Building a Relationship With My Community Around Clean Water Clean water is not something a community protects from a distance. It is something people have to care about together, in the same fields, along the same riverbanks, and around the same wells that everyone in a small town like Staples depends on. Building a real relationship with a community around clean water starts with showing up as a neighbor first, before showing up as an expert. LISTEN: Long before anyone trusts a person with technical knowledge about wetlands or watersheds, they want to know that person understands what daily life actually looks like on the ground. In a place like Staples, that means knowing which families rely on private wells, which fields flood every spring, and which stretches of the river have always been treated as informal fishing or gathering spots. That local knowledge does not come from a textbook. It comes from conversations at the feed store, at church, at the county fair, in line at the hardware store. Earning trust means being present in those ordinary spaces long before a permitting question or a water quality concern ever comes up. The second step is transparency about what protecting water actually requires. Regulations like the Clean Water Act can feel abstract or even threatening to landowners who worry about losing control over their own property. Building a relationship means explaining clearly why a wetland boundary matters, what it protects downstream, and how a permit process actually works, rather than letting people feel like rules are being handed down without explanation. When people understand the reasoning, they are far more likely to become partners in protecting water instead of adversaries trying to work around a regulation. Showing consistency over time. Trust in a small community is built slowly and lost quickly. That means following through on commitments, showing up to the same meetings year after year, and being honest when something does not go as planned. It also means celebrating small wins publicly, a cleaner stretch of river, a successful wetland restoration, a well that tested clean after a concern was raised, so that the community sees tangible proof that the effort is paying off. Build this kind of relationship means connecting clean water to things people already care about. In an agricultural community, that might mean tying water quality directly to crop yields and livestock health. Clean water rarely motivates people as an abstract environmental value. It motivates people when it is tied to their well, their crops, their kids swimming in the lake, or the family land they hope stays healthy for another generation. A lasting commitment to clean water in a place like Staples will not come from regulation alone. It will come from relationships built on presence, honesty, and a shared stake in the same watershed everyone already lives inside of. If just one waterway is cleaner for my community because of my efforts, I will have succeed in making a difference while I was here.

Hello, When my son died, everybody wanted a piece of him. They wanted his ashes before we had even had the funeral. One person wanted some in a necklace. People asked me for locks of his hair, and the funeral director cut it without asking me first. All I wanted was for my son to be left in one piece, and left alone, just once. He was twenty eight. He had a disability from birth, an arm deficiency, and almost nobody ever noticed it, because he had so much charisma that people met him and saw him instead. In his last year he was drinking, using, buried in debt, and facing something in court that was going to take everything from him. In October he jumped from a parking ramp. I had not seen him in five years. I did not walk away from my son. A door was shut on me and I spent five years standing on the other side of it. Mental illness did not end one life that day. It ended all of ours. Every one of us went off that ledge with him, and there is no climbing back up. Our lives changed, permanently, for the worse. A mother is only as happy as her saddest child, and mine is gone. Here is what I learned about people. When you need somebody the most, when nobody knows what to say, they are gone. That is what suicide does to the family left behind. It puts a silence around you. Nobody knows the right words, so they say nothing, and you end up standing in a room by yourself. I planned his funeral alone. I made the calls alone. I did not have a car, my phone was broken, and there were days nobody was beside me at all. I have buried my father, my sister, my mother, and now my son. One person showed up. My friend Kathy is a grandmother with a full time job and a family of her own, and she put all of it down and came, because nobody else would. She did not know what to say either. She came anyway. That is the whole difference. Not the right words. Just somebody willing to be in the room. There is a detail I cannot get out of my head. When they gave me his ashes, the container was lighter than I expected. Lighter than my father’s had been. I stood there wondering whether all of him was even in there. That is the kind of thought that lives in a mother’s mind now, instead of the good memories. I am fifty four. I am finishing a bachelor’s degree in environmental science, the first in my family to go to college, back in school after raising my children. It is something my son was proud of me for, something the two of us had a connection over. I am going to finish it harder than ever now, because it is one of the last threads between us and I am not letting go of it. What I want most is smaller than a degree. I want to be able to say his name out loud without my throat closing. I want to walk past his ashes in my own home and say hello to him, instead of turning away because I do not know how to feel and I am afraid of what happens if I let myself feel it. That is what I am working toward. Not being over it. Just being able to say hello to my son.

