had to figure it out alone, piecing together what “normal” and “healthy” looked like from the outside, like I'd been raised on another planet, dropped here without a manual. That confusion never fully went away. It got better, but it's always hovering. “How could anybody do the things you did so easily” is the question I no longer ask or expect an answer to. I used to desperately need an answer, something from her that would make it make sense. I don't anymore. It wasn't that I completely stopped being angry. I just stopped waiting for her mea culpa before I let myself build a good life. That's part of why Olivia’s music resonates so widely, including with someone decades outside her target demographic. She writes with an intensity that reminds me of Alanis Morissette in the '90s. But where Alanis’ anger still had to fight for space in a world demanding that women be more palatable, Olivia gets to say in the 2020s what even Alanis couldn't back then. “The Grudge” reminded me, again, that I didn't need permission to admit I'm still angry, or explain it away. That's part of why I'm working on NextGen Young Men now — a nonprofit for young boys and men absorbing damage they don’t yet have words for, the way I once did. I know what it costs to carry pain that old. I also know what it's like to put some of it down finally. Not because she deserved it, but because I did. Olivia Rodrigo wrote a song about a boyfriend. I heard my mother in almost every line. That's the thing about the best songwriting: it doesn't have to be about your details to tell the truth for you too.

Most people who are ambitious about one thing eventually specialize. I never got the memo. I've worked as a mechanic, a licensed psychiatric technician, and a front-end web developer for over two decades, all across four decades of my life. I finished a Master's in Health Informatics in December 2025 and immediately enrolled in an MHA program, also at Wake Forest, because one degree's worth of understanding wasn't enough for the scale of change I want to make. I've known ASL and French for over 30 years, and I'm currently improving my Spanish and learning Japanese, mostly because I like knowing how other people think and being able to communicate with them. Languages change your perspective on the world. I like that. My advantage isn't that I overcame a hard start, though I did. It's that I never stopped treating every field I touched as something worth actually understanding, not just passing through. When I got frustrated with clunky Android apps and predatory subscription pricing, I didn't just complain — I founded DadWillFixIt LLC and built my own: fairly priced, no data harvesting, solving problems I'd actually had. When I noticed teenage boys online were finding hate groups before they found mentors, going down dangerous paths, I didn't wait for someone else to fix it — I started building NextGen Young Men, a nonprofit now in active conversations with state senators' offices about policy partnerships that will also save millions of dollars in downstream costs. That's the pattern: I don't stay a spectator. I move from noticing a problem to owning a piece of the solution, whether that problem is in a hospital's EHR system, a broken credit score (mine went from 550 to 750 once I decided to learn how credit actually worked), or a teenager with no one steering him somewhere better. Most applicants can point to one lane where they've excelled. My advantage is that I've built the habit of excellence — or at least stubborn competence — across totally unrelated lanes, and I bring all of them into every new thing I do. Health administration isn't a departure from that. It's the next system I intend to actually understand, and then fix them.

When people hear “leader,” they often picture someone loud, confident, and usually, naturally charismatic. That’s never been me. My version of leadership started much quieter — with learning how to function in a world that wasn’t built for me: the way my brain and body work. I have learning disabilities, a processing-speed bottleneck that doesn’t slow my brain, but chokes the speed of thoughts and speech trying to get out, chronic pain, and PTSD from severe, ongoing childhood trauma. For a long time, school felt like something incomprehensible to me—relatively unimportant in a world where I was trying to survive, and constant failure. I wasn’t lazy. I wasn’t incapable. I was constantly overwhelmed, with no rule book. Finishing my Master’s in Health Informatics with a 3.8 GPA, and now pursuing further graduate training in Health Administration at Wake Forest didn’t happen because things suddenly got easy. It happened because I stopped fighting my reality and started working with it as it actually is. Eventually, I learned to build systems that work for myself. I use a strict structure, checklists, doubly verifying appointments and other important things, and time to focus without interruption. I learned to pace myself. Be more assertive in asking for accommodations, and turn what were originally limitations into strategic awareness. That shift — from frustration to design — is where leadership began. Now, I’m the Business and Informatics Manager at a chiropractic and wellness practice. When I joined, the clinic’s technology and workflow were outdated and fragmented. I upgraded the hardware and security systems for HIPAA compliance. I evaluated twelve EHR vendors not just for features but for contractual risk, and selected one that worked best for the practice and best protected the practice long-term. That process led me to write a white paper, now under review for publication, examining how Chiropractic EHR contracts—almost without exception—shift nearly all liability onto clinicians, who lack the time or leverage to push back. No one asked me to do that. But leadership means noticing a structural problem, refusing to ignore it, and being determined to change it. I also trained staff on new clinical technology, rebuilt the website to strengthen patient access, and developed marketing systems that increased profitability. None of that required a title change. It required initiative. Living with my many invisible disabilities has created my own style of leadership. I’m sensitive to overload because I’ve lived my life experiencing it. I simplify as many processes as I can for both the office staff and patients... because I know what chaos feels like. With my history in tech and design, I’m also a User Experience expert. I listen carefully because I know what it feels like to be dismissed. Those experiences don’t make me fragile. They make me observant, thoughtful, and adaptive. Outside the clinic, I’m working on a passion project: Next Gen Young Men, an online community and intervention. It's designed to intervene before isolation and alienation, or interested hate groups, harden young men into something destructive. It uses technology and public health principles to create healthier pathways for boys who might otherwise slip through the cracks. That work is personal—but it’s also strategic. Prevention is leadership at scale. And savings downstream. For me, leadership isn’t about overcoming hardship and inspiring people with the story. It’s about taking what you’ve learned in private battles and using it to build better systems in public spaces. I lead because I’ve had to think deeply about friction — and because I refuse to let that friction go unaddressed for the next person. That’s what makes me a leader.

Mental health isn’t an abstract concept in my life. It’s the life I had to live, and what I learned to survive, learn from, and ultimately lead. As a student, my ability to succeed has always been tied to whether my mental health was understood, supported, or ignored. I live with PTSD, learning disabilities, and other mental health challenges. For many years, these went undiagnosed, untreated, and misunderstood. For a long time, I didn’t have language. I had no understanding. I had no support. I grew up in severe instability, abuse, and emotional isolation. Mental illness ran through my entire family. There was little understanding of it, and no talking about it. By the time I reached adulthood, I’d learned how to function somewhat, but not how to feel safe, understand many social rules, regulate stress, or trust systems meant to help. As a student, this meant navigating education while managing hypervigilance, anxiety, depression, and invisible cognitive barriers. What “should” have taken me years took decades. Changing didn’t take toughness or willpower. It took mental health care. Years of therapy, recovery, and learning to advocate for accommodations gave me tools I had never been taught. Mental health support didn’t erase my challenges, but it made success possible. Today, I maintain a 3.7 GPA in graduate school, which would never have been achievable without sustained mental health support and access to care. I’ve also seen mental health struggles from the other side. I spent six years working as a psychiatric technician after three years as a certified nursing assistant, supporting adults and children with serious mental illness and developmental disabilities. I witnessed how often mental health needs are minimized, underfunded, or treated as behavioral problems rather than human suffering. I saw how stigma harms not only patients, but families, caregivers, and entire communities. Ultimately, I made the difficult decision to step away from my role there—not because the work lacked meaning, but because continuing was no longer sustainable for my own mental health. That decision deepened my commitment to advocacy rather than ending it. Today, I advocate for mental health in both formal and informal ways. I speak openly about my own experiences to name it, reduce stigma, and normalize help-seeking, particularly for men, who are often discouraged from naming emotional pain until it becomes destructive. I’m also building Next Gen Young Men, a nonprofit initiative designed to divert youth from hate groups and the damage they cause by addressing the mental health roots of alienation, shame, and identity collapse before they harden into extremism or violence. My academic path reflects this commitment. I am pursuing graduate training in health administration so I can influence mental health systems at the structural level, including policy, funding, access, and program design. I want to help create environments where people don’t need to reach crisis before being taken seriously. Financial and emotional challenges remain part of my graduate journey. Managing school alongside mental health care while maintaining stability requires constant balance. The Health Empowerment Scholarship would help relieve some pressure and support me as I continue my education while expanding my advocacy work. Mental health awareness is not about slogans or awareness months. It is about building cultures where people are believed, supported, helped, and given real tools, education, and understanding so they can thrive. Too often, those struggling with mental illness wake up each day to an epic battle, where surviving the day itself feels overwhelming and the idea of living even a few more decades feels like an unlivable life sentence. This is what I am here to change.

