I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine, just like Malgorzata.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. TI thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, tutoring another woman who is struggling, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

Growing up in Carroll County Maryland, it was always known that the area was not supportive of the LGBTQ+ community. Throughout middle school and high school, the few LGBTQ+ kids were always made fun of. They would be talked about behind peoples backs, get called slurs in the hallways, and always ignored. In middle school this was especially difficult and scary for me. In seventh grade, it was the first time that I realized that I may be a lesbian. I didn't know how to feel or what to do. The gay community was never openly discussed. I had always had to pretend to take interest in men when my friends would hangout and talk about all their crushes. I decided to not tell anyone this and continue being someone who I was not. It wasn't until the pandemic happened that I started to get more comfortable. While it was a time of fear and uncertainty, I was able to use it as a time to figure out who I was. For a long time I thought I was bisexual. I realize now that this was because I still felt pressure from my community to have to like men. What helped me out of this was social media. I feel as though many talk about social media in a negative way. They talk about how it is awful for mental health, especially for kids. While yes it can be harmful, social media provided me a safe place to explore my community. I never realized how many people were like me. Being able to see another lesbian couple hold hands, or seeing kids come out to their parents truly helped me come to find my true identity. It helped me relax, and gave me people to look up to. I plan on majoring in computer science next year. I love problem solving, and the moment I started coding I knew that it was what I wanted to do. However I realized that there a huge lack of members of the LGBTQ+ community in computer science. In just about every class I have taken, I have been the only one who was gay. There is an alarming lack of lesbians in computer science, and I want to do something to solve this problem. This scholarship will help me fund the education that I need to accomplish my goal of getting more members of the LGBTQ+ community involved in computer science. When I graduate, I want to start a foundation that will help provide other members of the LGBTQ+ community with the mentors, resources, and guidance that they need to succeed in this field. I want to be the representation that I didn't have for future generations. I want to be the change.

Growing up in Carroll County Maryland, it was always known that the area was not supportive of the LGBTQ+ community. Throughout middle school and high school, the few LGBTQ+ kids were always made fun of. They would be talked about behind peoples backs, get called slurs in the hallways, and always ignored. In middle school this was especially difficult and scary for me. In seventh grade, it was the first time that I realized that I may be a lesbian. I didn't know how to feel or what to do. The gay community was never openly discussed. I had always had to pretend to take interest in men when my friends would hangout and talk about all their crushes. I decided to not tell anyone this and continue being someone who I was not. It wasn't until the pandemic happened that I started to get more comfortable. While it was a time of fear and uncertainty, I was able to use it as a time to figure out who I was. For a long time I thought I was bisexual. I realize now that this was because I still felt pressure from my community to have to like men. What helped me out of this was social media. I feel as though many talk about social media in a negative way. They talk about how it is awful for mental health, especially for kids. While yes it can be harmful, social media provided me a safe place to explore my community. I never realized how many people were like me. Being able to see another lesbian couple hold hands, or seeing kids come out to their parents truly helped me come to find my true identity. It helped me relax, and gave me people to look up to. I plan on majoring in computer science next year. I love problem solving, and the moment I started coding I knew that it was what I wanted to do. However I realized that there a huge lack of members of the LGBTQ+ community in computer science. In just about every class I have taken, I have been the only one who was gay. There is an alarming lack of lesbians in computer science, and I want to do something to solve this problem. This scholarship will help me fund the education that I need to accomplish my goal of getting more members of the LGBTQ+ community involved in computer science. When I graduate, I want to start a foundation that will help provide other members of the LGBTQ+ community with the mentors, resources, and guidance that they need to succeed in this field. I want to be the representation that I didn't have for future generations. I want to be the change.

