One night, when I was six years old, I laid on my mom and sobbed harder than I could remember sobbing in my life. Money was tight, and we were dependant on the food bank and my church's pantry to make it meal to meal. We were showering at the local gym and cleaning our clothes at a friend's house. We were trying to make it paycheck to paycheck but were struggling. We couldn't even go to the thrift shop. Finally, we were in danger of losing our house. My mom cried and assured me that everything would be okay but I could see that she was scared and did not truly know if we would be okay herself. My father picked up a third job and my mom took up a job instead of being a stay-at-home mom. We continued to struggle for a few more years but my grandparents began to loan my parent's money. Soon, we finally got out of the hole we were in. Despite being out of the hole and no longer struggling, I never forgot how it felt to be struggling and the way people treated me for not having a lot. Because of this, I have made it a focus in my life to help people. I have completed over 60 hours of community service at my local food bank and I intend to go back once the pandemic is over. I liked going to the food bank because they told us how many meals we helped provide for people and every time we went, it was over 1,000 meals provided. It made me feel good to not only help people but to help people whose struggles I understood well. I donated toys at Christmas to my local children's hospital and got a letter of thanks. I have signed over 500 petitions online for a wide variety of subjects such as environmental issues and social justice issues. I created many care packages for veterans across the world for many years with my church. I have spent weekend mornings with the elderly in nursing homes and played bingo with them or just simply gave them company. With each of these acts, I believe I made my community a better place and brought joy to people who needed it. I know from personal experience just how much I helped people with my hours at the food bank and I am glad that I could provide for people who are struggling like I once struggled. Some of the petitions I signed ended up bringing about much-needed change that I am proud of and made the world a better place for everybody. For example, I signed a petition for the city of LA to put more money into communities of color instead of their police force. The mayor of LA announced that they had removed money from the police to put into communities of color a few weeks after! In my future, I hope to go into the field of oceanography and fight climate change. I want to write papers and inform the public about why the ocean and the planet have to be saved as well as convince people to do their part for the environment. I also hope to petition and get laws changed to protect marine animals. For example, marine biologists realized that ships were hitting animals in the docks of Fort Lauderdale and got a law passed that saved marine animals and significantly decreased ship strikes. I loved getting to help my community and I hope that I can continue helping out.

In second grade, my teacher threw my class a party, complete with a movie and popsicles. She had told us up to a week before about the party and I was so excited because we rarely did anything fun in class. When the party happened, she put in the movie and asked me what my favorite popsicle flavor was. I told her cherry and she smiled and gave me a large cherry popsicle. A few minutes later, another teacher called. I had a learning disability and therefore was in the IEP program. My IEP evaluation meeting was that afternoon and had been planned for at least a month ahead. I had to leave the party to complete a test for my evaluation. I asked the teacher if it could wait until after the party but the teacher smiled and told me of course not. I asked her if I could at least take my popsicle and the teacher smiled and again said of course not. At this point, the other kids were watching us and I was already in tears so I threw away my popsicle and went to complete my test. Once I was there, I rushed through the worksheets and handed them back only for the teacher to laugh at me and tell me that she gave me the wrong test and that I had to not only redo the test I had done but was required to stay the rest of the day with her. The test turned out horrendous and I was stuck in the IEP program for two more years. I learned later that the teachers had coordinated the whole thing to keep me in the program so that the school could get its bonus from having me in the IEP program. Situations like this were not a rarity. I constantly had teachers telling me that they did not have time to teach me or simply gave up on teaching me. I lost count of the number of ploys created to keep me in the program for other people's benefits or simply because they did not want to handle the paperwork of letting me go. Finally, I got fed up with it and I worked hard with my mama and a select few teachers of mine who believed in me to get me caught up and ahead of where I was supposed to be. I stayed after school for tutoring twice a week and did workbooks with my mom at home. I attended a Saturday academy for most of the school year and I constantly studied. I did my testing for my IEP again and got a perfect score. My case manager agreed that I should be let go but did not want to deal with the paperwork, so I had to keep my IEP for an extra year while I transferred schools. At my new school, my mom insisted that I be removed from and program and I finally was, at the end of my freshman year in high school. Because of this experience, I learned the value of hard work and patience but also how other people's decisions can affect others and how far some people would go to benefit themselves. I learned to be kind to people, to have patience for others, but to not let myself be stepped on and used. I learned how to teach and motivate myself when everything in the world seemed to be going against me. Because of my past, I have a great work ethic and work hard to get everything done and only turn in my absolute best work. I slowly built up confidence the more I learned and the more I saw my hard work pay off. I work hard to include others in my plans and in clubs where I an officer. I tried my best to think about the underdogs and how the decisions made could affect them. I hope, in my future, to continue helping the underdogs and people less fortunate than me. I am a woman who plans on going into a STEM program so I have no doubt that I will continue to have struggles but I believe that I am well equipped for my future. I want to continue to make the world a better place with diversity and inclusion and I do not want anyone to feel left out.

On April 14th, 2021, my mom called my sister and me to tell us that our grandmother had passed. It was not a surprise, she had been on life support for a few days and the doctors had already called us in to say our goodbyes but it was still heartbreaking. Instead of staying with me and supporting me, my sister locked herself in her room and called her boyfriend for the next few hours. I was crying over our grandmother but I could hear her laughing in the room next to me. This was also not new, recently, my sister was disconnected from the family and did not seem to care about our grandmother or anyone but herself. When the doctors called us in, she did not come and instead tried to go on a secret date. The day of the funeral came and while my mom and I stayed with our family, she disappeared to call her boyfriend for five hours. When we got home, she exploded at us and screamed for two hours because my mom said no to her. She screamed that we were ruining her life, that she hated us, that she hated living with us, and she exposed her double life that she had been living for years. She told us that we would know who she really was if we weren't so concerned about our grandmother. We were shocked. The things she admitted to having done were awful and many of the things had put my mom and I's lives in danger. The next day, she ran away. Less than a week after my grandmother's death. Through contacts and other means, we found out that she went partying every day that she was gone. I was devastated. I had just lost my grandmother and I had lost my best friend and sister. She did not even die, but the sister I had known and loved for years never even existed, she was an act put on. My mom was struggling horribly and I had to pay my college deposit within a week but I felt so lost, I had no idea what to do. During this time, my English teacher assigned a commencement speech assignment. For this speech, I had to thank the people who had helped me get to graduation and pick a quote and give advice to future generations. It took me a long time because of everything going on, but I finally sat down and wrote it. I thanked my mom, my grandparents, a few teachers, and my best friends. I selected Rakifi's quote from "The Lion King" and wrote about not letting the past dictate your future. I turned it in after pulling an all-nighter and waited. Two days later, I got my speech back with a 100%! My English teacher left a note that I was a great writer and that my speech was beautifully written. I sobbed. It does not sound like much, but with everything going on and learning that my sister was not my sister, I felt useless and depressed. Getting that positive feedback made me feel so much better and helped me find the energy to turn more work in. He left more positive feedback on my work and I was so happy and encouraged. My sister did return home after getting kicked out of her friend's house and she still had tantrums, but just his small comments make me feel so much better and help me to push through to do what I need to do for myself.