I am a Jewish graduate student whose life has been shaped by displacement, instability, and the long work of rebuilding identity. According to genetic records, I am 97.5% Ashkenazi Jewish, with 0.25% Han Chinese, and 0.25% Indonesian ancestry reflecting the complexity of my family history. (It sounds like a few distant family members had some adventures). While I was born in the United States, I spent formative early years living in Israel beginning in infancy, and my upbringing was deeply rooted in Jewish language, education, and values. I grew up with grandparents who spoke Yiddish as a living language, not a relic. Yiddish and Hebrew were part of my early world, along with Jewish learning and community. I attended yeshiva until the age of seven, and from an early age, Judaism was not theoretical for me—it was practiced, spoken, and embodied. Jewish values of justice, fairness, and loving-kindness are as embedded in my personality and psyche as my own sense of self. At the same time, my childhood was marked by extreme instability and abuse. By the time I turned eighteen, my mother had moved us fourteen times, across cities, states, and countries. There was no consistent sense of home, safety, or continuity. The severity of isolation and trauma meant that when I eventually re-entered broader society, I did not simply need to learn American norms—I had to learn human norms. Basic social expectations, trust, and emotional safety were not things I had been taught or allowed to develop naturally. This experience mirrors, in profound ways, the dislocation many immigrant and diaspora families know: the feeling of being perpetually out of place, of having to translate yourself constantly, of rebuilding identity without stable ground beneath you. For me, Judaism remained the one consistent throughline—a moral compass when everything else shifted. It taught me that survival carries responsibility, and that endurance alone is not enough; repair matters. Language became one of the ways I survived and rebuilt connection. In addition to Yiddish and Hebrew, I learned functional French and Spanish, and later American Sign Language. Learning languages gave me tools to listen carefully, to cross boundaries, and to belong where I otherwise felt invisible. Those skills continue to shape how I approach systems, leadership, and service. Today, I am pursuing graduate education with the goal of working at the systems level in healthcare and social services. My ambition is grounded in lived experience. I know what it means to be misunderstood by institutions, to navigate systems that assume stability you never had, and to rebuild without generational safety nets. I want to help design institutions that are humane, accessible, and grounded in real human complexity. Financial need remains a significant part of my graduate journey. Like many students whose paths were disrupted by instability and trauma, I am rebuilding later and with fewer resources. Support from the Ilya Flantsbaum Memorial Scholarship would meaningfully reduce that burden and allow me to focus fully on my education and long-term impact. Judaism remains central to my life. My wife is Jewish, and our shared commitment to learning, justice, and responsibility shapes how we live and plan our future. I carry forward the Jewish imperative of tikkun olam—repairing what is broken—not as an abstraction, but as a lived obligation. Through my education and career, I hope to honor that legacy by strengthening systems, serving vulnerable populations, and contributing work rooted in dignity, fairness, and compassion. This scholarship would help make that more possible.

My commitment to working with individuals with intellectual disabilities grew from both lived experience and years on the front lines of care. I have spent more than six years working as a psychiatric technician and three years as a certified nursing assistant, supporting adults and children with intellectual and developmental disabilities, including individuals with Down's syndrome and autistic individuals across the spectrum. What I witnessed during that time fundamentally changed how I understand disability, care, and justice. Professionally, I saw how deeply flawed the system is. Too often, services for people with intellectual disabilities were underfunded, understaffed, and treated as an afterthought. I observed a painful pattern: the more severe or complex a person’s disability, the less seriously their needs were taken. Individuals who were nonverbal, had significant behavioral challenges, or required intensive support were frequently dismissed as “difficult” rather than understood as human beings deserving dignity, patience, and well-designed care. It was impossible not to notice that those considered more “presentable” or socially palatable received more attention, while others were quietly neglected. That reality made me angry—but more importantly, it made me determined. My inspiration is also personal. Mental health conditions and neurodivergence run deeply in my family. I live with PTSD, learning disabilities, and chronic mental health challenges myself. My father struggles with narcissistic traits and mental illness. My mother lived with severe personality pathology. My brother has schizophrenia and ADHD. Growing up surrounded by unaddressed mental health needs showed me how devastating it is when systems that are supposed to help fail to intervene early, compassionately, and effectively. It also gave me empathy for caregivers and families navigating overwhelming circumstances with little guidance or support. Working in psychiatric and long-term care settings made it clear that the problem is not a lack of compassion among frontline workers—it is systemic failure. Poor policy, inadequate funding, and administrative decisions disconnected from lived reality result in environments where even dedicated staff cannot provide the care people deserve. Burnout is common, turnover is constant, and the individuals most impacted are those with intellectual disabilities who rely on stability and trust. That is why I am pursuing a Master’s degree in Health Administration. I want to move beyond surviving broken systems and help redesign them. My goal is to influence policy, funding priorities, and organizational practices that directly affect people with intellectual disabilities. I intend to advocate for better staffing ratios, stronger training requirements, accountability in care settings, and funding models that recognize complexity rather than punish it. I do not want to be removed from the population I serve. I want to be an administrator who understands the floor as well as the boardroom—someone who has cleaned rooms, literally changed many thousands of adult briefs and children's diapers, de-escalated crises, been assaulted, and sat with people who were ignored because they were deemed “too much.” Those experiences fuel my ambition and shape my leadership goals. I am driven by the belief that intellectual disability justice is not about charity or optics—it is about human rights. With advanced training in health administration, I plan to do everything within my reach to raise awareness, influence policy, and help create systems that treat people with intellectual disabilities not as burdens, but as full human beings worthy of care, respect, and investment. Getting this scholarship would help me focus more on my studies and worry less about finances and going into debt. Thank you very much for putting this scholarship out into the world.

Living with a disability often means navigating systems that were never designed with me in mind. In my life, disability is not a single diagnosis but an ongoing reality shaped by PTSD (now widely recognized as a neurodiverse condition), learning disabilities, and severe chronic pain. Together, they have influenced how I learn, work, and move through the world—and they have also shaped my commitment to disability advocacy, justice, and inclusion. Much of my disability experience was invisible and unrecognized for years. I struggled academically without understanding why, internalizing failure instead of receiving support. PTSD affected my concentration, memory, and emotional regulation, while learning disabilities created persistent processing barriers that traditional educational environments were ill-equipped to address. Later, chronic pain added another layer, limiting physical endurance and daily functioning. These challenges followed me into professional life. In one role, after formally requesting disability accommodations under the ADA, the company demanded that I get evaluated again at my own expense. I did. I was terminated the day before those accommodations were scheduled to take effect. I later filed a discrimination claim and won a settlement for my lost wages. The EEOC here in the south was barely any help. In any other state north of your I'm sure the settlement would have been much larger. While the legal outcome mattered, the experience revealed a broader systemic problem: many institutions publicly support inclusion while quietly excluding disabled individuals when accommodation requires real effort. Despite these barriers, I persisted. With appropriate accommodations, years of therapy, and self-developed strategies, I returned to higher education later in life. Today, I am a graduate student in Health Administration with a strong academic record—demonstrating what becomes possible when disabled students are supported rather than sidelined. My success is not the absence of disability; it is the presence of accessibility. These experiences have shaped my understanding of disability justice. Advocacy is not only about compliance or services: it is about dignity, equity, and thoughtful system design. Too many colleges, universities, and graduate programs lack sufficient disability services, trained faculty, and proactive support structures. As a result, capable students are often forced to choose between their health and their education—or leave higher education altogether. My academic and professional goals directly address these failures. Through my studies in health informatics and health administration, I am developing skills in data analysis, user-centered design, and systems improvement. I plan to apply these tools to improve how educational and healthcare institutions design services for disabled and neurodiverse populations. Accessibility should not be an accommodation requested after the fact—it should be embedded into systems from the start. Financial need remains a significant factor in my education. Managing graduate studies alongside disability-related medical time, expenses, and limited work capacity creates ongoing strain. Scholarships like the Yvette E. Pegues Scholarship do more than provide financial support—they affirm that disabled students belong in higher education and deserve the resources to succeed. Receiving this scholarship would help me to continue my education with greater stability and focus, while deepening my commitment to advancing disability justice through systemic change. My lived experience has shown me where systems fail. My education is preparing me to help fix them.

