Mental illness runs through my entire family without fail. Since my parents divorced in 2017, I have lived exclusively with my father who suffers from severe mental health struggles. Like him, I have lived with this truth and the full knowledge of its impacts on my prospects. When I was four years old I was diagnosed with ADHD, and two years later with the death of my grandfather, Bipolar. From a very young age, it was made abundantly clear what this meant - I needed to hold myself to a higher standard to reach the same point as my peers. From my first few years in school, I was an outcast, unable to make friends and unable to adequately articulate my feelings and thoughts. I had to try harder, the skills that came naturally to my peers would be a lifelong uphill battle for me. I would stare at an assignment with a pencil in hand for hours constantly distracted, unable to make any progress. At home, I severely struggled with my emotions and would be hospitalized for various reasons over a dozen times through the years. Any voice I had was quickly stripped away from me as my parents, doctors, social workers, and other professionals decided what to do with me.  Gradually, this taught me a fundamental lesson, I needed to advocate and make my needs clear to those around me. Advocacy was not a choice, it was my only way to survive. Since 2020 I have served on the New Jersey Department of Children and Families (DCF) Youth Council. Joining at the age of 14, and always being the youngest member, I have advocated for change in the child welfare and behavioral health systems on a systemic level. Every day I push for a changed and improved system. My greatest personal achievement has been the Sibling Bill of Rights. Realizing that siblings in New Jersey were being separated in foster care, we conceived, drafted, lobbied for, and passed a law unequivocally giving Siblings the right to stay connected. Having a sister myself, and having a connection that was severely strained by my involvement in the system, it hit close to home. I worked for two and a half years on every aspect of the bill. I was recently asked to work on a long-term project to fundamentally change group home settings from top to bottom. Now I am a consultant on the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s (AECF) partnership with DCF striving to "End the Need for Group Placement". It's this work that has become a lifelong goal of mine—to change how we treat our most vulnerable for the better. I count myself as one of the "lucky ones"- I never went to jail, never fell into drug abuse, and was never homeless. Sadly I'm an outlier in that regard. With the assistance of this scholarship, I can continue on my trajectory. Without significant scholarships, I simply won't be able to afford college. This past year I was accepted into Rutgers for my desired major- Public Administration, but had to take a gap year due to not being able to take out enough loans to pay for it. Financial need is currently the number one obstacle inhibiting me from seriously pursuing a degree. Scholarships are my only hope for higher education.

Legacy is a word that has conflicting meanings for me. Growing up diagnosed with mental illness and medicated from a very early age there wasn't much thought put into what I would become. Being placed into dozens of institutions added up to years of my life, given every possible combination of psychotropic medications and offered every possible diagnosis, that was not a thought my parents could afford. Mental illness runs deep in my family, it's not a taboo topic but rather a fact of our lives. As I grew up my opportunities in life looked grim, staying out of prison and simply staying in elementary school seemed a tall order. Through it all, my folks tried their best. I was afforded as many mental health services as my state had to offer, for better and for worse. By 10 years old I had spent nearly a year in different institutions. I was just as comfortable waiting for weeks on an emergency room couch for a psychiatric bed to open up as I was sleeping on my own. Hospitals became a second "home" to me. At this point, my family gave up. The system placed me into a group home with other foster kids and I was on my own to advocate for myself. Legacy wasn't in my vocabulary. Here I saw kids get “restrained” indiscriminately for the most punitive reasons. It was abuse, plain and simple. Most of these kids had nobody to advocate for them, and so we did our best to do so for each other. That experience changed my view of the world, the fact that this was allowed was not okay. For years, every night I would fall asleep with an MP3 player and a book, pondering existence and what the world has in store for me. It was up to me, myself, and I to voice what I needed, and the abuse I saw. So, I spoke up—and I was punished for it. If one thing was clear, the system was built to break kids down, not build them up. My advocacy didn't go completely unnoticed, however. My social worker saw my struggle and recommended I apply to my state's Youth Council. I jumped at the opportunity to make any change—and for once I wasn't let down. I told the leaders of that same system I was once subject to, how they needed to change—to their faces. And they listened. I authored, lobbied for, and passed a law protecting sibling rights for kids in foster care, now preventing sibling separation in New Jersey. I started a peer-to-peer mentoring program that now affords youth someone who advocates for them, not the system. I was asked to consult and tell others why this cycle needed to change—how the structures built to help were harming youth and families. Suddenly, legacy is back in my vocabulary; I am being encouraged to pursue college seriously and to take my activism to the next level. For me, breaking the cycle of mental illness and institutionalization is getting my degree and leading the charge as an activist to change the system. If my legacy is anything short of kids being treated with dignity, and respect, as equals in our system, I will have failed. Legacy for me is that constant battle for change. The universe wants to stay at rest but sometimes it takes one person willing to push the ball to make the change we need.