Hello, When my son died, everybody wanted a piece of him. They wanted his ashes before we had even had the funeral. One person wanted some in a necklace. People asked me for locks of his hair, and the funeral director cut it without asking me first. All I wanted was for my son to be left in one piece, and left alone, just once. He was twenty eight. He had a disability from birth, an arm deficiency, and almost nobody ever noticed it, because he had so much charisma that people met him and saw him instead. In his last year he was drinking, using, buried in debt, and facing something in court that was going to take everything from him. In October he jumped from a parking ramp. I had not seen him in five years. I did not walk away from my son. A door was shut on me and I spent five years standing on the other side of it. Mental illness did not end one life that day. It ended all of ours. Every one of us went off that ledge with him, and there is no climbing back up. Our lives did not pause and then resume. They changed, permanently, for the worse. A mother is only as happy as her saddest child, and mine is gone. Here is what I learned about people. When you need somebody the most, when nobody knows what to say, they are gone. That is what suicide does to the family left behind. It puts a silence around you. Nobody knows the right words, so they say nothing, and you end up standing in a room by yourself. I planned his funeral alone. I made the calls alone. I did not have a car, my phone was broken, and there were days nobody was beside me at all. I have buried my father, my sister, my mother, and now my son. One person showed up. My friend Kathy is a grandmother with a full time job and a family of her own, and she put all of it down and came, because nobody else would. She did not know what to say either. She came anyway. That is the whole difference. Not the right words. Just somebody willing to be in the room. There is a detail I cannot get out of my head. When they gave me his ashes, the container was lighter than I expected. Lighter than my father’s had been. I stood there wondering whether all of him was even in there. That is the kind of thought that lives in a mother’s mind now, instead of the good memories. I am fifty four. I am finishing a bachelor’s degree in environmental science, I went back to school after raising my children. It is something my son was proud of me for, something the two of us had a connection over. I am going to finish it harder than ever now, because it is one of the last threads between us and I am not letting go of it. What I want most is smaller than a degree. I want to be able to say his name out loud without my throat closing. I want to walk past his ashes in my own home and say hello to him, instead of turning away because I do not know how to feel and I am afraid of what happens if I let myself feel it. That is what I am working toward. Not being over it. Just being able to say hello to my son.

Hello, When my son died, everybody wanted a piece of him. They wanted his ashes before we had even had the funeral. One person wanted some in a necklace to wear around her neck. People were asking me for locks of his hair. The funeral director cut it without asking me first, and then handed it to me like he was doing me a favor. All I wanted was for my son to be left in one piece. Left still. Left alone, just once. That is what I keep coming back to. While he was alive, everybody wanted something from him too. Nobody let him be still. And when he was gone, it did not stop. My son was twenty eight. He jumped from a parking ramp on a Saturday evening in October. He had a disability from birth, an arm deficiency, and I will tell you something about that. Nobody ever saw it. He had so much charisma that people met him and never noticed. That was who he was. I had not seen him in five years. I was kept away. I want to be careful how I say that, because it is the part people misunderstand. I did not walk away from my son. A door was shut on me and I spent five years standing on the other side of it. Here is what I have learned about people since. When you need somebody the most, when nobody knows what to say, they are gone. That is what suicide does to the people left behind. It puts a silence around them. Nobody knows the right words, so they say nothing at all, and you end up standing in a room by yourself. I planned his funeral alone. I made the phone calls alone. I fought with a funeral home alone. I did not have a car, I did not have a phone that worked, and there were days I did not have one person sitting beside me. Friends I thought would be there disappeared. I have buried my father, my sister, my mother, and now my son, and I have never felt more alone than I did in those weeks. One person showed up. My friend Kathy who is a grandmother with a full time job and a family of her own, and she put all of it down and came, because nobody else would. She sat with me at the funeral home. She let them use her phone number when mine was broken. She did not know what to say either. She came anyway. That is the whole difference. Not the right words. Just somebody willing to be in the room. I would have traded places with him. Any parent would say that and mean it. The hardest part for me is that I was his mother. Not his friend, not his dad, not his brother, not his girlfriend. His mother. And I was the one who could not get to him. That is what I want to say to anybody reading this who is thinking about doing what my son did. You believe it will be easier on everyone once you are gone. I need you to know that is the one thing you are wrong about. He did not end one life that day. He ended all of ours. Every one of us went off that ledge with him, and there is no climbing back up. Our lives did not pause and resume. They changed, for the worse, permanently. A mother is only as happy as her saddest child, and mine is gone. I am what is left. I am a fifty four year old woman sitting in a house in rural Minnesota holding a plastic container that was lighter than I expected it to be. I could not stop wondering if all of him was even in there. That is the kind of thought that lives in your mother’s head now. Not the good memories. That. I cannot say his name out loud yet. I walk past his ashes in my own home and I look away, because I do not know how to feel and I am afraid of what happens if I let myself feel it. Whoever you are, you have somebody. Maybe not the person you think. Maybe it is a mother who has not been allowed to see you in five years and has never once stopped being your mother. Whoever is going to be left holding the container, they are going to be alone in a room with it, and no one will know what to say to them either. Please give them one more day. Then another one. Where I am going from here is not complicated, and it is not healed. I am finishing my degree. It is something my son was proud of me for, something the two of us had a connection over. I am the first in my family to go to college and I went back after raising my children. I am going to finish it harder than ever now, because it is one of the last threads between us and I am not letting go of it. What I want most is smaller than a degree. I want to be able to say his name out loud without my throat closing. I want to walk past his ashes and say hello to him instead of turning away. That is what I am working toward. Not being over it. Just being able to say hello to my son. Thank you this was healing for me.