Growing up in Carroll County Maryland, it was always known that the area was not supportive of the LGBTQ+ community. Throughout middle school and high school, the few LGBTQ+ kids were always made fun of. They would be talked about behind peoples backs, get called slurs in the hallways, and always ignored. In middle school this was especially difficult and scary for me. In seventh grade, it was the first time that I realized that I may be a lesbian. I didn't know how to feel or what to do. The gay community was never openly discussed. I had always had to pretend to take interest in men when my friends would hangout and talk about all their crushes. I decided to not tell anyone this and continue being someone who I was not. It wasn't until the pandemic happened that I started to get more comfortable. While it was a time of fear and uncertainty, I was able to use it as a time to figure out who I was. For a long time I thought I was bisexual. I realize now that this was because I still felt pressure from my community to have to like men. What helped me out of this was social media. I feel as though many talk about social media in a negative way. They talk about how it is awful for mental health, especially for kids. While yes it can be harmful, social media provided me a safe place to explore my community. I never realized how many people were like me. Being able to see another lesbian couple hold hands, or seeing kids come out to their parents truly helped me come to find my true identity. It helped me relax, and gave me people to look up to. I plan on majoring in computer science next year. I love problem solving, and the moment I started coding I knew that it was what I wanted to do. However I realized that there a huge lack of members of the LGBTQ+ community in computer science. In just about every class I have taken, I have been the only one who was gay. There is an alarming lack of lesbians in computer science, and I want to do something to solve this problem. This scholarship will help me fund the education that I need to accomplish my goal of getting more members of the LGBTQ+ community involved in computer science. When I graduate, I want to start a foundation that will help provide other members of the LGBTQ+ community with the mentors, resources, and guidance that they need to succeed in this field. I want to be the representation that I didn't have for future generations. I want to be the change.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. Success to me is when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine. This opportunity will help me achieve my goals by helping me afford the education that I need to help change the world by helping women in STEM get ahead and change the worlds expectations of us.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. I am beyond excited to pursue a major in Computer Science. One of the biggest reasons that I am excited for this is because throughout my education, in each one if my Computer Science classes there has been an extremely significant lack of women in these classes. In these classes, women like me are often ignored and talked down to by men in these classes. Because of this, women have stopped taking these classes because they are sick of getting talked down to. I want to be the change to keep women in STEM. I hope to use my education to provide other women like me the resources, leaders, and role models that lots of women don't have. I can't wait to help others with the use of my education.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. I plan to pursue a major in computer science and possibly a minor in information science in the fall of 2024. As of now, I aim to be a software engineer and inspire other women to pursue careers in STEM. Seeing a lack of women in STEM has pushed me to be a part of the change and pursue computer science. In all of my STEM classes in high school, there was always a very obvious difference between the difference between the amount of men, and the amount of women in those classes. Some of the men in those classes would rarely ever listen to what the women's thoughts were, or would always ignore them. For a while, I was very angry about this. I often asked myself, "Why do I even want to pursue STEM if this is the way women are treated?" However, I realized instead of letting this hold me back, I should use this to drive my passion towards STEM. I have been able to use this to help motivate myself to do well in not only my studies but also to help other women pursue STEM and help them get through the challenges of being a woman in STEM. This scholarship would help me tremendously in my pursuit of higher education because it will help me to pay for the best quality of education available so that I can have the best tools I need that I can fully concentrate on my studies and create change in our world by getting more women involved in computer science and STEM. This scholarship will help me to obtain the best opportunities, resources, and learning available to me and help fund my way to becoming change in the world.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I never thought in a million years that I would be a theater kid, but here I am. I got involved in theater my sophomore year after coming back from Covid. I have stage managed for my schools theater department for three years. Stage managing has taught me a lot, such as patience, perseverance, and time management. I think that if more people joined theater, it could give them many of these life long skills that are necessary to succeed in the real world. This also taught me to get out of my comfort zone. Coming back from Covid, I didn't have many friends, and as a shy kid I was nervous about talking to new people. However, this job almost "forced" me to do this in order to complete my job. This lead to me making more friendships than I ever thought I would make. I think that this could help many kids in my community, it would give them an opportunity to make friends and learn how to talk to people. This fall, I decided to be the special effects designer for the fall play of, "Sleepy Hollow". At first I was very hesitant about taking up this role. I had no idea how to set up our new fog machines or how to order dry ice. However, it ended up being one of my favorite high school experiences. It really taught me how to problem solve, which is a skill that I think that everyone could benefit from. What made me really see the benefit of doing theater was this fall after we had finished our Friday night shows. I could hear two young kids, maybe 10-12, talking about the special effects for the show. One of the kids said, "I want to do special effects one day, I want to make all that fog it looks so fun to play with!" This truly showed me the impact of theater in my community. It can inspire many young minds to get involved in their community. I think that theater gives many an escape. Telling a story, no matter if you are an actor or a designer, can be vital in giving those in the audience an escape from reality. Theater gives the power to change lives and inspire, and I think that many more people should get involved in theater because it gives them the power to change lives.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP CSP, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not interested in coding? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to ensure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I want to help my own community by raising awareness about this issue. I want to increase funding in STEM classrooms, get more women involved in STEM, and start a foundation that will provide women in my community with the necessary tools they need to get ahead in STEM.