My mom came to check me out of the hospital- at this point, it felt routine. A relief nonetheless but at least I knew I’d be going back home. I was successful! I had completed my month, I was going home. Then the bombshell, “You’re not going home”- what..? At ten years old it didn’t make sense so I just went along with it. The first stop was to register me at a new school, and next was what would become my new home for the next year. They checked me in, my belongings having been stuffed into a trash bag, and I took a seat in a meeting with a half dozen strangers- this wasn’t new. The meetings, the hospitalizations, this had been my reality for the past 5 years. They asked me a few questions, and I was quickly ushered upstairs by a staff member. I asked when I could see my mommy again and told I wasn’t allowed to… “But they told me I could!”. The staff quickly snapped back and called me a liar and as that meeting ended, my parents left the “home” without saying goodbye. They sobbing, me in tears, a staff member holding me back, and my new home, a rotating roster of 5 parents and 12 new siblings—called a “group home”. That same night I watched a kid get slammed to the floor in a “routine” restraint. I was supposed to get better here? Success here meant leaving without going to jail. That quickly became a fact of daily life, kids would get “restrained” if they were uncooperative in any manner. It was abuse, plain and simple. Most of these kids had nobody to advocate for them, and so we did our best to do so for each other. That experience changed my view of the world, how can people be so callous? I carried this “fight” with me everywhere I went, trying to advocate for others and do right. I didn’t want to be an advocate, I had to be. Success would not come easy, I had to fight for it. Eventually after years of this existence, my social worker saw that “fight” in me and pushed me to apply for my state's Department of Children and Families (DCF) Youth Council. Here I harnessed my energy to make wide-scale systemic change for thousands. I was instrumental in passing our state's Sibling Bill of Rights, which now prevents sibling separation in foster care. Channeling my experiences of having a severely strained relationship with my sisters while in the system was key in writing, lobbying for, and passing that law. I now serve as a Consultant for both the Department and the Annie E. Casey Foundation. My work there has been very meaningful to me personally, as I work to deconstruct the abusive systems which surround residential group homes. In addition to this, I was asked to serve on the National Governors Association as a Youth Advisor for mental health and was able to speak at the NJ Suicide Prevention Conference. Still, I don't feel successful. I look back at where I was, and every day I know that there is a little Jack going through the exact same things I went through. My success can only come when every kid feels as though they have a family and belonging, where their success is more than "not going to jail". These advocacy opportunities have already given me the chance to touch the lives of thousands, but I have to go a step further with college. I've now had the chance to work in the field my degree would help me in—public policy. The more I get involved and the more I do, the more I am convinced this is what I'm meant for. Last year I was accepted to my first pick school at Rutgers but had to take a gap year to try and pay for it. With the help of this scholarship, I can continue my work on an even wider-reaching scale.