I lost both of my parents long before they were physically gone. My parents divorced early in my childhood, during a period when my father was struggling with drugs and alcohol. His substance use continued until I was about eight years old, and while he eventually moved toward stability, those early years of addiction and separation left a lasting imprint. My mother, meanwhile, was abusive, volatile, and deeply unwell. Home was never a place of safety—it was a place of constant hypervigilance, emotional chaos, and fear. Like many children raised in these conditions, I learned early how to survive rather than how to feel. Years later, my mother died by suicide. That loss did not arrive as a single moment of grief. It landed on top of a lifetime of unresolved trauma and forced me to confront a truth I could no longer avoid: pain like this does not disappear—it repeats unless someone chooses to stop it. I chose to stop it. This cycle ends with me. For many years, I lived in reaction. Trauma shaped my nervous system, my self-worth, and my sense of what was possible. Like many survivors, I doubted myself constantly and struggled to imagine a future that felt stable or safe. Surviving my own despair required conscious effort, structure, and support. Healing did not happen by accident. Therapy was essential. Over time, it gave me language for experiences I had normalized and helped me understand how trauma shaped my reactions. It taught me how to distinguish present reality from old conditioning and gave me tools for accountability and repair. Alongside therapy, meditation and journaling became non-negotiable daily practices. Meditation helped regulate my nervous system and recognize when I was spiraling or dissociating. Journaling gave me a place to tell the truth without minimizing it—to process grief, identify patterns, and separate past trauma from present life. Together, these practices taught me presence. They showed me that emotions can be felt without being obeyed and that clarity comes from attention rather than avoidance. They did not erase loss, but they made it livable. Becoming a father clarified everything. Holding my son, I understood how much protection, steadiness, and care a child needs—and how damaging it is when those needs are absent. Fatherhood transformed my healing from something personal into something generational. I am not only recovering for myself; I am building a different emotional inheritance for my child, rooted in safety and compassion. This commitment led me to develop Next Gen Young Men, a nonprofit initiative focused on mental health, emotional literacy, and early intervention for boys and young men. Its mission is to intervene before isolation and untreated trauma harden into addiction, violence, or hate-based recruitment. At the same time, I face real financial strain. I was laid off from the tech industry and have spent over two years trying to regain stable employment while continuing my education. Returning to graduate school was a necessary step toward building a future aligned with healing and service. Receiving the Enders Scholarship would reduce financial pressure and allow me to focus on my studies, my family, and the inner work that keeps me well. For someone with a trauma history, stability is foundational. Loss shaped my early life. Healing is shaping everything that comes next.

“Service as a Second Language” Service saved my life long before it became my calling. In recovery, the first lesson I learned was simple but profound: “You keep what you have by giving it away.” I didn’t understand it at first, but over time it became the foundation of everything I do. Helping others isn’t something I added to my life—it gave my life structure, purpose, and peace. I’ve been in recovery since 1992. Before that, I was lost—chasing connection in unhealthy ways, repeating destructive patterns, and mistaking chaos for passion. Recovery forced me to rebuild from the inside out. Service was the anchor that helped me do that. Whether it was helping a newcomer in recovery, volunteering in the community, or mentoring people through mental-health or other recovery challenges, showing up for someone else reminded me that healing is never a solo act. Service also shaped my early career. In my twenties, I became a Licensed Psychiatric Technician, working with patients in acute and post-acute long-term mental .hhealth care. Those years taught me that service isn’t just about time—it’s about humanity. A calm presence, a kind word, or just not giving up on someone can be life-changing. That work showed me who I wanted to be in the world. Later, I transitioned into technology and spent years building digital products—but something vital was missing. Much of the work revolved around KPIs, engagement, and entertainment, not meaning. I realized I needed to return to work that directly helped others, which led me to my current master’s program in Health Informatics at Wake Forest University. To some people, that looks like a career pivot. To me, it’s simply another way of serving. My goal now is to design healthcare systems that give clinicians back their time with patients—to make technology humane. When you fix the systems that frustrate caregivers, you help everyone they touch: nurses, doctors, patients, and families. It is one of the most far-reaching acts of service I can imagine. In January 2026, I’ll begin a second master’s degree in Health Administration, allowing me to pair technical insight with compassionate leadership. I want to lead large-scale health-system reforms that reflect what recovery taught me: honesty, empathy, accountability, and courage. As a returning adult student changing careers, I’ve learned that if you’re going to start over, start boldly. These dual degrees will let me serve at a level I couldn’t have imagined earlier in my life. I also founded Boys to Leaders, a nonprofit dedicated to helping teenage boys and young men avoid online hate groups and build healthier definitions of belonging and masculinity. This work is deeply personal—it’s prevention through compassion, mentorship, and community. Every young man we reach is one more ripple of hope and one less life pulled toward harm. Today, I give back through mentorship, volunteer work, nonprofit service, and by building systems that reflect the values that saved my life. Tomorrow, I hope to do it on a larger scale—through healthcare innovation, organizational leadership, and continued community work that helps people heal before they lose themselves. Service, to me, is the art of showing up. It’s the thread that connects my recovery, my education, my parenting, and my purpose. I owe everything good in my life to the people who showed up for me when I didn’t know how to show up for myself. This scholarship would help me continue that cycle—to keep learning, keep serving, and keep spreading the same hope that once saved me.

Working with a child like Rebecca starts with a simple belief: every child communicates, even when they don’t use words. My job is to learn the way they communicate and meet them there. When I worked as a Licensed Psychiatric Technician, I spent years supporting children with autism, cerebral palsy, intellectual disabilities, and complex communication needs. The kids who made the biggest progress were always the ones whose teams slowed down and paid attention to who they were—their humor, their quirks, their sensory needs, and the small things that made them light up. Reading about Rebecca’s joy—her laughter, her excitement at “Happy Birthday,” her love of movement and music—I could immediately picture the kind of connection I would have loved to build with her. If I were working with a student like Rebecca, I would begin by observing and listening to her rhythms: what made her smile, what calmed her, what overstimulated her, and what she reached for. From there, I would build her learning around the things she enjoyed—music, movement, tactile tools, visuals, routine, and moments of joy. My methods would always be individualized and flexible: AAC supports, sensory-based strategies, modeling, co-regulation, and lots of patience. Kids like Rebecca communicate in ways that require adults to be attentive, open-minded, and deeply respectful. That’s how I’ve always approached this work. Families carry the day-to-day knowledge that no clinician or educator could ever replicate. They know what soothes their child in a meltdown, what a subtle behavior means, the story behind a certain fear, or the specific sensory input that helps their child reset. I’ve learned from families throughout my career, but I also understand this from my own life. My nephew has an extremely rare genetic disorder that mirrors severe CP, and I’ve seen firsthand how much progress depends on family insight, teamwork, and emotional resilience. When professionals listen to families, the child thrives. My own disabilities have shaped the way I show up for kids and families. I live with physical disabilities that require the daily use of a mobility device. I also manage learning disabilities and PTSD-related depression and anxiety. Navigating school, parenting, and work from within disability has given me a different kind of patience and presence. I understand how exhausting it is when the world expects you to keep up without acknowledging your limits. And I know how life-changing it is when someone believes in you anyway. That experience makes me more thoughtful, more flexible, and more compassionate in the classroom—and it strengthens my commitment to work in special education, pre-K through 12th grade. Although I am completing my Master’s in Health Informatics in December and beginning my Master of Health Administration in January, my long-term career plan has always centered on supporting vulnerable young people. I originally hoped to become a pediatrician, but my disabilities and mental health challenges changed that path. What never changed was my desire to work closely with children—especially those who are misunderstood or overlooked. It’s also part of why I’m building BoysToLeaders, a nonprofit supporting boys as young as 12–13, many of whom will have developmental or emotional challenges. Financially, I’m carrying about $69,000 in student loan debt. After being laid off, I’ve spent nearly two years mostly unemployed, now working part-time at a chiropractor’s office while raising my three-year-old with special needs. This scholarship would help me continue my education without sacrificing my stability as a parent and a student with disabilities. Children like Rebecca remind us of the power of joy, patience, creativity, and connection. I would be honored to continue that kind of work in her memory.