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. I plan to pursue a major in computer science and possibly a minor in information science in the fall of 2024. As of now, I aim to be a software engineer and inspire other women to pursue careers in STEM. Seeing a lack of women in STEM has pushed me to be a part of the change and pursue computer science. In all of my STEM classes in high school, there was always a very obvious difference between the difference between the amount of men, and the amount of women in those classes. Some of the men in those classes would rarely ever listen to what the women's thoughts were, or would always ignore them. For a while, I was very angry about this. I often asked myself, "Why do I even want to pursue STEM if this is the way women are treated?" However, I realized instead of letting this hold me back, I should use this to drive my passion towards STEM. I have been able to use this to help motivate myself to do well in not only my studies but also to help other women pursue STEM and help them get through the challenges of being a woman in STEM. This scholarship would help me tremendously in my pursuit of higher education because it will help me to pay for the best quality of education available so that I can have the best tools I need that I can fully concentrate on my studies and create change in our world by getting more women involved in computer science and STEM. This scholarship will help me to obtain the best opportunities, resources, and learning available to me and help fund my way to becoming change in the world.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. I thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I plan to study computer science one day and become a software developer in order to make these dreams come true. This scholarship will help me accomplish these dreams of mine, and help me help other woman across the world get to get involved with STEM. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. TI thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I plan to pursue a major in computer science and possibly a minor in information science. As of now, I aim to be a software engineer and inspire other women to pursue careers in STEM. Seeing a lack of women in STEM has pushed me to be a part of the change and pursue computer science. In all of my STEM classes in high school, there was always a very obvious difference between the difference between the amount of men, and the amount of women. Some of the men in those classes would rarely ever listen to what the womens thoughts were, or would always ignore them. For a while, I was very angry about this. I often asked myself, "Why do I even want to pursue STEM if this is the way women are treated?" However, I realized instead of letting this hold me back, I should use this to drive my passion towards STEM. I can use this to help motivate myself to do well in not only my studies but also to help other women pursue STEM and help them get through the challenges of being a woman in STEM. This scholarship would help me tremendously in my pursuit of higher education because it will help me focus less on how I am paying for college so that I can fully concentrate on my studies and create change in our world. This scholarship will also help me go to a better, but more expensive school so that I can get the best education I can receive without having to worry about how I will pay for it. A time when I made a contribution to my community that has impacted me today is when I helped put on the production of, "Sleepy Hollow" for my school fall play. I was the lead stage manager, special effects designer, and a part of the set crew. As we finished our show and went out into our school's lobby to talk to our friends and family who came out to see the show, I could overhear a conversation between two young girls. They talked about how amazing the show was, and how the set was beautiful and the fog was so cool. They both wanted to join theater after seeing the show, and it made me feel amazing to see that something I helped to produce helped to change the lives of others and inspire them to join the arts in their futures.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. TI thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. TI thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. TI thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. TI thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. TI thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

I can't remember a time when I didn’t love to build. From going to the Lego store when I was a kid to going to Ikea to find furniture with my Mom, I was always excited to build. Something about putting together all the pieces in those puzzles brought me a sense of pride. Even helping my Grandma reset her Facebook password just made me feel so good. When I was introduced to Computer Science in my sophomore year, it was like a whole new world was shown to me. I loved the feeling of coding a quiz game or debugging code to find the problem and fix it. However, it was soon after that I realized the problems there are with Computer Science. It didn’t take me much time to see that most of the students in my Exploring Computer Science class were men. I didn’t think much of it at the time, maybe there were more women in the other period class. However, the next year when I took AP Computer Science Principles, there were even fewer women in that class. In a class of about 32 kids, only about six of the people were women. TI thought that was strange. Were women just not as interested in coding as men? Shortly after I asked this question, I ran into my first problem. One of the smartest kids in my class ran into an issue with his code. He was frustrated, so I asked him if he needed help. He abruptly said, “No,” and not even seconds later he got up out of his seat to go ask another man in the class for help. I thought it was weird, but maybe it was just because they were good friends. Whenever I told an adult what I was doing with my future, I always got surprised looks. Even when we were assigned partners in the class, whenever the men ran into a problem with their code, they would always go and ask another man for help. This frustrated me. I kept asking myself why this would keep happening. What is so awful about a woman finding a bug in the code? So, when it came to a research project I had for my English class, this was the issue I researched. I learned that the reason for the lack of women in Computer Science is because of the lack of representation in the field. I thought about this and realized how true it was. Whenever someone thinks of someone big in the technology world, they think of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Mark Zuckerberg. A woman rarely comes to mind. At first, this frustrated me. But after time I realized instead of letting it hold me back, I could push myself to make a change. From that point of realization, I made it my goal to do everything I could to succeed in a world where it is so hard for women to succeed. I am taking every opportunity I can to get to that point. I’m taking every Computer Science class I can in my school, and even an internship for Computer Science. I’m teaching myself new coding languages to make sure I have everything so that one day I can get ahead and encouraging all my friends to take Computer Science so that there is more representation in the future. I hope that one day when someone thinks of a person in technology, one of the first names to come to mind is that of a woman, and I hope that that name is mine.