Hello, Nobody in my family had ever gone to college before me. My mother didn’t finish high school, and I was raised by a single parent who worked hard just to keep us going. There was no roadmap for what I was doing, no one to call when I got stuck. I figured it out as I went, and that shaped how I see other people doing hard things without a safety net. One of my most unique skills is restoring player pianos, including the pneumatic systems that make them work. I taught myself during the pandemic by taking apart a free piano I found on Facebook, and I have been doing it ever since. When I first bring a piano in and start taking it apart to clean it, I never know what I might find inside. Old coins, handwritten notes, and sometimes photographs. Once I found a photo tucked inside that I was able to get back to the owner. They cried when they saw it. That picture had been lost inside that piano for who knows how long, and there it was again. Those are the moments that remind me what this work is really about. Player piano pneumatics are incredibly intricate, and most people who work on regular pianos won’t touch them. When I bring one back to life, that old-time music fills the room again, music that families thought they would never hear again. People cry, but for a good reason. They remember their grandparents, their childhoods, songs that felt lost forever. That is empathy in action. That is community being rebuilt, one song at a time. I am finishing a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science at University of Phoenix with a concentration in Natural Resources and Conservation. Even through some of the hardest seasons of my life, I held a 4.0 GPA across six classes, and I dedicated every one of those grades to my son Tory. That is what kept me going when nothing else did. My goal is to become a certified wetland delineator working along the Mississippi River corridor doing Section 404 permitting work. Wetlands are not just pretty land along a riverbank. They filter agricultural runoff, absorb floodwater, recharge groundwater, and protect every community downstream. What happens to a wetland in Minnesota does not stay in Minnesota. That water moves south through the entire Mississippi River system all the way to the Gulf of Mexico, carrying whatever we put into it or failed to protect along the way. Wetland delineation is the work that stands between healthy water and a degraded system that affects millions of people who never see the headwaters but drink and fish and live downstream from them. After I finish my bachelor’s degree, I plan to go on to earn my master’s and obtain my wetland delineation certification. That path takes time and money, and as a first-generation student, and 54 years old without family financial support, every scholarship I receive makes a real difference in whether I can keep going. This one would help me get there. Whether I am returning a lost photograph, bringing back music a family thought was gone forever, or protecting a wetland a community depends on, I show up the same way. I listen first. I use what I know. And I make sure the people around me feel like they matter. That is how I build something more empathetic, one restored piano, one protected wetland, one community at a time. Thank you for your time.