Saturday morning, my mom woke my sister and me up at around seven in the morning. We needed to pack quickly to get to my grandparent's house two hours away. My grandfather was terminally ill and needed surgery, my uncle had said he would be there but had called earlier that morning to tell my grandmother that one of his grandchildren's friends was having a birthday party and he apparently needed to go. Groaning, my sister and I got out of bed, packed, ate breakfast, then slept on the way there. When we got there, my grandfather was already in surgery, and my grandmother lectured my mother about not being there. We learned that my grandmother hadn't eaten since breakfast the day before. My sister and I were left with our grandmother while my mother got breakfast for her. My grandmother refused to eat but my mother insisted. Afterward, we learned that our grandmother hadn't slept the night before. So, after my grandfather got out of surgery and we saw he was okay, my mother took our grandmother home and convinced her to sleep for two hours. There were many incidents like this while my grandfather was terminally ill. My extended family informally abandoned us and my grandmother routinely took her stress out on my mom but my mom continued to help my grandmother and parent her when need be while parenting my sister and me. Seeing my mom be so kind and helpful to her parents was no surprise since she had raised my sister and me on her own but the lengths she went to surprised even me. After my grandfather passed, we became the sole caregivers for my grandmother and she got another job to support her mom. All the while, she was going through school to become a teacher. Because of this, I consider my mom to be my role model. Throughout the years, she has taught me so many different things that I can take into my future. Growing up, I had an abusive then absent father but she stepped up as a single mother to take both parenting roles. Because of this, the wound of an absent father was lessened and I did not suffer from what other many fatherless daughters suffer from. From this, she was able to teach me that not only is having less not a bad thing, but it can be a good thing. She taught me that I don't have to stay in a relationship if I want and that I am free to leave any relationship that hurts me, no matter the relationship. Also while growing up, I had a learning disability and some teachers would refuse to teach me. My mom stayed up with me many nights in order to teach and tutor me so that I did not fall behind my peers and she even got me ahead. She encourage me to join the band in middle school and recreational basketball. Because of this, I was able to come out of the shell I had locked myself in and make friends for the first time in my life. Because of my successes in these activities, I was able to build confidence for the first time in my life and I was able to find things that I enjoyed doing. I could go on and on about why I admire my mom. She is selfless, always taking care of others. For example, in the first paragraph I told about how, when my grandfather was terminally ill, she went above and beyond to take care of her parents and even started a new career in order to support them. She dropped everything to take care of her parents for two years. She gave my sister and me a basis of the family when our father was abusive and when he left. She stepped up for both of us and was an incredible mother to both of us. She dealt with my father for years and put up with family defending him and blocking her from leaving. She even health with them when they blamed her for him leaving. With my learning disability, I was difficult to teach. However, she pushed through to teach me more than an teacher has and helped me open myself up to new things that helped me in the long run, even when I refused and hated her for signing me up. Because of all these things, I admire and love my mom,

On the morning of March 13th, 2020. I woke up and drove myself to school like any other day. When I arrived, everybody was laughing about getting a bonus spring break, about how this wouldn't be a big deal and we would be back in two weeks. The teachers arranged us for online and, as expected, that evening we got a call that we would be off for two weeks. At first, we did review for two weeks until we could go back. I continued having to do community service for a club and doing team meetings for competition in late March. However, after those two weeks, we were told we would be out for the rest of the year. The teachers floundered because they had only planned for two weeks, my competition I had worked so hard for was canceled, and I was panicking because the club I needed community service hours for refused to cancel. Over the next few months, my family and I struggled. School wasn't too bad because my teachers were understanding and were mostly giving us easy work. However, my entire family was high risk and we were the sole caregivers for my grandmother. It was only my mom, my sister, and me. My mom was the only one leaving the house and we were still financially responsible for my grandmother. We began to struggle financially and it took a huge hit on all of us. We could no longer afford a lot of things and we went without to make sure my grandmother had everything she needed and wanted. I was a junior at the time and had to drop my ACT retake for financial reasons and had to reevaluate my college lists because of our money situation. I had to cut off a lot of schools and I was disappointed. We hit summer and I, who usually relaxes while reading, tore through all the books I had and had almost nothing to do to relax. I became heavily interested in social justice but struggled to find people who care like I did and supported me. I was emotionally hurt and exhausted but I forced myself to continue and live as though nothing was wrong. By August, I narrowed my college list to schools I liked that did not require SAT/ACT and schools I could tour online because I wasn't able to go on a college tour for money and because of COVID. I went ahead and applied to my schools so I could start my senior year as easily as possible. I was only taking two classes but they were honors classes and I knew I would have other things to take care of during my senior year. I started my senior year. One of my teachers was very kind and understanding, but the other one seemed to be the opposite. He assigned us double the work because, as he told us, we were home more and should have had nothing to do and graded us harder because he believed that we would all cheat and so we didn't deserve such a thing. He also believed that, because we were honors students, that we could handle harder work and he didn't need to work as hard to teach us. His class was the hardest I had ever taken. I spent all-nighters watching tutorials and getting help from family only to fail tests. While this was happening, I was applying to every scholarship I could and we getting rejected by every since one. By my birthday in October, I was done with the year and emotionally numb. I was done applying to scholarships and done trying in his class, which most of the students had dropped. The final straw came when my grandmother became tired of being alone and went with my extended family to the beach for their family vacation, on my birthday. I plan on majoring in oceanography and I love the beach so this mixed how much we had helped my grandmother shattered me. I spent my days in bed doing nothing but work for my classes. I cut everybody off and canceled almost all plans for my future. However, I learned later that week that I got into my dream school. It was exactly what I needed. I got out of bed and began to work on everything again. I learned a lot during that year. I learned how to rearrange my plans on the fly and that it was okay if plans fell through. I earned that there are many ways to get to your goals and not to panic if something didn't work. I learned how to motivate and help myself through all different kinds of struggles. Although it was awful, last year taught me a lot.