From the first time I hit run on a program, I instantly fell in love with coding. The feeling of successfully going through a program or debugging the code was something that gave me pride. From that point on I knew this was something that I wanted to do for the rest of my life. I plan on majoring in Computer Science for the fall 2024 semester in hopes of being a software developer one day. I hope to learn more Python and C++ soon. I love being able to learn new languages by myself. There is something about figuring out how everything works that makes me feel so accomplished. So far I have learned Java and Javascript and I cannot wait to learn more. However, coding hasn't always gone easy for me. When I first started there was a very noticeable difference between the number of men in the classroom and the number of women. As I took more advanced classes, there were even fewer and fewer women. In most of these classes, there were no members of the LGBTQIA+ community, which as a Lesbian made it difficult for me to feel like I belonged. However, instead of letting this hold me back, I decided to keep pushing and to one day be the representation that I never saw. Other than coding, I also love nature and the environment. I love being by the water and paddle boarding or kayaking whenever I have an opportunity. I am an avid activist for environmentalism and I strive to make a better world for future generations. I would love to do more work for the environment to make a better world. I would love to combine this goal with my love for computer science to create a more healthy environment, possibly creating simulations to help forecast environmental changes. I also would like to create more change in the feminist movement. Seeing the lack of representation in STEM fields has made me feel much more strongly about wanting to create change in feminism. I can combine my passion for coding with this by creating safe spaces for women to learn how to code, and give them easily accessible resources to help them get ahead in the field of STEM. Most importantly this will increase representation and help more women achieve their goals in STEM. This scholarship will help me to not just change the STEM field, but also to change the world and pave the way for generations to come.

I plan to pursue a major in computer science and possibly a minor in information science. As of now, I aim to be a software engineer and inspire other women to pursue careers in STEM. Seeing a lack of women in STEM has pushed me to be a part of the change and pursue computer science. In all of my STEM classes in high school, there was always a very obvious difference between the difference between the amount of men, and the amount of women. Some of the men in those classes would rarely ever listen to what the womens thoughts were, or would always ignore them. For a while, I was very angry about this. I often asked myself, "Why do I even want to pursue STEM if this is the way women are treated?" However, I realized instead of letting this hold me back, I should use this to drive my passion towards STEM. I can use this to help motivate myself to do well in not only my studies but also to help other women pursue STEM and help them get through the challenges of being a woman in STEM. This scholarship would help me tremendously in my pursuit of higher education because it will help me focus less on how I am paying for college so that I can fully concentrate on my studies and create change in our world. This scholarship will also help me go to a better, but more expensive school so that I can get the best education I can receive without having to worry about how I will pay for it. A time when I made a contribution to my community that has impacted me today is when I helped put on the production of, "Sleepy Hollow" for my school fall play. I was the lead stage manager, special effects designer, and a part of the set crew. As we finished our show and went out into our school's lobby to talk to our friends and family who came out to see the show, I could overhear a conversation between two young girls. They talked about how amazing the show was, and how the set was beautiful and the fog was so cool. They both wanted to join theater after seeing the show, and it made me feel amazing to see that something I helped to produce helped to change the lives of others and inspire them to join the arts in their futures.