My mom came to check me out of the hospital- at this point, it felt routine. A relief nonetheless but at least I knew I’d be going back home. Then the bombshell, “You’re not going home”- what..? At ten years old it didn’t make sense so I just went along with it. The first stop was the school to register me at a new school (unbeknownst to me), and next was what would become my new home for the next year. They checked me in, my belongings having been stuffed into a trash bag, and I took a seat in a meeting with a half dozen strangers- this wasn’t new. The meetings, and the hospitalizations, had been my reality for the past 5 years. They asked me a few questions, and I was quickly ushered upstairs by a staff member. I asked when I could see my mommy again and told I wasn’t allowed to… “But they told me I could!”. The staff quickly snapped back and called me a liar and as that meeting ended, my parents left that house without saying goodbye. They sobbing, me in tears, a staff member holding me back, and my new home, a rotating roster of 5 parents and 12 new siblings—called a “group home”. That same night I watched a kid get slammed to the floor in a “routine” restraint. I was supposed to get better here? This quickly became a fact of daily life, kids would get “restrained” if they were uncooperative in any manner. It was abuse, plain and simple. Most of these kids had nobody to advocate for them, and so we did our best to do so for each other. That experience changed my view of the world, how can people be so callous? As I bounced back and forth from hospital to group home my determination that something had to change became more ingrained. I carried this “fight” with me everywhere I went, trying to advocate for others and do right. Eventually, my social workers saw this in me and pushed me to apply for my state's Department of Children and Families (DCF) Youth Council. Here I harnessed my energy to make wide-scale systemic change for thousands. I was instrumental in passing our state's Sibling Bill of Rights, which now prevents sibling separation in foster care. Channeling my experiences of having a severely strained relationship with my sisters while in the system was key in writing, lobbying for, and passing that law. I now serve as a Consultant for both the Department and the Annie E. Casey Foundation (AECF). My work there has been very meaningful to me personally, as I work to deconstruct the abusive systems which surround residential group homes. In addition to this work, I was asked to serve on the National Governors Association as a Youth Advisor for mental health and was able to speak at the NJ Suicide Prevention Conference. These advocacy opportunities have already given me the chance to touch the lives of thousands, but I can go a step further with college. I've now had the chance to work in the field my degree would help me in—public policy. The more I get involved and the more I do, the more I am convinced this is what I'm meant to do. Last year I was accepted to my first pick school at Rutgers but had to take a gap year to try and pay for it. With the help of this scholarship, I can continue my work on an even wider-reaching scale.

I'm only nineteen, but again and again, I've been told that I'm an "old soul". I don't think I'm particularly wiser than my peers, but I've had more adverse experiences than most and had the time to reflect on what it all means. I grew up being shopped around to dozens of institutional settings, culminating with me spending years of my life in some pretty dreadful places. There's a lot to change- as an advocate who has an audience with system leaders it is INCREDIBLY daunting, and every day I try to come up with solutions. Coming out of the troubled teen industry, many want to move on and forget what they went through- my way of dealing with this trauma is different, I want to change and rebuild a broken system. I want to build a system that truly supports vulnerable youth who, often, are going through the worst times of their lives. I want to build a setting where youth feel as though they are treated as people, where staff is paid a livable wage, and where there is a sense of improvement when youth exit this "system". Building systems that support youth is an investment in the future of our nation, it's not a simple altruistic mission. Communities improve when they have the support they need. I've started this work in my own life, where from my personal lived experiences in these systems I consult for them now and am actively working to "end the need for group placement". Taking it a step further is taking my education to the next level, and pursuing an undergraduate degree in policy. My dedication to this work has been and continues to be unwavering, whether it's the passing of an actual law to protect sibling rights in foster care or speaking out at conferences and presenting on youth mental health. I'm on my own to pay for college- I don't have family to help take out loans and I don't qualify for most financial aid. Scholarships like this one are my only option, and without that, I'm back to square one; Last year I had to take a gap year after being accepted to my first-choice college for this exact reason. Others can go from cause to cause, finding a new issue to work on every few years- but I'm married to this work. Changing, transforming, and rebuilding the system I went through is my life's goal. I will prevent other kids from experiencing anything remotely similar to what I went through, and college is the next step toward that goal.