Planting seeds in a garden you will never see grow may sound stupid for some, but for me, it is one of my main goals in life. For me, leaving a legacy means doing something important, hopefully positive, that you are remembered for years after you are gone. Of course, there are different types of legacies people can leave behind. People can leave behind global legacies, where they do something to impact the whole world. For example, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died at age 87 in 2020 but the impact of her life and accomplishments are felt all over the world and all over the US. People can leave behind local legacies, where they are important for their communities and hugely impact them but are unknown outside the communities. Then, people can leave personal legacies where they help and impact people so much that the memory of that person lives on in those people's minds for years after they pass. An example of this is my grandfather. Growing up, my own father was abusive so my grandfather stepped in to be a father figure for my sister and me and was also a great father to my mother. He passed away recently, but my sister, mom, and I all have fond memories and remember his legacy of love, kindness, and caring very well. In my future, I hope to leave behind a positive global, local, and personal legacy. I hope to major in marine science then do research and publish research papers along with other publications that would inform the public about conservation issues for the ocean and what they can do to help. I hope that, with my research and publications, I can combat climate change effects on the ocean and, hopefully, convenience enough people to care that we save the ocean and many of the species of marine life that are threatened by marine life. I also hope that, with my research and publications, that I can lobby and work to have local laws passed in my community to protect wildlife and support conservation efforts of wildlife not just in the ocean, but on land too. Just like my grandfather, I hope to leave a positive impression on my friends and family. I want to be a role model for my nieces and any other children that my friends have. I want to make people proud that they knew me. While planting seeds in a garden that you will never see may seem like a waste of time to others, I consider it a huge honor. I want to leave a lasting positive legacy for myself that I and others will be proud of.

"The past can hurt. But the way I can see it, you can either run from it or learn from it." Growing up and watching The Lion King, I never understood Rafiki's most famous quote until I grew older. Throughout my life I have had to overcome many obstacles to reach my goals and get to where I am now. I had multiple abusive family members, mental health problems, and a learning disability throughout my younger years of life. As a preteen and a young teen, I had low self esteem and avoided things I thought I could not do as if they were the plague. I let past traumas dictate my life and stop me from creating and reaching goals. Until I found marine science, I wanted to become a musician. However, because of my learning disability and speechment mixed with things family members had told me in the past, I forced myself to let go of that dream. I had wanted to be a model but because of things that family members had said and done to me in the past, I forced myself to let go of that career. My body became a focus of my life because of bullying I had suffered to the point where I spent every second worrying about eating and constantly working out. I thought that everything that had gone wrong in my family and I's life was because of me. Around the time when I was fifteen, I got tired of not enjoying anything and being miserable. I started going to therapy and working through my past traumas. By resolving past traumas, I was finally able to do things that I was unable to do previously. I finally made goals and was able to complete them. I applied to my dream school, got in, and was accepted into their honors program! Until this, I had no idea how much the past was dragging me and holding me back. When I was finally able to move past what I had gone through and was able to accept it, I began to enjoy my life and make big plans for my future. I hope to go to an ivy league school and get a phd in marine science so that I can conduct research and write my own research papers to inform the public about the ocean and the issues that it faces and how they can help. If I had never moved on from the past, I would have gone to a different school for something easy, that I knew I could do, but I would never have been happy. I hate what I went through and hate the people who put me through it, but I'm glad that I was able to move past the trauma I suffered from. I learned that, like Rafiki said, we can learn or run from the past. I tried to run from it and it didn't work so instead I learned from it.

Everybody's community, or the group of people with whom they live, is hugely important for them, whether they know it or not. Having a community is important because it allows us to interact and and share experiences about our modern struggles. Being apart of a community builds valuable relationships and gives us a deeper sense of belonging. Being an active member in your community can provide paths to meet goals, connect with people with like interests, and help younger people feel secure. Throughout my life, I have participated in multiple community service projects. I have participated in several church pantries where we collected, stored, and gave food to people in need. I also participated in several GA mission trips to nursing homes and homeless shelters where we spent the day with people and kept them company after dropping off donations. I have completed more than 60 hours of community service for the Food Bank of Eastern North Carolina, where I and a group sorted fruits and goods to be sent out to people in need. I completed two hours of community service sending toys to children in the children's hospital during Christmas. Each of these projects brought me closer to my community and introduced me to people and things that I did not know about. I was able to build connections with people that I would never had met if I did not complete these projects. I was able to find people who were interested in what I was interested in so I never felt alone in my interests. I met people who were able to help me be successful and meet my goals. I am incredibly thankful for these opportunities and I know that, without them, I would not have the connections or life I have now. In my future, I hope to continue to help my community. While I do plan to move out of state, I hope to do more volunteer work for the Food Bank of Eastern North Carolina once it is safe . After college, I hope to do research about marine life and conservation efforts on the ocean. After doing research, I hope to publish research and publish other publications in order to inform the public about marine life and ocean conservation efforts and what they can do to help. The ocean is important to everyday life and climate change is damaging the ocean in an irreversible way. The ocean absorbs most of the excess heat from greenhouse gas emissions, which causes an increase in ocean temperatures. Increasing ocean temperatures negatively affects marine life and ecosystems by causing coral bleaching and loss of breeding ground for marine life. Changes in ocean temperatures can change weather patterns and currents around the world. However, alternative energy sources can decrease ocean temperatures, which would save marine life and corals, as well as prevent changes in currents and weather patterns. However, the public needs to be made aware of this issue and what they can do to stop or reverse the problem before it affects them negatively. By writing research papers, I could convince enough people to care that we could reverse and prevent further damage to the ocean. Although going forward my impact on my community will be more global, I am still proud knowing that I will have a positive impact on the global community and my local community. I am proud of the community service I did while I was younger and thankful for the positive influence it had on me.