Another terrible breakup, another terrible hospitalization. That was my pattern. Being crazy and out of control, never alone, like my mother. Each collapse felt like the end of the world, and in a way, it was—the world as I understood it. Panic attacks would spiral out of control, landing me in the hospital in 2009, then again in 2015. It wasn’t until much later that I understood what I was really trying to recover from: a lifetime of addiction, trauma, and the impossible search for comfort in all the wrong places. I’ve been in recovery since 1992. That’s over three decades of learning how to live, one honest day at a time. My addiction was about escape—trying to fill an emptiness that couldn’t be filled from the outside. Escape any way, anywher. Especially through sex and love. For years, I mistook chaos for connection. I kept choosing people who mirrored my own unhealed parts, other addicts trying to survive their own pain. Every time, it ended the same way: heartbreak, self-doubt, and another reminder that I couldn’t heal through someone else’s love. Recovery taught me so much. It taught me how to stand still. How to sit with feelings without letting them destroy me, and how to take responsibility without drowning in shame. I'm not sure what was harder: giving up the addictive patterns or learning to trust myself again. But each year of recovery has built on the last, slowly replacing fear with faith and confidence, and confusion with purpose. Finally, it taught me that my abusive, mentally ill mother—and others in my family—weren't safe, weren't to be trusted, and were to be avoided at all costs. That was brutally hard. But it created a new family for me. The support of my family of choice and the purpose I now lived in led me back to college in my forties and now to graduate studies in Health Informatics at Wake Forest University. Following that, I'll be taking a Master's in Health Adminstration at Wake. Recovery has taught me, sometimes go big or stay home. I’m using what I’ve learned in recovery—self-awareness, patience, compassion—to help fix broken systems in healthcare. My goal is to design and improve technology to help people heal instead of getting them hopelessly lost in bureaucracy. I’m also building Boys to Leaders, a nonprofit that helps young men find belonging and mentorship before their pain drives them toward destructive paths. It’s prevention through empathy, community, meaning, and honest answers—all things I wish I’d had earlier. Addiction took many years—decades—from me, but recovery has given me a life with meaning, worth living, finally. This scholarship would help me keep growing that life—honoring Alexander Hipple’s legacy by showing that healing isn’t just possible; it’s beautiful. Because since I starte recovery, every time I’ve fallen, recovery has taught me the same truth: I can always begin again. Usually through the almost literal life vest of "No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others."

I love math because it’s never lied to me. We can't hide from each other. No matter what was happening, math stayed solid. 1,297 plus 1,297 was always 2,594. That kind of reliability is rare for me, as I lived a life full of chaos, twists, turns, and unexpected detours. Math made sense when almost nothing else did. For most of my early life, though, math and life was a struggle. I had undiagnosed learning disabilities. They made school feel like running a marathon on another planet. I would disassociate. Numbers, reading, would slip away from me. I wasn’t bad at thinking—I just didn’t think the same way everyone else did. And I had to work around my dmaaged places. Eventually, I learned how my mind works—and how to work with it—and suddenly, the whole picture shifted. And a great algebra teacher made all the difference. Math wasn’t a wall; it was a pattern I hadn’t been taught how to see yet. Once I saw it, I couldn’t unsee it. Math started showing up everywhere—in sea foam looking like lichen from any distance, in rhythms, in music, in the way people talk or how traffic flows through a city. Chaos Theory and visualizations made it mysterious and beauful. It’s the secret whispers underneath everything. It's the jigsaw puzzle of how the world comes together. It's why Carl Sagan sent equations as part of Voyager's message to the stars. What used to make me panic started to calm me instead. It taught me patience, humility, and how to "keep at it" until it makes sense. Now, as a grad student in Health Informatics, I use math every day to make sense of messy, human problems. It’s behind the algorithms that predict disease, the systems that save doctors time, and the tools that make healthcare more compassionate. Math lets me turn data into understanding—and understanding into impact. But even beyond school or work, I love math because it mirrors life. It teaches me that every problem has a solution, even if I can’t see it yet. I just have to take it one step at a time, keep showing up, and trust the process. That’s what math has meant to me once I "got it": clarity, honesty, and a reminder that even in the chaos, there’s always a pattern waiting to be found.

Second Chances At fifty, I’m finally doing what I was meant to do all along—build systems that heal people, not not just "entertain" them. It took me decades, a detour through trauma, and a long career shift to get here, but here I am: an adult learner, a husband, a father, and a man who still believes that second chances can change everything. I didn’t grow up expecting a happy ending. My childhood was defined by instability, neglect, and the kind of chaos that makes survival your only subject. I had undiagnosed learning disabilities and PTSD that made school feel like running uphill in quicksand. I wasn’t lazy or disinterested; I just didn’t yet have the tools to learn the way my mind worked. For a long time, I thought “smart” was something that belonged to other people. But pain can be a strange teacher. I learned empathy early—the kind born from understanding what it feels like to be unseen. That empathy carried me into mental health care, where I became a licensed psychiatric technician in my twenties, working with patients in crisis. I witnessed what happens when people fall through the cracks, and how one act of compassion can bring someone back from the edge. Those years taught me that healing isn’t just about treatment—it’s about dignity, presence, and trust. Later, I transitioned into technology. On the surface, it was a major career change, but I soon realized the throughline: systems. Whether in mental health or tech, I was fascinated by how people interact with the structures meant to help them—and how often those systems fail the people who need them most. I saw how empathy and design could intersect to create change on a large scale. Somewhere between those worlds, I found my purpose. Now, as a graduate student in Health Informatics at Wake Forest University, I’m merging my experiences in both fields to improve healthcare from the inside out. My goal is to make electronic health records more usable and humane so clinicians can spend less time clicking and more time connecting. My studies have also inspired *Boys to Leaders*, a nonprofit I’m building to help teenage boys and young men resist recruitment into online hate groups by offering mentorship, mental health resources, and positive models of masculinity. It’s prevention through compassion and design—using technology for healing, not harm. Starting in January I will be beginning a second, complimentary Master's degree in Health Administration to Go Big or Go Home and have a very competitive CV, a serious final act in my career. Every path I’ve walked—survivor, caregiver, technician, developer, father—has shaped my values: resilience, empathy, and purpose. I’ve learned that growth isn’t about erasing the past; it’s about transforming it into something that serves others. This scholarship would help me do exactly that. It would ease the financial pressure of balancing graduate school, parenting, and nonprofit work, allowing me to focus fully on building systems that change lives. Like Debra Jackson, I returned to education not because life was easy, but because I knew it could be better—for my family, my community, and the people I’ll serve next. Second chances don’t erase what came before. They honor it by proving that transformation is possible. I'm going to make mine count.

I was in my early twenties when I got sepsis, and it was one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. At the time, I didn’t even fully understand what sepsis was: I was sick with an infection and felt like my body was shutting down. I remember looking at the ER ceiling and thinking, "I might actually die." That kind of clarity is unforgettable. Thankfully, my case wasn’t as severe as it could have been. We caught it early, and with fast IV antibiotics and hospital care, I was pulled back from the edge. But the experience changed me permanently. I developed a different relationship with medicine, with my body, and with how I view systemic care. It also introduced me to a world of survivors, many of whom had stories far more traumatic than mine, as well as those who didn't survive. That reminder—how close it came, how fragile life is—never left me. Sepsis doesn’t get the attention it deserves, despite its massive impact. In the U.S. alone, it affects 1.7 million people each year and claims 350,000 lives. Survivors often deal with lasting physical and psychological effects. That trauma doesn’t just vanish when the infection clears. I still carry anxiety, a hyper-awareness of every strange symptom, and a sharp understanding of how fragile systems—bodies and institutions—really are. That experience changed my trajectory. I’m currently studying health informatics and administration, shifting away from web development because I want my work to matter in a different way. I want to build systems that identify risk earlier, educate people about conditions like sepsis, and support quicker, smarter responses from both patients and providers. The gap in awareness, in readiness, in response—it’s far too wide. And I want to help close it. Beyond that, I'm working on a nonprofit platform that uses gamified, interactive education to engage vulnerable young men and guide them away from harmful online spaces. Many of them come from backgrounds with low healthcare literacy. Teaching them to recognize when something’s off, whether it's physical or mental health, is part of the same mission. It's about survival. It's about health systems that serve everyone, not just the few. This scholarship would ease some of the financial pressure, but more than that, it would connect me with a community that understands how real this threat is. I didn’t die in that hospital, but something shifted in me. Now, I’m taking that fear, that close call, and turning it into something useful. I’m here because medicine worked. I’m staying to help it work better—for more people, in more places, before it’s too late.