When I was four I was diagnosed with ADHD, and when I was six I was diagnosed with Bipolar. Mental health has been a lifelong struggle for me; As I grew up, and I struggled with my emotions, if I did not articulate my needs and feelings adequately decisions were quickly made for me. I was placed into one institutional setting after another, adding up to years of my life. My advocacy journey started by sheer necessity, not choice. I slowly but surely learned the skills I needed to survive. Group home settings are ripe for abuse, and I needed to learn how to tell the right people what was wrong. I saw true injustice happen to me and the kids I grew up with, with nobody else willing to speak up and say what was wrong. Eventually, one of the people in my life saw this "fight" in me and pushed me to apply for my state's Department of Children and Families (DCF) Youth Council. Here I harnessed this energy to make wide-scale systemic change for thousands. I was instrumental in the passing of our state's Sibling Bill of Rights, which guaranteed many rights to siblings and now maintains the relationships of the many thousands of foster kids who go through the system. My experiences having a severely strained relationship with my sisters through my involvement in the system was key in writing, lobbying for, and passing that law. Thanks to the many other achievements during my time on that youth council, I was asked to help build a Consultant program for DCF. I now serve as a Consultant for both the Department and the Annie E. Casey Foundation (AECF). My work with the AECF has been very meaningful to me personally, as I work to deconstruct the abusive systems which surround our residential group homes. In addition to this work, I was asked to serve on the National Governor's Association Youth Mental Health Policy Academy as a Youth Advisor and to serve on their Youth Advisory Council. This work has led me to advocate for Youth Mental Health with the New Jersey governor's office and leadership from all of our state departments. Recently with this work, I was able to speak at the NJ Suicide Prevention Conference where I spoke about the services and lack thereof where there are systemic gaps. These advocacy opportunities have already given me the chance to touch the lives of thousands, but I can go a step further with college. I've now had the opportunity to work in the field my degree would help me in- public policy. The more I get involved and the more I do, the more I am convinced this is what I'm meant to do. Last year I was accepted to my first pick school at Rutgers but had to take a gap year to try and pay for it. With the help of this scholarship, I can continue my work on an even wider-reaching scale.

When I was four I was diagnosed with ADHD, and when I was six I was diagnosed with Bipolar. Mental health has been a lifelong struggle for me; Every day it's a constant battle to stay the path to complete the same menial tasks that my peers have seemingly no issue with. This reality is very hard to explain to others, and to get them to understand why my life doesn't look like theirs. As I grew up, and I struggled with my emotions, if I did not articulate my needs and feelings adequately decisions were quickly made for me. I was placed into one institutional setting after another, adding up to years of my life. My advocacy journey started by sheer necessity, not choice. I slowly but surely learned the skills I needed to survive. Group home settings are ripe for abuse, and I needed to learn how to tell the right people what was wrong. I saw true injustice happen to me and kids as young as five, nobody else willing to speak up and say what was wrong. Eventually, one of the people in my life saw this "fight" in me and pushed me to apply for my state's Department of Children and Families (DCF) Youth Council. Here I harnessed this energy to make wide scale systemic change for thousands. I was instrumental in the passing of our state's Sibling Bill of Rights, which guaranteed many rights to siblings which now maintains the relationships of the many thousands of foster kids who go through the system. My experiences having a severely strained relationship with my sisters through my involvement in the system was key in writing, lobbying for, and passing that law. Thanks to the many other achievements during my time on that youth council, I was asked to help build a Consultant program for DCF. I now serve as a Consultant for both the Department and the Annie E. Casey Foundation (AECF). My work with the AECF has been very meaningful to me personally, as I work to deconstruct the abusive systems which surround our residential group homes. In addition to this work, I was asked to serve on the National Governor's Association Youth Mental Health Policy Academy as a Youth Advisor and to serve on their Youth Advisory Council. This work has led me to advocate for Youth Mental Health with the New Jersey governor's office and leadership from all of our state departments. Recently with this work I was able to speak at the NJ Suicide Prevention Conference where I spoke about the services and lack thereof where there are systemic gaps. These advocacy opportunities have already given me the chance to touch the lives of thousands, but I can go a step further with college. Last year I was accepted to my first pick school at Rutgers but had to take a gap year to try and pay for it. With the help of this scholarship I can continue my work on an even wider reaching scale.