Growing up with a mom as a teacher, education has always been important in my life. Even with just myself, education has always been something I prioritized. In May, I will graduate from high school. I am currently getting my grades up so that I can graduate with honors and top of my class. After graduating high school, my plan is to attend a four year college and be in the honors college or program, whichever the college has. My life's goal is to receive a PH.D in whatever I major in and attend an ivy league school. With this money, I would pay for tuition or another cost from college. Because I want to receive a PH.D, every scholarship I earn and every dollar I raise is important. My family has always struggled with money and the pandemic has hit us especially hard. Despite this, my family and I are still determined to send me to college so I can complete my education. I will major in Marine Science or Biology. Whichever one I major in, I will do research for a large part of my career. I plan to minor in english so that I can write and publish research papers. By doing this, I hope to help educate the public about important issues and promote solutions to these issues. By funding my education, you are assisting me in making the world a better place and spreading education to others who may not have the chance to attend school. You are helping my family fund my education without them having to sacrifice their own lives. I know the pandemic has hit many families hard but, since before the pandemic and continuing after the pandemic, my family has paid for my sister to go to a private college and my family are the caregivers for my grandmother. We are covering all of my grandmothers fees such as groceries and medical bills. My sister attends a private college due to a scholarship she earned from the school but due to raising tuition and raising costs, the cost of her education has tripled and it is causing a strain on my family. I would be grateful for the money and I know that I would be able to pay it forward.

It was Thanksgiving, and my family and I had joined my extended family at my grandmother's house. Though it was the day after Thanksgiving, my family had a tradition of eating the leftovers from the Thanksgiving meal for all meals until it was gone. My uncle, most of my cousins, and grandfather went outside to do yard work in the freezing cold after breakfast while my mom, grandmother, and aunt had gone to the living room to discuss the items they had purchased during black friday. My sister and I were alone in the dining room, watching the tv as Fresh Prince of Bel-Air reruns ran on the BET channel. Suddenly, my youngest cousin came into the room. She stood in front of me and asked me to repeat something she had said. Because of my speech impediment, that she was well aware that I had, I couldn't form most of the words she had said. She laughed and made me try to say them again and again until finally she told me to come with her so she could show my mom, grandmother, and aunt how I couldn't talk. I started to get up but my sister told me to sit back down, that I wasn't going anywhere. My cousin, who was and still is horribly spoiled, got mad that her fun was ruined and told my mom and grandmother that my sister had hit her, despite the fact that she never got up. My sister was punished, but she took it in stride. Because of this moment and so many more moments like this, I consider my sister to be my role model. Throughout my life, she was taught me many important lessons. She has always stood up for what she believed in, protected the people she loved, been selfless, and has never let her fibromyalgia stop her from doing things that she wanted to do. Even when she was faced with failure, she quickly regained herself and found a new path. Because of her, I was able to meet some goals I had for myself that I never thought possible. I applied to my dream school and was accepted into the major I wanted and was offered admission into the honors program after she made me apply when I thought I had no chance of getting admitted. I learned how to stand up for myself and what I believe in from her and not let people walk over me because of my insecurities and disability. Because of her, I have been able to defend future plans from people who do not support me and I have found ways to motivate myself to reach my goals. I have been able to bounce back from failure and not let it get me down. I have learned that there is more than one way to reach my goals and to not quit because one thing didn't work out. I will pay forward what she has taught me by reaching my goals and being successful. Afterwards, I will continue to fight for what I believe in and will teach others all of the lessons that she has taught me. I will carry her lessons and advice through my life and remember her everyday. Everybody needs a role model while growing up, for me, my sister was my biggest role model and the person I want to be like the most when I grow up. I am proud of her and she is proud of me.

On the day of the thirteenth of March, I had gone to school just like any other student. I got up, showered, ate, brushed my teeth, and drove myself to school. When I arrived, there was some concern about not coming back to school but I did not think much of it. Our teachers set us up for online programs but were joking like we weren't actually going to need it. Of course, I was more worried about a club I was officer of that had a competition the next week. When I got home, I saw that there was a message on the answering machine. We were going to be out for the rest of the month. Our spring break had been moved up so the first week I only stressed about the competition I was supposed to attend that ended up being cancelled. Two weeks went by and we got the news that school was cancelled for the rest of the year and my state was in a lockdown. Everything changed in a way I thought was not possible. Suddenly, my family and I were not allowed to leave our house and we were the caretakers for our grandmother. Luckily, neither of my parents lost their job, but we began to have to pay our grandmother's bills, groceries, and other living expenses. We were tight on money before and having to now cover another person's living expenses made the situation worse for us. Everybody in my family was high risk so we had to ration to make food and supplies stretch so nobody had to go to the store. My classes moved online but not all of my teachers were accommodating. I had to teach myself a lot of the curriculum and had to motivate myself to finish and turn in my work for school for the first time. Luckily, exams were cancelled and grades were not taken. I was going into my senior year but I had to cancel my college road trip and all other college plans I had. I had to find new ways to look at schools I wanted and get the information I needed. I had to adjust my college list because we could no longer afford some schools. Over the summer, my family had to travel constantly to take care of our grandmother. My sister and I had lots of books to read over the summer so we could distract ourselves. During the fall, however, things took a turn. I began the stressful period of applying and hearing back from colleges. All of my classes were honors and some of my teachers were not accommodating whatsoever and I went back to having to teach and motivate myself but it was new material I had never heard before and the teachers left horribly rude comments about my work. I began to suffer from cabin fever and depression. The only places I had been since lockdown started was my grandmothers and my house since everybody in my family was high risk and we no longer had the money to do much anymore. I had found a routine that previously grounded me but I found myself bored and not interested in anything I did. This all came to a head when my grandmother and extended family went to the beach during my birthday for their family vacation because they did not believe in the virus. They sent us photos of the beach and let it be known very clearly they thought we were fools for being careful. For an entire week, I laid in bed unable to find motivation to do anything. I stopped caring about my classes and the colleges I applied to. I barely ate and barely showered. The first week of November came and the election was no help to me getting back on my feet. Finally, the second week of November came and I learned that I had been accepted into my dream school. Slowly, I began to get out of bed and I began to work again. Throughout this process, I learned more about myself and my mental health. I learned what I struggle with and I found ways of coping with what I struggled with. I learned how to motivate myself and I learned how how to teach myself. I learned more study habits that work well for me and I learned the best times for studying. I have learned what my limit is for stress and how to take a step back. Unfortunately, I learned that the world does not often corporate nor does the entire world want what is best for humanity. I learned that, while I can do my part, I cannot force others to comply even if they are helping other people. I learned that just doing my part is enough. I learned that, while there is a lot of evil in the world that I and no learned about, there is an equal amount of good. This experience has taught me a lot of valuable lessons that I will take into the future with me.

