My Metamorphosis Have you ever felt like you cannot be yourself somewhere? As a bird without mom in a desert. My first day of High School felt like that. I felt in another universe, in which no matter what I did, everyone around me would notice it and make a negative comment about it. I felt like everyone was always watching me. It took some time for me to realize that the most important thing about being a teenager was for me to learn to be myself completely and love myself. I came to the United States without knowing about the system here. I was like a bird unable to fly. I started High School and the first months were miserable. Everything I did, even blink, my classmates would notice and say something negative about it. I started being quiet with no desire to participate in class. At home, my face was an ocean during the storm, I didn’t even want to go to school. People would not even call me by my name because it was “too hard to say”. I have a second name, NICOLE, NICOLE, NICOLE “What’s your name again?” “JERMAYOLIS” “umm Nicole is easier, can I call you by Nicole?” “Sure.” I didn't care that people called me Nicole, it was like a new part of me. I liked it but it was weird for me because all my friends and family called me Jermayolis my whole life. It was another part of my identity I had to let go of but I was so worried about fitting in, I let it happen. I started to wonder, is that who I really am? A shy and quiet girl who did not like to participate in class; who cares about people’s opinion and who is not funny at all? I was literally hiding my real self. I'm not NICOLE! Not that bored and weak girl. I’m JERMAYOLIS; the girl who brightens people’s day because of her silliness, who does not care about people’s opinion, and who feels free to be herself no matter what people think. After this, I flourished and I started to feel like myself again. Why should we care about others' opinions? We just need to be our real self with no excuses. I started reminding myself, a mi que me importa lo que diga la gente, yo no como con eso. This experience really marked me in my life. Some people would take it as a bad experience, but it is not. I took it as a life lesson. I am only 16 years old, the youngest in my current 12th grade, but I already learned one of life’s most valuable lessons: you teach people how to treat you. I will never make myself smaller for other people. I am Jermayolis and I have so much more to do.

From the time I was a little girl in Santiago, Dominican Republic, I have always dreamt of going to college. When I was a little girl I thought I would like to be a doctor but then as I started growing I realized that that's not something that I would really enjoy doing. While I was growing I enjoyed watching true crimes documental. I start realizing that I find very interesting understanding people’s way of thinking and how do their past/background can affect their actions. Forensic psychology is the career that connects psychology with the legal and criminal justice system. This career fit perfectly on my interests because is about understanding people 's minds functionalism; why they behave the way they do  and how their mental health can influence their actions and is mostly in crimes or other legal situations. I can say that I really love learning. I appreciate all of my classes but especially History and I love science and learning about how the brain works. I’m also very invested in my Peer Leadership course and learning how to reflect on who I am and what kind of leader I can be. Being profesional is very important to me because one of my life goals is to be educated and financially independent with a career that I love. Through my school year in Claremont International High School I have learned a lot of peer skills and also I have learned how to be more social in mixed cultural backgrounds and I expect to keep exploring communities and cultures. I also want to keep exploring the idea of participating in events that involve speaking. I deserve this scholarship because even though I had always have big dreams, I have also been working really hard to achieve those goals; involving myself on leaderships activities, being resilient even though I feel like I can’t keep going and being open to new changes in life. I would always feel proud of myself because I’m just 16 years old and I’m going to college this year, when I was in third grade at my country, I demonstrated exceeding engagements in all my classes and that take me to take a test which I passed and It allowed me to skip third grade and go to fourth grade. I also studied English In my country for some months. I was scared that when I first came here, I would be a grade lower, but thanks to the English classes that I took and my scores from my past school, I stayed in the same grade (9 grade with 12 years old). Wining this scholarship will take me a step forward on my dream of becoming a forensic Psychologist and that independent girl that I always wanted to be.