Hello, Being a first-generation college student means starting from zero in a system nobody in your family understands. My mother never finished high school. There was no one in my house who could explain how financial aid worked, how to read a syllabus, how to talk to a professor, or even what a degree program actually required. I have had to figure all of it out myself, one step at a time, without the kind of guidance that comes naturally to students whose parents already walked this path. I came back to college as an adult, not straight out of high school, which adds another layer to the first-generation experience. I am studying Environmental Science with a concentration in Natural Resources and Conservation at University of Phoenix. I did not grow up around people who talked about degrees or careers in science. I grew up around survival, hard work, and the unspoken assumption that college was for other families, not ours. The biggest challenge has been trusting that I belong in this world at all. Without family precedent, every new academic hurdle feels like proof I might not be cut out for this. Research papers, citation formats, navigating a learning platform, applying for scholarships, all of it had to be self-taught through trial and error and a lot of late nights figuring things out alone. There was no one to call who had already done it and could tell me it would be fine. What carried me through is the same thing that drew me to environmental science in the first place. I live on rural property near the Mississippi headwaters in Minnesota, and I have spent years watching the land and water around me, the runoff, the wetlands, the slow changes in the watershed. That firsthand connection to place became the thing that made the degree feel worth the struggle. I was not chasing a credential for its own sake. I was chasing the ability to actually do something about what I was seeing. My dream is to become a certified wetland delineator, doing Section 404 permitting work along the Mississippi River corridor, and eventually to earn the Professional Wetland Scientist credential. That is technical, specialized work, and it requires continuing education and certifications that cost real money, money a first-generation student without family financial backing does not have sitting around. This scholarship would directly support that path. It would mean fewer hours spent worrying about how to afford the next certification and more time actually doing the field work I have been building toward. Being first in my family to do this is not just my story. It is the foundation for whatever comes after me, and I want what comes after me to include cleaner water and healthier wetlands because I finally had the chance to learn how to protect them properly. Thank you for your time.

Hello, My mother never went to college. She raised me as a single parent, working hard to keep a roof over our heads, and college was never part of the conversation in our house. It was not that she did not value education. It was that survival came first, and there was no room left over for anything that looked like a luxury. I grew up understanding that some families get to plan for the future and some families are just trying to get through the week. I followed a similar path. I raised three kids as a single parent, on my own, with no degree and no safety net behind me. There were years where getting everyone fed, clothed, and to school on time was the entire victory of the day. College was not on the table. It could not be. Every bit of time and energy I had went into keeping my kids steady, making sure they had what they needed, and trying to give them a better foundation than the uncertainty I grew up with myself. What I did not expect was that raising them well would eventually become the thing that freed me to go back to school. One by one, my kids grew up and left for their own lives and their own educations. The house got quieter. The constant demands of small children needing things right now slowly gave way to something I had not had in decades, which was time that belonged to me. I remember sitting with that realization, that I finally had the space to do something I had wanted for myself for a very long time, and deciding I was not going to waste it. I enrolled at University of Phoenix to study Environmental Science with a concentration in Natural Resources and Conservation. I am finishing that degree now, working toward becoming a certified wetland delineator doing Section 404 permitting work along the Mississippi River corridor. I live on rural property near the Mississippi headwaters in Minnesota, and I have spent years watching the water here, the runoff, the wetlands, the slow changes in the land. Going back to school let me turn that lifetime of watching into something I can actually use professionally, to protect the water systems I have cared about long before I ever sat in a college classroom. Being raised by a single parent who could not access higher education, and then being a single parent myself who delayed it for decades, taught me that education is not a straight line for everyone. Sometimes it waits for you. Sometimes you have to put other people first for twenty years before it becomes your turn. I do not regret a single year I spent raising my kids before I got here. It built the patience and persistence I now bring to a demanding degree program. Going forward, I want to give back by doing work that protects the water and land for the next generation, including my own children and the grandchildren who will come after them. Wetland and watershed protection is generational work. The decisions made now about runoff, development, and permitting determine what kind of rivers and groundwater future families will inherit. I plan to be part of making sure that inheritance is a healthy one, the same way I once made sure my own children had what they needed to grow into adults who could go out and build their own lives.

Hello, My work will contribute to a healthier, more sustainable world by closing the gap between what gets protected on paper and what actually gets protected on the ground. I am finishing a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science with a concentration in Natural Resources and Conservation, and I am headed toward a career as a certified wetland delineator doing Section 404 permitting work in the Mississippi River corridor. I live on rural property near the Mississippi headwaters in Staples, Minnesota, so this work is not abstract to me. I watch the watershed every day. I see agricultural runoff move through drainage ditches in the spring. I have watched a neighbor’s hillside change after timber clearing left the soil exposed through two rain seasons. I see forest succession happening in real time on my own land. That daily, long-term observation is something I bring to environmental science that a textbook cannot teach. Wetland delineation sits at a critical pressure point in conservation. It is the technical work that determines what counts as a protected wetland under the Clean Water Act and what does not, which means it directly shapes how much of our remaining wetland acreage survives development. Wetlands filter pollutants, slow flooding, recharge groundwater, and support biodiversity that has nowhere else to go once those systems are drained or filled. The work I am training for is not flashy, but it is foundational. If the boundary on a delineation map is wrong, everything downstream of that decision is compromised, including the actual water downstream. I have gotten may start in this kind of field work through GIS and ArcGIS mapping with the Minnesota DNR, working with Professor Kent Montgomery at Central Lakes College on old-growth forest status designation. That fieldwork taught me that data only matters if it accurately reflects what is happening on the ground, and that the best environmental scientists are the ones willing to go out and check rather than trusting the map at face value. I plan to carry that habit into my professional work. I want to be the kind of delineator who builds relationships with landowners before a project starts, who tracks change over time instead of treating a single site visit as the whole story, and who is willing to flag when a technically defensible boundary does not match ecological reality. Long term, I am working toward the Professional Wetland Scientist credential, which will let me take on more complex permitting work and speak with more authority in the rooms where development decisions get made. I want my career to mean that fewer wetlands disappear quietly through undercounted delineations, and that the agricultural and rural communities along the Mississippi corridor have someone in their corner who understands both the science and the practical realities of living on the land. I think about the world my future grandchildren will inherit, and I want them to still have headwaters worth camping near, water worth drinking, and wetlands doing the quiet work of holding a watershed together. That is what I am building toward, one delineation, one permit, one accurate map at a time. Thank you for your time.