Growing up, I was practically raised on my grandparents farm. From the time I was a little girl to now, as a young woman, I have always been close to the farm. Being so close to the farm, I have seen some the effects of climate change first hand. The older I got, the more difficulty we had producing crops and receiving water supplies. We had more and more insects in our crops until we had to stop farming entire crops. I developed a passion for the environment and animals and wanted to help combat climate change in the future. I found Marine Science and fell in love. However, just like my grandparents farm, I began to see the effects of climate change not just at home, but around the globe. I learned and saw the effects of flooding, erosion, and learned more about the declining water supplies I experienced on my grandparents farm. I decided to focus on sea levels for my future. Not only because of my love for marine ecosystems, but also because of the influence that the ocean has on the world. At least half of the world's oxygen comes from the ocean, however, with sea levels rising entire landforms and species will disappear. These damages will cost over five-hundred million dollars a year. Ecosystems would be damaged beyond repair and the ripple effects would be felt around the world. However, there are already many exciting solutions that Governments are already implementing. For example, buffers to protect the shore, reducing use of greenhouse gases and energy, and limiting use of a car. However, I believe the most efficient way to prevent rising sea levels is protecting wetlands and natural buffers such as dunes. Wetlands act as natural barriers for coastal areas during hurricanes and rainstorms. They absorb precipitation and storm surge waters. There are already many conservation projects in place for wetlands but more projects and more laws would hugely benefit the wetlands. Dunes protect inland areas from wind and wave action. Despite being fragile, they have a huge role in protecting the shore. In many places, laws have been passed to protect dunes but punishments for violating such laws are not harsh enough and there are fewer conservation efforts being made for dunes. I believe that these conservation efforts are our best options for preventing sea levels from rising because it is cheaper and has the least amount of cons. Reducing greenhouse gases, energy use, and vehicle use has long been fought over and alternative energy can be costly. Creating buffers to protect the shore can actually do more harm than good for the ecosystems on the coast. With my degree in Marine Science, I hope to work in research and work on ways to protect dunes, wetlands, and all marine ecosystems. I hope to combat climate change and its effects on the ocean. I believe more research and more awareness will greatly assist conservation efforts.

I will never forget one particular day in my second grade year. My class had won a fundraising competition and had earned the prize of popsicles and a movie. I had just sat down with my favorite flavor of popsicle alone, because I had almost no friends due to my speech impediment. The phone rang. I had to leave the class to take a test for my IEP evaluation. I was forced to throw away my popsicle and leave. When I arrived at the testing sight, I was given the test and a pencil. I rushed through the test to get back to the party and tried to turn it in but the teacher laughed, said she had forgotten to give me a blank piece of paper, and gave me a blank test. I tried the test again and asked for help, telling the teacher that I had not learned some of these things. The teacher once again laughed, told me she knew but no one had the patience or time to teach me, and to just finish the test. I tried my best and turned it in. When I got back to the class, the party was over and the other children looked at me oddly. I asked if I could at least have a popsicle but the teacher informed me that the party was over and it was time to work. I failed my evaluation and my disability aid stayed with me. I learned later that the teachers had purposely planned the test during the party. This is just one of the many moments that defined my experience growing up with a disability. Throughout my academic career, I was bullied by both my peers and my teachers. I lacked social development skills and was so far behind in the curriculum that I was failing all of my classes. As a child and preteen, I was horribly depressed and had no self- confidence. I had no plans for my future and was struggling just to get through day to day. However, when I was in the sixth grade, my sister began to look at colleges and go on college tours. I loved the atmosphere of college and the tours and I decided I wanted to go to college. I knew my grades were awful so I began to self teach myself the material. I worked hard during school and whatever freetime I had to work through workbooks from elementary and middle school. By eighth grade, I had progressed into all honors classes with an A average. At the same time, I joined band class because I loved music and wanted to learn how to play an instrument. Little did I know that band would be so monumental in my development. I gained friends for the first time and experienced no bullying. I slowly began to enjoy life and think about my future. I knew that I had a talent for writing and english because of the years I had refused to talk to anyone for fear of them hearing my speech impediment so I began to look at a future with creative writing. I did not see much so I began to look at other strengths. I loved science and loved animals since animals did not look at me oddly because of how my voice sounded. I began to investigate careers that involved animals and research. I have always been curious and having to self-teach showed me that I could have a successful future in research. I did research for a while and took a few different classes in high school until I found Marine Biology. I loved the research projects that the careers offered and the subject fascinated me. I began to fiddle around with the subject until I discovered that I could do research and publish research articles and paper. I even discovered that I could still do creative writing on the side. Currently, I have applied for colleges and hope to double major in biology and marine science and minor in english. I want to go on to receive a phd in marine science or biology and attend an ivy league school. What I went through was horrific and no child should be put through it, but without it I would not be where I am today and I would not have chosen my current major or future goals for myself if I had not gone through those struggles.

Self-love, the regard for one's own wellbeing and happiness, is something that many people struggle with. For myself, I struggled with self-love for most of my life. Growing up, I had a disability and was large for a child. Due to this, I was bullied by my peers, teachers, and some members of my family. Because of this, my self confidence took a huge dive. However, because I was so young the bullying had a ripple effect. I struggled to make good friends throughout the entirety of my elementary, middle, and high school years and barely spoke to anyone. Because of the bullying from the teachers that included them refusing to even attempt to teach me things because of my disability and making snide comments about my weight, which was mostly done in elementary school, my grades and test scores were awful and I was behind where I was not taught certain things. I needed support since I had no friends and was failing in school but had a very limited family due to the bullying. For many years I struggled to the point where I came home from school everyday sobbing and refused to talk to anyone. My mother wanted to put me into a new school but we could not afford to send me to another school. Due to all of this, I was depressed as a child and preteen. I did not have much hope or joy and I did not try to connect to anyone for fear of being hurt. I didn't think I would live to be eighteen. When I was in the sixth grade, I was tired to failing my classes because my teachers would not teach me and I created a goal of doing better in middle school. Over the summer and throughout the school year, I worked hard to teach myself. I used whatever resources I could and for the first time ever, teachers helped me. By the time I was in eighth grade, I had made enough progress to be in all honors classes and practically phased out of my disability aid. I joined band because I loved music and I wanted to major in music but I had no idea the wonders band would do for me. I finally came out of my comfort zone and made friends for the first time in my life. Because I was becoming more sociable and doing better in school, my quality of life increased exponentially. Suddenly, I had plans for the future whereas I didn't know if there was a future before. Currently, I want to receive a phd in biology or marine science. I have applied to colleges and was accepted into my top four plus an ivy league school. Unfortunately, I had to remove some family members from my life. But, I would not change anything. I am happier than I've ever been and love myself more than ever. I still struggle, but I take it day by day.