I've lost seven friends to suicide, and in 2022, my mother also died by suicide after a lifetime of mental illness. Her threats of suicide were a constant part of my childhood and adolescence. I grew up in an environment of abuse and chaos, which shaped my early struggles with my own mental health and suicidal thoughts. The loss of my mother was deeply complicated: grief mixed with anger, and relief mixed with sadness. For ten years, from age 23 to 33, I cut off contact with her to protect myself. Later, I tried again to build a relationship with her, and it remained difficult until her death. These experiences have made me intimately aware of the ripple effects of suicide. It's not only the individual who suffers, but the family and friends who are left to piece together their lives after such a loss. The grief is rarely straightforward. It comes with questions, guilt, memories, and often, isolation. With all those lost friends, I carried that weight, thinking I had to manage most of it by myself. Over time and with necessity, I began to find resilience and hope through connection. Therapy and support groups gave me language for my experiences and tools for healing. Friends, therapists, and surviving family members became lifelines when I felt overwhelmed. Meeting my wife and building a family with her has been one of the greatest sources of stability and healing in my life. Our three-year-old son, born the same year my mother died, has been a living reminder that love and growth are still possible even in the shadow of loss. Losing so many people to suicide has changed my sense of purpose. It's made me more empathetic, more determined to build systems of care and community, and more committed to reducing the stigma around mental health. In my professional studies in health informatics and administration, I focus on designing systems that don't overlook people who are struggling silently, and I'm working to create a nonprofit platform to reach vulnerable young men before harmful influences take hold. The Jean Ramirez Memorial Scholarship represents more than financial support for me; it represents recognition of the long, ongoing work of healing. I've learned that resilience isn't a single act. It's a practice. Hope isn't something that arrives on its own; it's something you build every day, through relationships, self-care, and service. Despite the losses I've endured, I've chosen to continue building a life of meaning and connection, and I'm determined to use my education to help others survive and heal as well.

I didn’t grow up with one language: I grew up with three. English, Hebrew, and Yiddish swirled around our home like a code-switching symphony. Later I learned French, ASL, and Spanish. English was for school. Hebrew was for family along with a companion in Yiddish for subtext, sarcasm, and survival. Each language carried a different cultural weight, a different emotional undertone, a different version of me. It’s not always easy navigating multiple linguistic worlds, especially when English isn’t your first instinct but the system insists it should be. I often can't think of the right word in English in the middle of a sentence. I spent years translating school forms, phone calls, and even the news for family members. I was the bridge—sometimes the only one—between bureaucratic systems and the people I love. That responsibility teaches you two things fast: how to adapt, and how to advocate. And I’ve carried both into everything I do. Right now, I’m studying health informatics and administration, with a background in web development. My goal post-graduation is to build systems that work better for everyone—especially people who don’t speak perfect English, who fall through the cracks of digital forms and institutional design. I want to design health systems that don’t assume English fluency as a given, and that respect cultural nuance as more than a checkbox. I am also creating a 501c3 community and challenge, gamified, interactive web system to help vulnerable young men to be diverted from online hate groups that take advantage of their need for answers, community, and meaning. Young men from marginalized communities and backgrounds, some with ESL spoken at home, are especially vulnerable to some of these recruitment efforts. Being multilingual isn’t just about vocabulary. It’s about perspective. Language shapes how we understand time, respect, humor, even illness. Growing up flipping between languages taught me how to listen for what’s not being said, how to read subtext, and how to connect across gaps. These aren’t soft skills. They’re survival tools in both tech and healthcare. But it wasn’t always framed that way. I grew up feeling like I had to hide or flatten parts of how I spoke to make others comfortable. Teachers corrected my phrasing when it followed Hebrew logic. Classmates laughed at Yiddish words I didn’t realize were unusual. It takes time to reclaim pride in multilingualism—to see it as a strength instead of a stumbling block. I’m there now. This scholarship would help me keep going—through grad school, into a system that badly needs people who can speak more than one kind of fluency. Not just in language, but in empathy, complexity, and human systems. I’m here to build things that make access real, for people like the ones I grew up translating for. And I’m bringing all my languages with me.

Calculus is the deep end of the mathematical pool—and for good reason. It doesn’t just ask you to memorize formulas; it demands that you think in motion, reason with change, and quantify the unseeable. That kind of thinking isn’t just useful in STEM fields; it *defines* them. I study health informatics and health administration, with a background in web programming and development. In my work, calculus shows up more than most people realize. Modeling patient data trends, optimizing resource allocation, forecasting system demands, and understanding population health metrics—these are fundamentally calculus problems, even when they’re mediated through dashboards or code. Calculus trains your brain to model the real world abstractly and mathematically. That skill doesn’t just make you a better student; it makes you a more precise thinker. Health systems are increasingly data-driven, and that means we need to reason rigorously about change. Calculus is foundational in understanding how variables interact over time, how to optimize complex systems, and how to make evidence-based decisions. Whether it's designing algorithms for predictive analytics or improving the efficiency of hospital workflows, calculus is often working behind the scenes. And sometimes, it's working right in your backyard. One weekend, I found myself trying to figure out how much concrete we needed to fill in an uneven patch of garden. It wasn’t a neat rectangle or a clean box. It was irregular, sloped, and just complex enough to stump a tape measure. But breaking it into smaller sections and applying volume integration techniques—yes, actual calculus—got me the answer. That moment connected theory to reality in a way that stuck with me. Calculus isn’t just academic; it’s practical. But beyond the utility, there’s a kind of quiet defiance in learning calculus. It’s not easy. It doesn’t click in a weekend. Taking it on is a signal, to yourself and to the world, that you’re here to build things that last, to tackle problems with depth, and to embrace the mental heavy lifting. It’s not performative. It’s preparation. I come from a background where tuition is not just a line item; it’s a wall. Scholarships like this one aren’t just generous, they’re catalytic. I’m not studying STEM because it’s trendy. I’m studying STEM because I want to solve hard problems, make health data work smarter, and help build systems that support real people. That starts with understanding change—and nothing teaches change better than calculus. In my Bold.org profile, I lead with authenticity and clarity. My goals aren’t hypothetical. I’m building toward them every day, one challenge at a time. Calculus included.

I grew up in a home defined by trauma and instability. PTSD, depression, anxiety, and learning disabilities shaped my childhood, and for years, survival felt like my only option. Love was conditional, boundaries were blurred, and chaos was the norm. School was difficult—not because I lacked ambition, but because when survival is your focus, there isn’t much room left for dreaming. That experience gave me something else, though: a deep awareness of what pain, isolation, and hopelessness can do to a person. It also gave me empathy and a fierce commitment to making sure others don’t have to fight their battles alone. That commitment drives the work that inspires me most today: Boys to Leaders, a nonprofit I am building to help teenage boys and young men avoid being recruited into online hate groups. This mission is deeply personal. I know how vulnerable people become when they’re searching for belonging, guidance, or purpose and can’t find it in healthy places. Online communities—whether around eating disorders, suicide, or violent extremism—exploit that vulnerability, pulling people in at their weakest. I believe we can do better. Boys to Leaders is about offering a powerful alternative: mentorship, community, mental health resources, and positive models of masculinity. It’s about helping boys and young men find meaning and belonging that strengthen them instead of destroying them. When young men feel connected and valued, they don’t just avoid harmful paths—they build healthier futures for themselves, their families, and their communities. This work inspires me every single day. It also connects directly to my career path. I’m now pursuing a master’s in Health Informatics, a field at the intersection of healthcare, data, and human experience. After working in mental health care and later in technology, I realized I could bring those worlds together to create tools and systems that make real change. My studies give me the ability to design interventions that reach people early, before small cracks turn into life-shattering crises. I never became the doctor I once dreamed of being, but now I’m building tools doctors—and patients—need, and creating something that can ripple far beyond me. The truth is, this path hasn’t been easy. For the last 18 months, I’ve been unemployed as a programmer and designer. I pick up part-time work using my skills in business, marketing, and tech, but I’ve had to draw from my retirement savings to cover basic expenses—an unsustainable path that underscores how critical this scholarship support would be. This scholarship would give me the stability to continue my education and grow Boys to Leaders into a sustainable, far-reaching resource. More than just financial help, it would be an investment in prevention, compassion, and the belief that no one should be left to fight their battles alone. I’m deeply saddened that Christina Taylese Singh never got to see the full arc of her dream. I carry mine forward with respect for people like her, for those I’ve lost, and with gratitude for the chance to keep building something that might give others the future they deserve.