Hello, Nobody in my family went to college. Not my mom, not my dad, not my grandma. Education was something you were supposed to look up to, but it wasn’t for us. It was for other people. The ones with money, or the ones who left and didn’t come back. I’m the first. And I didn’t go at eighteen like you’re supposed to. I went later, already a grown woman with a business and a whole life, which means I know what it costs to walk through a door nobody in your family ever opened. Here’s why it matters to me. School changed how I see the ground I’ve lived on my whole life. I’m out in rural Minnesota, up near where the Mississippi starts, surrounded by drainage ditches and farm fields. I watched that water go bad for years. Ponds that used to be clear, choked with algae. Runoff coming off the fields every time it rained hard. I knew something was wrong way before I had the words for it. That’s what school gave me. The words. The proof. I’m finishing a degree in environmental science, natural resources and conservation, and working toward getting certified as a wetland delineator. So now when I look at that water I don’t just feel that it’s wrong. I can show you why. I can measure it and I can stand in front of the people who decide things and make them listen. I used to think being right was enough. It’s not. Took me a while to learn that. When it’s real water and real land, you don’t get to half know something. School didn’t make me care more, I already cared plenty. It made me useful. That’s the difference. I went from a woman who loved her land to a woman who can actually do something about it. The drive, honestly, came from not having anybody to ask. No parent who could look at a syllabus and tell me what the professor really wanted. Nobody to call when the science got hard. I just figured it out. One class at a time, while running my piano business and keeping the rest of my life going. Things happened that would’ve been a good enough reason for anybody to quit. I didn’t. I kept my head down and kept going, because the other choice was standing there watching the water get worse while I knew I could’ve helped. What I want to leave behind is two things. First is the land. I want the wetlands and the water up here by the headwaters to be better off because I showed up and did the work. Wetland delineation isn’t pretty. It’s technical, it’s boots in the mud, and it’s exactly the kind of work that decides whether a wetland gets saved or drained. I want to be one of the people who made sure the right ones got saved. You can’t put that in a photo. It’s just water staying clean for the folks downstream, and most of them will never know my name. Second I want to be the proof in my own family. The one who went first, so college stops being some far-off thing that belongs to other people and just becomes something we do now. The kids coming up after me should grow up knowing the door opens, because they watched it open for me. That’s why education matters to me and what I’m hoping to leave. Cleaner water in the place that raised me, and a family that quits believing college is for somebody else.