Going into high school, I had already decided exactly what I wanted to do with my life. I had already decided that I was going to go to college, major in music, move to Los Angeles, and live as a music producer. In middle school, I had been in band all three years and adored it. Band had brought me out of my shell and had helped me make friends for the first time in my life. I always looked forward to band class, even on my worst days. Band helped me get through my struggles and my worst times. In order to get into the music department at my dream school, I had to participate in a marching band in high school. I signed up and my family scraped together the money. I attended my first day of camp excited and came home in tears. Throughout the first week, it became evident that the marching band was only about winning the competitions, not music. The teachers and students believed that humiliation was the best teacher. The teachers had a goal of tearing us down in order to try to make us a ‘family’. For example, there was one time a student was exhausted and couldn’t get a dance correct and they allowed the band to have a break to sit down and watch them run two laps around the parking lot. Within the first day, I had been yelled at by a teacher in my face and humiliated. This continued on every day for three weeks. We got one hour for lunch, barely any breaks, and worked from 6 to 9:30 every day for three weeks straight. When anybody showed concern over how long we were working, the teachers would tell us we would pass out before we die. We had to do pushups and situps on hot pavement in the middle of the day while teachers walked around and yelled at us if we paused. There were times I had raw skin and rocks embedded in my skin. There were times when I had teachers yell in my face or have the entire band watch me redo things because I had made a mistake and the teachers deemed my try not good enough. I had a teacher tell me, in the middle of a practice, that I needed to lose weight because my size was ruining the look of the band. By the second week, I no longer wanted to participate but it had cost so much money and strained my family so much that I didn’t want to throw it away. At our first show, we did great. We went to eat at the football stand afterwards and the teachers ordered us to make sure we didn’t get anything they didn’t approve of. Afterward, we went back to the band room where a teacher yelled at us for fifteen minutes about something that had gone wrong and some equipment that had been mishandled while another teacher quietly chewed us out for taking too long to get ready. The next day, we watched the performance and made a list and paragraph about everything that went wrong and discussed it. During these discussions, students were eager to throw each other under the bus about mistakes that had been made. This happened everytime we had a show. At our first away competition, we did not place in finals and there were actual fights among students where students tried to beat other students whom they assumed had ruined the show. Several students had panic attacks and were almost taken to the hospital. When we got back, we still went through the procedure of listing what had gone wrong. Finally, we came to our main performance of the year. We traveled to Atlanta and performed in the Mercedes-Benz arena. I was so excited to be in Atlanta and be on a NFL football field. However, the parents assisting us had made a mistake while setting up our show and it threw the show off. We tried to get it together but several students had meltdowns on the field and fell or couldn’t play. It was obvious by the end that we were not going to finals. We sat in the parking lot of the arena for two hours because the parents had reservations at an expensive restaurant for us but because we weren’t getting into finals, they did not think we deserved it. It wasn’t until a student with blood pressure issues started struggling that the adults gave us bagged chips to eat. I stuck around for concert band because the concert band had no competitions. Within the first week, all-county band tryouts were held and some people got in while some people didn’t. Again, there were fistfights over who had gotten in and who hadn’t. People began to separate and purposefully mess up the people who had gotten in the all-county band. By the end of this experience, I hated band and music. I floundered for at least two years after trying to find something else I liked. This experience changed my perspective on life like an avalanche. Before, I thought it was always a negative to quit on something you had started but this experience taught me that, sometimes, you had to let something go. Especially if it was destroying you. This experience taught me the value of mental health and how important it was to look after your mental health. Throughout the season, I suffered from depressive episodes and had a burnout when it was over where I could enjoy nothing for a month or two. While this was happening, my grandfather became terminally ill but we could not be with him. I learned that there is more to life than money and success. Because of this experience, I stand up for myself, refuse to take abuse, and focus more on my mental health. I learned that plans can change and that it's okay if plans change.

All through high school, I participated in multiple extracurricular activities but my philanthropic activities are the ones I am most proud of. During my junior year of high school, I completed over 45 hours of community service at the Eastern Food Bank of North Carolina, going almost every Saturday I could. I assisted in sorting and packaging over a thousand meals to be sent out to people who were food insecure. In the summer between my junior and senior years of high school, I heavily participated in social justice philanthropic work. I contributed to donating money to organizations such as the Bail Project and Black Lives Matter. I shared the links so that my friends and family could also help donate money to such organizations. I signed over 100 petitions for Black Lives Matter and other organizations fighting for things such as Native American rights and protecting the environment. I shared as many petitions as possible and my followers signed at least 50 petitions. I used my social media to spread awareness and spread information and resources that could help protesters. In my senior year of high school, I used my social media to spread information about voting and included links to register to vote and order mail-in ballots or make a plan to mail in person. Throughout my philanthropic work, a challenge that I often ran into was selfishness. I would share links to issues or to take action for an issue and I could always get comments about ‘why should I care?’, ‘why isn’t there something like this to help people like me? Why just them?’, and, always, some long, insulting paragraph with poor grammar about how stupid I and anyone who believed in these issues were. At first, I was shocked and amazed that people could have such a reaction to such a thing. Then, I began to become disheartened. Even at the food bank, people who were volunteering would often speak negatively and rudely about the people that we were sorting and preparing food for. However, I continued to do my part and I continued to feel slightly better with every step I took to help. With this grant, I hope to get a degree in Marine Science/Biology. I want to go into a career of research and environmental conservation. I hope to continue donating to organizations such as WWF and Oceana. This grant would be a great jumpstart to my future. By funding my education, this grant would assist me in helping the environment and fighting against climate change to protect our future and make the world a better place.