I grew up in an unstable, often unsafe home where love was conditional, boundaries were blurred. Chaos and violence were the norm. By the time I was a child, I was already navigating PTSD, trauma, and learning disabilities. School was rarely about learning for me—it was about surviving long enough to make it through another day. That kind of start leaves its mark. But it also gave me a deep empathy for others, especially people living with mental health challenges. I saw, and later experienced, the enormous gap between what people need and what they actually receive. Far too often, that gap is where people lose hope. I began closing that gap for myself and others as soon as I could. First, as a CNA in a psychiatric facility, then as a licensed psychiatric technician. I worked with patients in acute crisis—people in delusion, in unbearable pain, and on the edge of giving up. I learned how stigma keeps people silent until their suffering becomes unbearable, and how one moment of human connection can sometimes mean the difference between life and death. Mental health care, I learned, isn’t just medication or treatment plans—it’s trust, presence, and being there when someone believes no one will be. Eventually, I moved into a career in technology, discovering that systems, processes, and data could be just as powerful as bedside care when applied to the right problems. I realized I could merge my two worlds—mental health and technology—to create solutions that prevent crises before they start. Now, as a graduate student in Health Informatics, I’m doing exactly that. My most important project is Boys to Leaders, a nonprofit I’m building to help teenage boys and young men resist recruitment into online hate groups. This is a growing public health crisis. I understand how isolation, identity struggles, and untreated mental health issues can leave someone vulnerable to toxic influences. Boys are looking for what we all want: meaning, belonging, and guidance. But too often, they find it in the darkest corners of the internet—from pro-anorexia forums to suicide boards to violent extremist (and mental-health-destroying) spaces. Boys to Leaders offers a better path: real community, mentorship, mental health resources, and positive role models. We aim to meet boys early, while they are still shaping their identities, and help them build lives grounded in empathy, purpose, and connection. In doing so, we prevent harm—not only to them, but to the people and communities they touch. My long-term goal is to expand access to compassionate, effective mental health systems—combining my experience in direct care with the power of technology to make services more proactive, personal, and available to everyone who needs them. I believe prevention is as essential as treatment, and that we must meet people where they are, long before they reach the breaking point. The Autumn Davis Memorial Scholarship would allow me to continue my education and grow Boys to Leaders into a sustainable, far-reaching resource. It would help me honor Autumn’s memory by continuing the work she cared about—creating a world where fewer people suffer in silence, where mental health care is as fundamental as physical care, and where hope is something everyone can reach.

For as long as I can remember, I wanted to be a doctor. I pictured myself in a white coat, stethoscope in hand, helping people heal. But my life took a different course. Trauma, disability, and instability were constants in my youth. My energy went into survival—navigating unsafe environments, coping with invisible wounds, and working around learning disabilities I didn’t fully understand. Dreams felt like a luxury I couldn’t afford. It took years to find my footing. Along the way, I worked in mental health care as a licensed psychiatric technician, supporting patients in crisis. Later, I transitioned into tech, learning the tools and systems that power modern information sharing. That’s when it clicked: I could merge healthcare and technology to create meaningful change. Today, I am a graduate student in Health Informatics, a field at the intersection of healthcare, data, and human experience. My focus is improving systems that often fail the people who need them most—especially those with invisible disabilities, mental health conditions, or chronic pain, my own particular triad. I’ve also devoted myself to service. I’ve volunteered in mental health crisis support, mentored teens, and contributed to suicide prevention and peer support projects. Most recently, I began developing a nonprofit to prevent the recruitment of young men into online hate groups—a public health issue with far-reaching consequences. My goal is to offer healthier sources of meaning, belonging, and purpose before extremist networks can exploit them. What drives me is not professional ambition but the commitment to reducing harm and improving lives. I know firsthand the damage caused when healthcare systems overlook the whole person—and the relief that comes from being seen and supported. My mission is to build tools and processes that help providers treat patients as complete human beings, not just a diagnosis code. I never became a doctor, but my work is no less vital. I’m building the systems and supports that doctors—and patients—need to thrive. My path is about connection, compassion, and efficiency, so that healthcare can fulfill its true purpose: helping people live healthier, more dignified lives. Christina’s story resonates deeply. She achieved so much and still had so much ahead of her. I understand the weight of deferred dreams, and I know the gratitude of creating new ones. Christina’s dedication to helping others lives on in the spirit of this scholarship, and I would be honored to carry that forward. This scholarship would allow me to continue my education and expand my work in healthcare innovation. More than that, it would serve as a reminder that while our paths may differ, the goal is the same: to use our skills, compassion, and persistence to make the world a better place.

What does recovery mean to me? When I was young, I wanted to be a doctor. But growing up in a house shaped by inquiry, addiction, abuse, and dysfunction—where love was conditional, boundaries nonexistent, and chaos normal—I learned early that survival was what I had. Dreams weren’t for someone like me. I’m a child of the 12 Steps and decades of therapy. This next part isn’t dramatic—it’s just a fact: I would literally be dead without it. It took me years to realize I was living in reaction—to other people’s pain, to trauma I couldn’t name, to coping mechanisms that became their own prison. Recovery began with the brutal clarity that I couldn’t have a life while living like that. I had to build fresh. Recovery isn’t just being clean and sober. It’s waking up every day and choosing presence over numbness, clarity over chaos. It’s learning to sit with pain without letting it run the show. It’s being able to focus, to care, to try—and to dream—again. I never became a doctor. But I’m in grad school now, studying Health Informatics. I want to help fix the broken systems that failed people like me—and the people I love. Recovery gave me a future. I’m not chasing old fantasies anymore. I’m building something new—healthier, wiser, grounded—and filled with dignity and joy.

Hello, I want to be honest without sounding like a victim or asking for pity, but I want you to know the facts that make this scholarship meaningful to me. I’ve lived much of my life feeling like I’m holding an umbrella in a hurricane—staying upright, but only just. PTSD, depression, anxiety, dissociation, and learning disabilities have been constant undercurrents, shaping everything from school and work to how I show up for the people I love. In recent years, I’ve also become physically disabled. I live with constant, intense chronic pain. I can walk only a few hundred feet or use a mobility scooter. My brother is gay and lives with severe OCD. We didn’t grow up together—I’m older; he was raised by our father, I was raised by our mother—but we’re close now. I support him emotionally, practically, and, when necessary, financially. I know what it means to show up for people, even when it’s hard. So many people have shown up for me; I have to be part of that circle too. “Survival” has been literal for me. I’ve had suicidal thoughts since I was nine. For years, they were a distraction, a weight, a warped lens through which I saw the world. With therapy and support groups, they’ve become background noise—persistent, but less paralyzing. I made a plan once, 18 years ago—and checked myself into a hospital. And again, 15 years later. Still, I can’t pretend the idea of escape doesn’t bring a strange calm when things get overwhelming. So what’s kept me here? A stubborn, internal light and feeling of hope—however small—I’ve carried all my life. But also: connections. My wife, toddler, brother, “good” family, friends, those who’ve helped me out of kindness, chosen family—and an inexplicable refusal to let the people who hurt me win. I’ve lost seven people to suicide. A cousin in constant pain. A roommate who overdosed and died alone. Another who murdered someone, then himself. A therapy group member who drove into traffic. My mother’s long-ago friend, whose death I only recently learned was suicide. A unique soul who had just started antidepressants before hanging himself. And someone I loved—funny, brilliant, and gay—who drank and took pills until he never woke up. Each one broke me in a different way. They’ve made me into a kind of kintsugi: the Japanese practice of repairing broken pottery with gold-infused lacquer—honoring damage without hiding it, making something new and meaningful. Despite all this—or because of it—I’m here. I’m pursuing a master’s in Health Informatics, working to make health and mental health systems better, more compassionate, accessible, and effective. They can’t. So I do. Though I’ve been unemployed for over a year, I’ve used this time to return to school and build something deeply meaningful: a nonprofit to prevent the recruitment of young men into online hate groups—guiding them toward healthier paths that offer what they’re really seeking: meaning, belonging, friendship, and answers. It’s early, but it’s the most important and promising work I’ve ever done. People like me don’t always make it. People like Elijah and my friends sometimes don’t get the chance. Sometimes it’s just luck that gets us the help we need—or doesn’t. Which is why I live in gratitude and keep fighting—to turn grief into something useful, hopefully beautiful. This scholarship would make life just that bit easier. It would honor my struggle and striving—and every person I’ve lost who didn’t get the chance to do the same. Thank you for reading. For honoring Elijah. And for understanding that survival is not just an individual act—it’s a collective one.