Membership, Not Ownership: A Close Reading of Aldo Leopold’s Land Ethic Selected paragraph (Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, “The Land Ethic”): “We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.” Aldo Leopold is doing something quietly radical in these two sentences. He is not asking us to recycle more or pollute less. He is telling us that the way we damage land traces back to a single mistake in how we categorize it. We treat land as property, as a thing we own, and ownership gives the owner the right to use a thing however he pleases. Leopold’s underlying argument is that the abuse is not a behavior problem to be corrected with rules. It is a relationship problem. Until we change what we believe land is, no rule will hold, because the belief underneath the rule still says the land is ours to spend. The first sentence names the disease. We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. Notice he says commodity, not resource. A commodity is something whose entire value is its exchange value, something that exists to be bought, used up, and replaced. When a forest is a commodity, the only honest question an owner can ask is how much it is worth and how fast it can be converted to cash. Leopold is pointing out that the cruelty is built into the category itself. You cannot abuse something you genuinely belong to. You can only abuse something you stand above. The word belonging in that sentence is doing the damage. It puts the human on top and the land underneath. Then the second sentence turns the whole structure over. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect. He keeps the word belong, but he reverses its direction. In the first sentence the land belongs to us. In the second, we belong to the land. That single inversion is the entire land ethic compressed into one move. Membership replaces ownership. We are no longer the proprietors of the field, the river, and the soil. We are one more species inside a community that also contains the soil, the water, the plants, and the animals, and a member of a community does not get to strip-mine the other members without consequence to himself. I want to sit on the phrase he chose, which is community to which we belong. Leopold was an ecologist, and he is being precise, not sentimental. He saw that soil, water, plants, animals, and people form one functioning system where the health of each part depends on the others. To call it a community is to say it has internal obligations, the same way a town or a family does. You do not get to poison the well because the well is technically on your deed. The water moves. It belongs to everyone downstream. The moment you understand yourself as a member rather than an owner, your freedom to take is bounded by your responsibility to the whole. The two small words at the end, love and respect, are easy to skim past, but they are the payoff. Leopold is claiming that those feelings are not decoration. They are the only durable engine for conservation. He had watched regulation fail again and again because rules can be evaded, lobbied away, or simply ignored when no one is watching. What cannot be evaded is how a person feels about a place he considers part of himself. You protect what you love without being forced to. So the sentence is not soft. It is a hardheaded claim about what actually changes human behavior over the long run, which is affection rather than enforcement. There is also a warning folded into the word may. He does not promise that seeing land as community will make us use it well. He says we may begin to. Leopold is honest that this is a starting point, not a guarantee. The shift in how we see land only opens the door. The walking through it still has to be done, year after year, by people who keep choosing membership over ownership even when ownership pays better. That modest word keeps the passage from being a slogan. It admits the hard part is still ahead. This passage is the reason I do the work I do. I live near the Mississippi headwaters, and I watch what happens when land is treated as a commodity that happens to belong to whoever holds the title. I see fertilizer run off fields into ditches, I watch algae bloom in water that should be clear, I see drainage cut to move water off private ground as fast as possible with no thought for what receives it downstream. Every one of those choices is legal, and every one of them comes from the first sentence Leopold wrote, the belief that the land is a possession to be optimized. The headwaters do not belong to any one owner. They belong to a community that stretches the length of a continent, and the people at the top of the watershed are members of that community whether they accept the membership or not. That is what Leopold is really saying. The fix for environmental abuse is not primarily technical and it is not primarily legal. It is a change in identity. As long as a person stands outside the land as its owner, he will use it the way owners use property, which is to extract value and move on. The moment he understands that he stands inside the land as one of its members, the calculation changes, because now harming the land means harming the community he is part of, and protecting it becomes a form of protecting himself. Leopold did not write a rule. He wrote a relationship, and he was betting that getting the relationship right is the only thing that ever makes the rules unnecessary.

Sustainability In Environmental Science Sustainability should be a priority in my field because environmental science only matters if it actually protects something. I am studying to become a certified wetland delineator, and my whole reason for doing it is to keep water and land healthy enough to keep serving the people and wildlife that depend on them. If the work does not lead to real protection, it is just paperwork. Sustainability is the point, not a bonus. I live in rural Staples, Minnesota, near the headwaters of the Mississippi River. The river starts small up here, and what happens at the top flows all the way down to the Gulf. I see the pressures on it every day. After a hard rain the drainage ditches run cloudy with agricultural runoff. Roadside sloughs bloom with algae. The water that feeds a huge part of the country begins right here, which means the choices made here ripple outward for thousands of miles. That is why sustainability in my field is not abstract to me. It is the ditch down my road and the slough across the field. A wetland delineator reads the soil, the plants, and the water to mark exactly where a wetland begins and ends. That sounds technical, but it is one of the most practical sustainability tools there is. Wetlands filter runoff before it reaches the river, soak up floodwater that would otherwise damage homes and farms, and hold habitat for fish and birds. When they are mapped honestly and protected, development and farming can move forward without quietly destroying the systems that keep the water clean. When they are ignored, communities downstream pay for it. Good delineation is how you balance growth with protection instead of choosing one over the other. I see myself reducing environmental impact in a very hands-on way. I am not going to be making sweeping policy from a distance. I am going to be the person out in the field, boots in the muck, documenting what is actually there so that land use decisions are based on real conditions instead of guesses. I already have GIS and ArcGIS mapping experience from field work with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, and I am building the science behind it through coursework in watershed health, toxicology, and ecological risk. Every class adds another tool I can use to turn observation into protection. My vision for the future is steady and local. I want to spend my career protecting the wetlands and waterways near the Mississippi headwaters, working with farmers, counties, and land managers to keep development from damaging the water everyone shares. I want to be a trusted local voice who can explain, in plain language, why a healthy wetland keeps the whole community safer and the water cleaner. Caring for the planet often sounds like a global problem too big for one person. I have learned it is also a local one. If I do my work well, the water leaving my corner of Minnesota will be cleaner for everyone downstream. That is the difference I plan to make.