I remember my first day of school as though it was yesterday, my mom had taken me to preschool at a different elementary school than I would attend because the closest elementary school to us had cancelled their preschool program. I was in the same class as my best friend and another friend from my childhood who was highly autistic. I myself had a speech impediment. Throughout that school year, I would see how the teachers tried less to teach us, giving up on us when they would have continued with other students and doing work for us instead of letting us try. Throughout my school career, I would notice how students with disabilities were treated differently. Because of how stubborn I was, I was determined to be the best I could be and defy them, just to annoy them. I had no idea how important education would be to me. By middle school, I was far behind other students. However, because I had pushed myself, I was able to self teach and reach the level of all honors classes by my eighth grade year. By high school, I was able to convince everyone that I no longer needed my disability aid. I continued to self teach and get through my struggles. I have taken eleven honors classes in high school, have an almost perfect GPA, and have been accepted into an ivy league school. However, it wasn’t just my own experiences that contributed to the huge role education plays in my life. In my own extended family, there are people who do not believe in education or public school. Growing up, I have watched them, their children, and, ultimately, their grandchildren suffer from the lack of education offered and the lack of importance education has. Many of the struggles they have gone through could’ve been prevented if education had been given a focus in younger years and many of their struggles have been a product of not finishing a basic education. Around the time that my family was being pushed away for my mom being a teacher, I began to feel sorry for them and put even more effort and value on my own education to ensure my quality of life was the best I could make it. My sister is working on her Masters degree and my mom has a Masters degree. Both my sister and I hope to receive Phds in our fields. Self teaching myself and developing a deep love for learning gave me confidence that I had never had before and gave me more success than I could have ever imagined. I have no idea who I would be without an education. I shattered barriers that others and myself had placed on me.

I am an eighteen year old young woman from Raleigh, North Carolina. Growing up, I was always a large child because of my bone structure, I have large bones and a barrel chest. I was often bullied by my peers and some of my family for my weight and I learned to hate myself. Going into high school, I wanted to change myself. I began to cut down on the amount of food I was eating and working out for over an hour every day. I lost fifteen pounds my freshman year. However, my grandfather became terminally ill my sophomore year. Due to circumstance and my mental health, I was unable to continue with my diet and weight loss. By my junior year, I had gained back those fifteen pounds plus sixteen more. I had to rework on cutting down the food I was eating and exercising. When I finally got back on track, I struggled to lose weight. I lost eight pounds at the most and even then, it was give or take. I did the best I could do between my classes and extracurricular activities but nothing seemed to work. Unfortunately, COVID-19 reached the United States and my school and state went into lock down. Because of how my classes worked when we went into lockdown, I was able to put more time into my weight loss journey. I began a rigid schedule that included two meals, a small snack, an hour long workout, and walking for over 300 minutes a day. Over the six months of quarantine, I managed to lose sixty pounds. I can now see muscles and bones on my body where before there was fat. Because of my weight loss, I am so much happier and so much more confident. I can wear clothes that I love for the first time. My family is proud of me and, whenever my grandmother sees me, she always comments on my weight and how small I am getting. My friends are proud of me and happy for me. Everyone is glad for my accomplishments and I have people who ask me to help them. I am so happy I managed to lose my weight and be as happy and proud as I am right now. I have never been happy with my body but now I am and I wouldn’t trade the feeling for almost anything. I continue to work out and watch what I eat but I know that I am about to go to college and I have been made aware of the infamous ‘freshman fifteen’. I am still working on a workout plan that would work while I am in college but I am sure that I can minimize the damage. I am proud of myself and thankful that I started a fitness routine. I know that, without fitness, I would not be where I am today and I would still be miserable.

There are many changes that could be made in my community and world that would make the environment we live in a more positive place for everyone. For example, 13 million people face hunger, 4 million of those being children. There could be a many number of reasons why a family or people would be food insecure. My family and I were food insecure at one time ourselves so we understand how hard it can be to pull yourself out of a negative situation. Being food insecure can cause stress, lower grades, less sleep, bad health, and many other problems. To help in the best way I can, I volunteered almost every Saturday in my junior year of high school at the Eastern Food bank of North Carolina. I volunteered for over 30 hours sorting and packaging food to be sent out all over Eastern North Carolina. I believe that if more people would volunteer to help people in need and be less judgemental about people who are struggling, that the world would be a much better place and we would be able to improve the standard of living for so many people. Another issue is police brutality. Police brutality is an issue all over the United States but some people do not believe in helping the people who are being targeted or are selfish enough to only think of themselves. Recently, I helped donate money to organizations such as Black Lives Matter and the Bail Project. I used my social media to spread information that would help protestors, spread information about new news concerning police brutality, and spread as many petitions as possible. I signed over 100 petitions and convinced my friends to sign as many as thirty and donate money as well. I believe that if people had more compassion about each other and were more educated, then everyone from all walks of life would have a better experience in this world and certain groups would not have to live opposed. I believe that, all over the world, people need to have more compassion and more empathy in general. The problem for many people is that they have a mindframe of ‘if it's not my problem, then why should I care?’. This mindframe causes people to sit around when injustices and problems prevail. Because of these people, injustices are never put right and problems continue to get bigger and bigger until it does concern them but by then, it is too late. People often sneer at people who are in need of help and oftentimes go out of their way to not help or help in a way they think is helpful when, in real life, they could have just made everything worse. An example of this is how churches often make ‘food bags’ for homeless people because they do not want to give them money for fear that they will take that money and buy drugs or other items they condemn. Well, homeless people do need food, that is true. But, now, how will they pay to wash their clothes? How will they pay to use the library? How will they pay to rent a place? Where will they get the money to get themselves out of poverty? Because these people made an assumption about these people and thought of them negatively and without compassion, they may have helped these people short term but have stunted them in the future. Another issue is performative activism, people pretend to help to get kudos when, in reality, they do not. For example, many Christians go to mission trips to third world countries and take lots of photos with kids and native people but then they come home and speak negatively about them, their country, and support laws that would negatively impact people from the country who live in America. If people had genuine compassion and would honestly help people without thinking of themselves, this world would be a much better place.