THE CHALLENGE: DID THEY DO THAT?? Let’s be honest—Love Island is at its crazy best when trust is papercut-thin and everyone’s spiraling into a hysterical black hole over a half-second glance at someone else. So here’s a challenge designed to turn even the most solid couples into viewer-gripping emotional wrecks: “Did They Do That?” THE OVERVIEW: The Islanders are brought to meet with Ariana one by one, and shown short, dramatic video clips of their partner doing something, shall we say, “sketchy”—kissing someone, making out, trash-talking, flirting way too hard. Some of these clips are real. Some aren’t. The fake ones are, well, *deepfakes,* probably taken at nighttime, so they can be grainy and shadowy, making the deepfakes indistinguishable from real footage. But no one knows which is which—not the audience, not even Ariana or Iain. 1. THE SETUP: Each Islander gets their own clip, customized for maximum emotional drama. These clips, whether real or fake, look completely legit. Real lighting, real angles, real faces. Just enough ambiguity to make everyone question what they’re seeing. 2. THE RULES: NO TALKING—JUST REACTIONS: Right after watching the clip, the Islanders aren’t allowed to talk to their partner. At all. They’re taken straight to the Beach Hut to record a raw, off-the-cuff reaction—whatever they’re feeling at that moment about what they saw and heard. Then—and here’s the truly twisted part—that reaction video gets played in front of the entire villa, including their partner. So even if the clip was fake, now everyone’s dealing with the fallout of what that person thought happened. This keeps everyone guessing, even the partner. The Islanders watching have no context for what they just saw, or for what the person saw, only how they felt about it. So whatever reaction they have (crying, screaming, cursing, freaking out, etc.), their partner and the entire villa can only imagine what happened. Probably, of course, the worst. This fuels paranoia, encourages gossip, and forces everyone to face emotional insecurity—but without any facts. 3. DECISION TIME: After watching their partner’s reaction (or non-reaction), each Islander has to make a public call: “I believe what they’re reacting to actually happened” or “I don’t believe it.” No sitting on the fence. Everyone has to take a position. Once the reveal happens, if an Islander had guessed wrong: - They lose immunity - Their partner gets a free date with a new bombshell - The villa votes on whether they overreacted or underreacted 4. THE REVEAL: The producers open a classy-looking folder—leather-bound or woven, or some similar classy look, and for the first time, everyone gets to know which clips were real—and which were fake. Cue complete chaos, crying, apologies, and a lot of awkward “I didn’t mean it like that” conversations. Big-D Drama, aka pure, undiluted Love Island fuel. 5. WHY THIS IS AN INCREDIBLY PERFECT LOVE ISLAND CHALLENGE: This challenge feeds on paranoia and perception—two things Love Island is already great at and the very stuff the show lives on. It’s what the viewers want to watch. It pushes Islanders to ask: “Do I trust what I saw, or what I feel?” Which is exactly the kind of mind-melting tension that makes the show so addictive. It’s dramatic, meme-worthy, and would 100% ruin at least three couples in one episode. So… a perfect episode.

Dear Debra S. Jackson Scholarship Board, Returning to school at 50 wasn’t part of the original plan. But then again, life rarely follows the script you start with, does it? Like Debra S. Jackson, I chose to return to higher education later in life—after years of personal challenges, career changes, caregiving, and the relentless pursuit of stability and purpose. Unfortunately, my early years were shaped by severe trauma, undiagnosed learning disabilities, and the challenges of growing up with a single parent suffering from mental illness. School was more battlefield than classroom. Despite this, I kept moving forward. I graduated high school with a 2.3 GPA—not for lack of potential or effort—but due to barriers beyond my control. I eventually completed my undergraduate degree at age 41, graduating from UNC Chapel Hill with a 3.3 GPA in Political Science and Entrepreneurship. Now, I’m earning my Master’s in Health Informatics at Wake Forest University with a 3.89 GPA, while raising a toddler, helping care for my brother who lives with mental illness, and building a nonprofit to help young men and teens avoid online radicalization. Over time, perseverance becomes its own kind of talent. These experiences didn’t just shape my values—they defined them. I believe in second chances. I believe in transformation through education and self-reflection. And I believe in using every hard-earned insight for the benefit of others, especially my young son. My capstone project, BoysToLeaders, is an initiative to support teen boys and young men vulnerable to online hate group recruitment. It blends data science, behavioral psychology, public health, supportive community, and custom algorithms to offer paths of empowerment, belonging, and personal growth. It’s deeply personal work, rooted in both my past and my desire to offer young people something better—something healthier and more empowering—than what I had or what those groups offer them. This scholarship would ease the financial strain of juggling school, caregiving, and part-time consulting. More importantly, it would help me finish my degree and launch a nonprofit that has the potential to change lives at the moment they need it most. Like Debra, I didn’t return to school just to change my own future—but to serve others with knowledge, compassion, and a spiritually grounded sense of purpose. This scholarship would be a meaningful step forward in that mission. Thank you for creating this opportunity—and for honoring the legacy of a woman who reminds us all that new chapters are always possible. I hope to contribute to the dream of doubling scholarship opportunities by one day creating a scholarship of my own to carry that torch forward for others like us.

Dear OMC Scholarship board, thank you for your consideration. How This Scholarship Will Help with My Goals I never imagined I’d be here—a 50-year-old graduate student at Wake Forest University, earning a 3.89 GPA in Health Informatics. But here I am, proving daily that it’s never too late to learn, grow, and make a real impact. This scholarship would help cover tuition, accelerating my mission to improve healthcare systems and serve as a role model for adult learners and patients alike. Day-to-Day in Grad School My days start at 7 a.m.—coffee, toddler wrangling, and daycare drop-off. I mentally review the week’s academic and consulting workload. Then it’s off to support a local chiropractic office, tackle academic projects, or take a needed rest. Afternoons vary: coursework, client tasks, errands, or more studying. My academic work includes tracking patient risk scores, improving data flows, building predictive models, taming databases, creating effective data visualizations, and learning much more. I’m also developing BoysToLeaders, my capstone and passion project, designed to divert teen boys and young men from online hate groups using public health tools, stories, question libraries, tech, inspirational personal story videos, and mentors, as well as unique algorithms for tracking success, recommending changes and enhancements, and personalizing participant paths. Evenings are for family—homework resumes after bedtime. Weekends are a mix of everything. Challenges and Triumphs Balancing grad school, parenting, and caregiving for my brother, who lives with severe mental illness, is no small feat. My own learning, physical disabilities, and PTSD can slow me down—but they’ve taught me how to plan, adapt, and persist. I use assistive tech, break work into chunks, rely on a strong care team, and stay ahead where I can. My 3.89 GPA reflects more than intellect—it shows grit, focus, and purpose. Why This Scholarship Matters Tuition, fees, caregiving, and childcare expenses can pile up quickly. This award would ease financial strain—especially as I build BoysToLeaders into a working nonprofit. Every dollar toward tuition means more focus on studies and less stress about bills or debt. Career and Social Impact My goal is to reduce clinician burnout, improve system efficiency, and raise patient outcomes—especially in under-resourced communities. I’m developing a consultancy model to help clinics that can’t afford full-time health informatics staff. This scholarship, paired with my training and experience, strengthens my reach and credibility with those who need this work the most. Beyond My Work I choose to carry the added responsibility of being open about my disabilities and challenges. As a disabled adult grad student, I hope to show late bloomers, caregivers, and others facing obstacles that higher education is still possible. Every milestone isn’t just mine—it’s a signal that their goals are still within reach. Thank You Thank you for considering my application. I hope to turn this opportunity into real-world impact—and someday, fund a graduate scholarship for students facing challenges like mine. We need more of them.