My Future What I want to build is a future where the water in my community stays clean, and a career that lets me be one of the people protecting it. I live in rural Staples, Minnesota, right near the headwaters of the Mississippi River. Most people think of the Mississippi as a wide river far downstream, but up here it starts small, and what happens at the top flows all the way down. I see the threats up close. After a heavy rain the drainage ditches run cloudy with farm runoff. Roadside sloughs turn green with algae blooms. The water that feeds half the country begins right here, and right here is where the damage often starts. That is what I want to build my life around stopping. I am a non-traditional student finishing my Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science, with a concentration in Natural Resources and Conservation. My goal is to become a certified wetland delineator. That is the person who walks a piece of ground and reads the soil, the plants, and the water to mark exactly where a wetland begins and ends. It matters because wetlands quietly filter runoff, soak up floodwater, and protect the river before pollution can spread. When they are mapped honestly and protected, the whole community downstream is safer and healthier. More schooling is what lets me build this. I already have hands-on GIS and ArcGIS mapping experience from field work with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, and I am adding the science behind it through coursework in watershed health, toxicology, and ecological risk. Each class gives me another tool to turn what I observe on my own land into work that actually protects it. The impact reaches well beyond me. Clean water is not a luxury. It is drinking water, healthy fishing, safe recreation, and farmland that lasts. When I protect a wetland near the headwaters, I am protecting every town and family downstream who never realizes their clean water started up here in a quiet Minnesota slough. That is what I am building. Not just a career, but a healthier future for the water my community depends on, and for everyone who comes after us.

My Son We always thought Tory was the strong one. He was my oldest, born without bones in his arms, his arms short his whole life, and he never once claimed the word handicapped. His friends did not see it. His family did not see it. He would not let us. He made it to twenty eight as a straight A student, nearly valedictorian, and the lesson he taught everyone around him was never spoken out loud. It was just the way he lived, refusing to be defined by the thing that was supposed to define him. If anyone had a reason to announce his pain to the world, it was Tory, and he never did. He turned what could have been a limit into the quiet proof that a person decides who they are. Then last October something happened to him that I still do not understand, something I could not see, and he took his own life. He had carried more than most people ever carry and made it look easy, and that is exactly why none of us saw the danger coming. Here is the part I have turned over a thousand times. I have lived with mental illness my whole life. I know the inside of the dark place. I moved through my own version of it in my twenties and somehow came out the other side. So I have asked myself, over and over, how I of all people did not see it in my own son. I should have noticed him going quiet. I should have caught something in his voice. I should have known the signs better than anyone because I have lived them. That guilt is its own kind of grief, and I will probably carry it the rest of my life. But living with this illness taught me something that answers that guilt, even when it does not erase it. The people who hide their pain best hide it from everyone, including the ones who love them most and know the territory firsthand. Tory spent twenty eight years making sure no one saw what he carried. That was the same strength that made him refuse the word handicapped. He was not sending signals I missed. He was working hard so there would be no signals at all. Knowing the dark place myself did not give me the power to see into his. That is the cruelest thing about suicide. It takes the people who spend all their energy making sure everyone else is okay. Nearly fifty years ago Ethel Hayes was lost the same way. A kind and courageous woman, she could not cope with the realities of her inner and outer world, and the people who loved her were left to carry the silence after her. Half a century later, families like mine are still losing the strong ones the same way, in the same silence. That is what stays with me about her story. The years pass and the science changes, but the thing that kills is still the shame, the belief that you must not say I am not okay out loud. Her son turned that loss into a reason to bring the darkness to light so it would slowly fade. I understand now why he built something out of it. When you cannot save the person, the only thing left is to try to save the next one. Losing Tory changed what I want the rest of my life to count for. I am a non-traditional student finishing my degree in environmental science, working toward becoming a certified wetland delineator near the Mississippi River headwaters where I live. My work is about protecting things that look stable on the surface but are quietly under stress, watersheds and wetlands, the slow damage nobody notices until the water turns. The healthiest looking systems can be the ones closest to collapse. Paying attention is the whole job, with water