If I had to pick anyone to be my role model, I would have to pick my mom and my sister. There are lots of fictional characters and people in my life that are important and that I love but my mom and my sister have had the greatest influence on me and I look up to them more than anyone else. My mom and my sister raised me together. Despite what they had going on and their own struggles, they always had time for me and supported me through what I was doing. They helped me with my homework, taught me how to do things such as cook, play softball, play basketball, and many other things. They taught me what it means to be a woman in the south, in the world, and how to achieve my goals and take care of myself. Most importantly, they taught me what it means to be a family. For example, when I was younger, we struggled with money and had to eat spam and beans, wash our clothes at a friends house, shower at the gym, and do many other things to survive day by day. Throughout all of this, we stayed close, trusted each other, and worked together to find a way to live and get out of the hole that we were caught in. Another example is when my grandfather became terminally ill when I was in my sophomore year of high school. My family became the primary caregivers for my grandparents. My sister was completing summer classes for her last year at college and I was taking four classes, two of them honors. I was also participating in several extracurricular activities. When at home, my sister and I cooked, cleaned, and did other housework to take stress off of our mom as well as completed our school work and participated in extracurricular activities. We would often be home alone until five pm, but we kept each other company and found ways to have fun. When my mom did come home, my sister and I continued to do everything we could to help her. Oftentimes, we went to my grandparents house, which was two hours away. We would have to stay for weeks at a time and, even when my sister and I were at the house, we were supposed to always be prepared to leave at a moment’s notice. However, my sister and I continued to work together to take stress off my mother and grandmother and make sure they were taken care of when not at the hospital. We supported each other and kept each other company during the long days we were left at home. We learned how to work together to ration things out like food and cleaning supplies. When my grandfather died, most of our family did not help us and we had to lean on each other for support. Only, throughout the year my grandfather was sick and for a year after, my family had to financially cover my grandmother. To this day, we are still covering some of her living expenses such as bills, groceries, etc. We almost reached a bad financial situation for ourselves once again but we banded together and saved ourselves. My sister and my mother have taught me what it means to be a part of a family, a part of a team, how to communicate, and problem-solving skills that most people do not acquire until late in life. Without them, I would not even be close to who I am today. Because of them, I want to help the environment and be active in my community. I already have goals such as getting a PhD and going to an ivy league school. I hope that one day I can be even half of them and teach my nieces the lessons they taught me.

All around the world, animals such as the black rhino, tigers, pandas, and so many others are facing extinction. Their numbers get lower everyday and yet little help seems to come to them. Part of the problem is that people do not seem to understand what losing just one species does to an ecosystem. Just the loss of one species could throw off the balance of an entire ecosystem and, if not replaceable, the entire ecosystem could collapse just from losing that one species. For example, if you were to take a tide pool ecosystem and remove starfish, all of the species who were connected to the starfish would become endangered and, slowly or quickly, mollusks would dominate the ecosystem with little or no other species left in the ecosystem. As interconnected as the world is today, the loss of one species would cause ripples around the world in places most people would not even think. For example, off the coast of North Carolina, scientists removed sharks from a certain area off the coast of the Outer Banks as part of an experiment. Because of the lack of sharks, barnacles began to dominate the area and the oyster population decreased dramatically. In fact, the population decreased so much that neighboring restaurants had to remove foods with any oyster or oyster by-product in them from their menus. The number one producer of oysters in the world is China, if something were to happen to the oysters or something were to happen to a species involved with the oysters and production were to decrease, the effects would be felt around the world. Restaurants would have to take oyster products off the menu, prices would go up, the ecosystems would suffer from the oysters and other affected species being unable to complete their niche. This, in turn, would cause other species, ecosystems, and economies to suffer. From there, it would become a whirlpool of issues. The good news is that there are already practices in progress to help these endangered animals. For example, natural parks such as the Theodore Roosevelt National Park and Bear Mountain State Park that have been created to protect and spread information about endangered animals. There have also been laws passed to limit hunting or prohibit the killing of these animals around the world. State of the art technology has been made in order to count the population of wild species, such drones that can also map deforestation and other dangers to animals. However, there are also steps that individuals can take. It can be something small, such as not littering, picking up litter, driving carefully so no animals are hit, minimizing use of pesticides, not buying things made from endangered animals, or just visiting a national park. Or, to do the most, individuals can start or join a clean-up crew for a certain habitat, make a backyard wildlife habitat, make a pollinator garden, report anything they see that harms endangered animals, email local politicians to pass laws that support endangered animals, or they can even join organizations and donate to protect endangered species. Communities can make a big difference just by setting environmentally-friendly guidelines, having a community park, having a community garden, and having fundraisers for endangered animals in the area. Countries can continue to pass laws and have organizations but it would also be helpful if more money were put into saving endangered species and if harsher punishments were given to people who violated the laws that protect endangered species. Even the loss of one species would have a huge effect and would cause damage all over the world. We must protect and help endangered species if we hope to have a positive future.

Most everybody had struggles they had to overcome when they were children. Whether it was divorce, money, broken family, everybody makes a choice of how to deal with these struggles. Some people move on, some people hold on to them for the rest of their lives. Growing up, I suffered from a speech impediment which was listed as a learning disability. Throughout my years in the public education system, the system did nothing but made things much more difficult than they had to be. I was in the IEP/EC system until my freshman year of high school. In elementary school, I was given a set time when I had to leave my regular class to attend in-school tutoring. This was a great idea, but poorly executed. Oftentimes, the tutoring sessions would go into my lunch and recess so I would have less time to socialize with the other kids and had to eat with barely ten minutes left in lunch. When I returned from such sessions, teachers made no attempt to include me on what was currently happening in the classroom or wouldn’t help if something was started before my leaving for the class. This resulted in me missing vital material from my regular classes that the teachers would sign off on having taught me, but really they did not. I would receive tests for material I was not taught and then the tests were used as an excuse to keep me in the system. When I would tell people that I was not taught the material, I was told that I had but was not able to remember or, I was told by teachers and staff, there simply wasn’t enough time or patience to teach me. Going into middle school, I was fairly behind on some of the curriculum. Luckily, my middle school did a better job of teaching students with learning disabilities and I was almost caught up to exactly where I needed to be come 8th grade. However, the woman who oversaw my IEP/EC case preferred to do whatever was necessary to make sure she did not have, what she considered, too much work. Because of this, I was placed into classes that were too easy and did not challenge me because it was easier for her to keep all of the IEP/EC kids together, despite our skills and levels. The motion for me to be signed out of my IEP/EC came when I was in 7th grade. Everybody agreed that I no longer needed to be in the system however, the teacher in charge of the IEP did not want to fill out the paperwork required. So, I carried the IEP into my freshman year of high school. From there, we filled out the paperwork in the first month. Despite being at a disadvantage in the early stages of my life, I have always worked hard and tried to be successful at everything I do. I currently have a 3.95 GPA and received a 22 on my ACT. My lowest grade in my high school career has been a 84 I received my freshman year. I have taken more than ten honors courses throughout my high school career. I worked hard with my teachers to get caught up to where I need to be. I am proud of myself and fully confident that I have overcome my struggles to be the best me that is possible. I have learned how to be resilient, brave, hard working, clever and many other things. All of these skills will be beneficial to me because I hope to get a bachelor's degree in Marine Science. As a woman going into a STEM program and going into a potentially political fied, I will need all the skills I learned from overcoming my speech impediment and working my way back from being behind in order to be the best I can be and help the oceanic environment as much as possible. I would be honored to win a 500 dollar scholarship and I know it will be put to good use.