From Misfortune to Fortunate Opportunities to Make a Difference In graduate school, I am pursuing a Master's in Health Informatics, focusing on health data analysis. My goal is to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of health technology and research, making personalized, data-driven medicine universally accessible—irrespective of financial, social, or cultural barriers. Health insurance has changed drastically since I was a child, and with it, so has accessibility. Monthly rates (\$1,700+) and out-of-pocket maximums (\$18,500!) are amounts fewer and fewer people can afford. By increasing efficiency and accuracy in healthcare diagnosis and treatment, I hope we can drive those numbers down and make care available across the financial spectrum. My journey has been shaped by overcoming significant challenges. As a younger student, I struggled due to learning disabilities and mental health issues I was unaware of, and persistent abuse, leading to severe PTSD. These obstacles made school nearly impossible. In high school, I maintained only a 2.35 GPA due to these challenges, though I achieved a 28 on the ACT, showcasing my potential. Thankfully, the University of California saw my potential via those scores, admitted me based on my ACT scores and essay alone. Through perseverance, therapy, and other strategies, I have learned to navigate my disabilities—chronic pain, learning disabilities and PTSD anxiety, depression, hypervigilance, and flashbacks. Accommodations and determination enabled me to thrive academically. Today, I maintain a 3.89 GPA in graduate school, demonstrating my commitment and abilities. My lived experiences fuel my passion for Health Informatics. I understand firsthand the barriers created by disabilities, but I also know what it takes to work with them. Initially, I dreamed of becoming a pediatrician, but my challenges made that goal unattainable at the time. Instead, I became a licensed Psychiatric Technician in my mid-to-late 20s, providing care to patients with mental health needs. Years later, I returned to academia, graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a bachelor's degree in Political Science and Entrepreneurship. Despite the odds—only 2-3% of students who drop out return to complete their degrees—I succeeded, earning a 3.3 GPA (EducationData, 2024). During this time, I launched a business in web development and design, which evolved into a career in the tech industry. However, my experiences in tech revealed systemic challenges. Many employers failed to accommodate learning disabilities or ignored ADA requirements completely. Additionally, I realized that my work in tech lacked the meaningful impact I sought. Observing the industry's trajectory and my own aspirations, I decided to redirect my career toward healthcare—a field where I could merge my skills and passion for making a difference. Now, I am combining my love for healthcare with my expertise in technology. Health Informatics represents the intersection of these passions, offering opportunities to address the inefficiencies in the U.S. healthcare system. Our country spends 2-4 times more per capita on healthcare than others, often with worse outcomes, such as ranking 39th (OECD, 2022) in infant mortality. Predictive modeling, for example, is a true game-changer, as is personalized medicine. We are becoming able to link health issues together that never made sense before and can plan to give the best possible care much earlier, leading to better outcomes. Personalized care allows us to determine the best possible treatment for an individual based on their own histories and insights gleaned from massive datasets—something doctors 20 years ago could only dream of. The incredible changes in technology and information analysis are making the massive troves of health data alone (estimated at over 1 petabyte—1,099,511,627,776 kb: 1+ trillion kb per day and growing) usable and understandable. This enables the medical and scientific fields to take medical diagnosis and treatment to truly 21st-century levels. As a former worker in tech, I have been unemployed for well over a year now, and I know many other coworkers who are in a similar situation. That’s one of the reasons I decided to go back to school now—because I knew it was going to take time in this economy and because of the massive technical shifts already here and arriving more and more every day. Inspired by some of my studies and internships, I’m developing a nonprofit to prevent the recruitment of young men into online hate groups, using data, design, and public health tools to intervene early and provide better paths forward. This work is personal, purposeful, and powered by everything I’ve fought through. This is one of my dream projects that I'm working on, and I will continue that while I pursue my career in Health Informatics. In the mid-to-long term, I aspire to establish a consulting group providing health data and informatics services to clinicians and organizations that cannot afford full-time specialists. We would offer data management, analytics, and support for Electronic Health Records and systems. Additionally, I dream of creating a scholarship for individuals with invisible disabilities like myself, offering resources that could profoundly change lives. Currently, there are few scholarships dedicated to students with invisible disabilities and even fewer available for graduate-level study. Similarly, resources for male survivors of abuse are almost nonexistent. While the scholarships available for women are crucial, men also need access to support for recovery and rebuilding—support that includes funding for education, therapy, and disability coaching. That is why, if I were to receive the Pastor Thomas Rorie Jr. Furthering Education scholarship, it would help alleviate the financial strain of balancing graduate studies, part-time work, and parenting my toddler, Toby. This support would allow me to focus more fully on my studies, internships, and future career in Health Informatics—without having to spend a great deal of that focus on getting rent paid, daycare, and meals on the table. Thank you very much for your time and consideration. I know you read and get many of these applications, and I hope you understand how grateful applicants like me are for these opportunities being available—and personally, to share my story and aspirations. While I may not receive this scholarship, as there are many other deserving applicants, I thank you who is reading this, and the scholarship trustees, for the possibility of being considered. ============ Sources Hanson, Melanie. “College Dropout Rates,” August 16, 2024, [https://educationdata.org/college-dropout-rates#:\~:text=College%20Dropout%20Re%2DEnrollment%20Rates,than%20other%20types%20of%20institutions](https://educationdata.org/college-dropout-rates#:~:text=College%20Dropout%20Re%2DEnrollment%20Rates,than%20other%20types%20of%20institutions) OECD, Data Explorer, 2022 [https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=HEALTH\_PROC](https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=HEALTH_PROC)

My favorite will always be the cartoon from the late 60s and early 70s. It is always brought me joy and the feeling that justice is possible despite all of the crazy characters in the world, despite terrible bosses, and despite the feeling of being – originally – helpless, weak, and completely unempowered. The theme song has echoed in my head all these many years and brought me great joy The theme song has echoed in my head all these many years and brought me great joy. And while this may sound silly, it gives me courage. It felt like each victory first Spider-Man against injustice, and evil was a victory for me, and for the world, and something that could inspire me to believe that the world could be fair and balanced with the right actions. Peters mask with something I have a dental fight with greatly hiding behind an external view that the world saw me hours, while inside, being an awkward and sometimes clueless teenager. I had a crush on Mary Jane, and then each episode she was in urged Peter to just make that move to do something, as if his agency could somehow affect mine. This shows writing and humor on multiple levels made me enjoy it all the more over the years as I got older, and understood jokes, but I never even saw when I was younger and contexts that made no sense to me at the time. I love, have loved, and always will love the original animated series. The movies are great. The actors have all done a fine job, though my favorite will always be Tobey Maguire. but I think the highest movie award has to go out to Willem Dafoe as the Green Goblin. "Don't tell Harry."

My song: THE GRUDGE. While this song is clearly about a romantic relationship, to me it rings true to me about the extreme childhood abuse I suffered from my mother until I left home, even a few years after until I was able to further separate from her, and the reflections of it I lived in my life that plagued me for many years. My waking life was a nightmare, no break from the nightmares I had while sleeping. I was exhausted. I woke up and cried in the shower every morning before I could start my day. I cried at lunch. I wanted to cry forever. My trust was betrayed, everything was taken from me, I felt crushed between my mother’s finger – who to this day has no idea that anything she did was wrong despite constant emotional, sexual, and physical abuse. She believes she was a “great mother” and that I am making this all up because I was angry at my father and have fantasies about her, or that somehow my therapists made me believe all this. Insane, right? For so long, I held on to every detail as if my life depended on it, the truth of who I am, the truth of why I was the way I was, and what I needed to do to heal. I was terrified to let go of any of it as it was the only identity that I had. I was enraged with her for what seemed like forever, it consumed me, an “undying grudge,” and not surprisingly, I hear her voice still, every time I think I’m not enough. I have learned to hide it, to “be tough,” but I was screaming inside, trapped in wondering how anybody could do the things she did so easily. I couldn’t let it go, I tried for so long, but have mostly been able to with years of therapy and treatment and psych meds. I have spent thousands of hours arguing with her in my head, screaming at her, fantasizing different outcomes in which I win, dreaming about a time when she’s “a little fuckin’ sorry,” which will never come, of course. I tried for so long to understand why she would do all this to me, and it’s true, she is a narcissist, insecure and unhappy, abused herself, and has no idea why; she is a livid victim to everything. Of course, people hurt people, and more than ever, we realize that child abuse, sadly, is and has been widespread. But those of us on the path of healing and breaking the cycle are changing the world, each one of us at a time, and with each child we raise with dignity and respect and kindness I couldn’t draw blood from her as a child, though I wished with all my heart that I could … but once I was an adult and not scared of her, you better believe I did. But the childhood cuts, the scars left, each a memory, the psychic damage — the power was never equal. Which is what abuse is all about. Power. Control. Insecurity. Retraumatizing ourselves and everyone around us.