I have committed my entire life to mental health and disability rights advocacy. Whether that be harnessing my lived experiences in group homes or doing public speaking events on suicide prevention, it's not an option for me to advocate for others. Being diagnosed at four years old with ADHD, and undergoing a lifetime of medication to try and treat it, I understand the ramifications and seriousness of this disorder with more depth than most. From 2020 to 2023 I served on the NJ Department of Children and Families (DCF) Youth Council wrote and passed the New Jersey Sibling's Bill of Rights, which guarantees rights to siblings so that they would not be separated while in Foster Care. At the same time, I advocated for our state's children's system of care to come to the table and listen to the concerns of youth advocates, eventually leading to a series of systemic recommendations my subcommittee proposed. I recently spoke at the New Jersey Suicide Prevention Conference, talking about my experiences and talking about where services are lacking for youth and families with mental health struggles. I was asked to be a member of the National Governor's Association Youth Advisory Council on Youth Mental Health, where I've had the opportunity to voice my concerns and bring the realities of our system to the Governor's office and for change to be made. I currently serve as a consultant for both my state's DCF and the Annie E. Casey Foundation working to overhaul our residential group placement system. My work has already impacted thousands, but I want to take this a step further and pursue a full-time education for Public Policy/Public Administration. With a degree I will have the qualification to lead the charge and make even more change to these systems. My lived experience in residential group homes has lead me to dedicate my life to the advocacy and systemic reform of the system I was once a cog in.

Mental illness runs through my entire family without fail. Since my parents divorced in 2017, I have lived exclusively with my father who suffers from severe mental health issues. Like him, I have lived with this truth and the full knowledge of its impacts on my prospects. When I was four years old I was diagnosed with ADHD, and two years later with the death of my grandfather, Bipolar. From a very young age, it was made abundantly clear what this meant - I needed to hold myself to a higher standard to reach the same point as my peers. From my first few years in school, I was an outcast, unable to make friends and unable to adequately articulate my feelings and thoughts. I had to try harder, the skills that came naturally to my peers would be a lifelong uphill battle for me. I would stare at an assignment with a pencil in hand for hours constantly distracted, unable to make any progress. At home, I severely struggled with my emotions and would be hospitalized for various reasons over a dozen times through the years. Any voice I had was quickly stripped away from me as my parents, doctors, social workers, and other professionals decided what to do with me. Gradually, this taught me a fundamental lesson, I needed to advocate and make my needs clear to those around me. Advocacy was not a choice, it was seemingly my only way to survive. I knew what was best for me, and if I didn’t say that to the dozen adults around the table I would be subjected to something that I knew was even more negative. Since 2020 I have served on the New Jersey Department of Children and Families (DCF) Youth Council. Joining at the age of 14, and always being the youngest member, I have advocated for change in the child welfare and behavioral health systems on a systemic level. Every day I push for a changed and improved system. My greatest personal achievement has been the Sibling Bill of Rights. Realizing that siblings in New Jersey were being separated in foster care, we conceived, drafted, lobbied for, and passed a law unequivocally giving Siblings the right to stay connected. Having a sister myself, and having a connection that was severely strained by my involvement in the system, it hit close to home. I worked for two and a half years on every aspect of the bill. I was recently asked to work on a long-term project to fundamentally change congregate care settings from top to bottom. Now I am a consultant on the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s (AECF) partnership with the DCF as well as with the top three providers in our state for congregate care, to strive to "End the Need for Group Placement". It's this work that has become a lifelong goal of mine- to change how we treat our most vulnerable for the better. I count myself as one of the "lucky ones"- I never went to jail, never fell into drug abuse, and was never homeless. Sadly I'm an outlier in that regard. My experiences in the system and with mental health are extensive, and they push me to do better and make the change that was needed when I was in the system. Instead of letting my losses, traumas, and struggles drag me down, I let them fuel my drive to advocate, to make a change. I will continue to advocate so that no kid has to go through the same experiences I went through.