and with people both. I did not plan for my work to teach me about my son, but it did. It changed my relationships too, and it changed what I believe prevention really is. I say the hard things out loud now. I ask people how they actually are, and I wait for the real answer instead of accepting the easy one. I do not let the strong ones off the hook just because they seem fine, because Tory seemed fine. I have learned that prevention rarely looks like a crisis hotline, though those matter and they save lives. Most of the time it looks like one person refusing to let I’m fine end a conversation. It looks like making it safe to tell the truth long before the truth becomes an emergency. It looks like a family that talks about sadness the way it talks about everything else, so no one has to hide. Love is not enough on its own. Love has to come with attention, and with the willingness to drag the darkness into the light instead of letting people bury it the way so many of us were taught to. I wanted to apply for this scholarship because it honors a woman lost the way my son was lost, and because its whole purpose is the work I now believe in with everything I have. Finishing my education is how I rebuild a life with meaning after the worst thing that can happen to a parent. Last year I held a 4.0 across six classes and did not lose a single point, and I kept it for that boy, who was so proud of me. He is still the reason I open the books. I am doing this later than most, while running my small business and grieving and watching the land I love, but I am still here. I intend to spend the rest of my life paying attention, to the water and to the people both, so that fewer families learn what mine learned.

Hello, I didn’t go to college right after high school like most people. I raised my kids first, spent years watching the world from a different angle, and somewhere along the way I figured out what I was put here to do. Now I’m finishing my bachelor’s degree in Natural Resources and Conservation at University of Phoenix with a clear mission: to become a wetland delineator protecting water quality in Minnesota and beyond. What pushed me toward higher education wasn’t some lightning-bolt moment—it was years of living near the Mississippi River headwaters in Staples and watching agricultural runoff change our waterways. I’d see the chemicals washing off fields after every rain, heading straight into the streams that feed the Mississippi. I kept asking myself, who’s standing up for these rivers? Who’s making sure we’re not destroying what we can’t get back? That question wouldn’t leave me alone. When I got the chance to work with Professor Kent Montgomery at Central Lakes College on GIS and ARC mapping projects for the Minnesota DNR, something clicked. We were documenting old forest status designations, and I realized this was real work that made a real difference. You map it, you document it, you protect it. That’s when I knew I needed the full education to do this right. The journey hasn’t been smooth. Last October I lost my son Tory, and that knocked me sideways. I had to withdraw from courses, couldn’t focus, couldn’t see the point of much of anything for a while. But grief has a way of clarifying what matters. My son’s death reminded me that if I’m going to be here, I better make it mean something. My personal values got shaped by being a mother first and a student second. I learned patience, persistence, and how to keep moving forward even when everything feels impossible. Those same values drive my career aspirations now. Becoming a wetland delineator means I’ll be the person who determines what areas need federal protection under the Clean Water Act. I’ll be documenting wetlands, analyzing soil and hydrology, identifying the boundaries that keep development from destroying critical habitat. It’s technical work, but it’s also advocacy—standing up for ecosystems that can’t speak for themselves. The community impact is personal because I’ve seen what happens when nobody speaks up. Agricultural runoff around Staples affects water quality all the way down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico. Wetlands filter that pollution before it reaches our rivers, but only if we protect those wetlands in the first place. When I’m certified and working, I’ll be directly protecting the water systems that Central Minnesota communities depend on. Every wetland I help protect is filtering water, preventing flooding, and providing habitat. That’s service that matters. This scholarship will help me finish what I started. After my son’s death, I faced financial challenges from those course withdrawals, and money’s been tight. I’m close to the finish line, but I need help getting there. Once I have this degree, I’ll pursue wetland delineation certification and start working with environmental consulting firms or agencies like the DNR or EPA. I’m not the traditional student they probably had in mind when they designed these programs, but maybe that’s exactly why I’ll be good at this work. I’ve got perspective, determination, and a bone-deep understanding that protecting our natural resources isn’t abstract policy—it’s about the water our kids drink and the land we leave behind. That’s the impact I plan to make, one wetland at a time.

Hello, I didn’t take the traditional path to environmental science. I raised my children first, working to keep a roof over our heads while watching the Mississippi River flow past Staples, Minnesota, where I lived for years. Every spring, I’d see the water turn cloudy with agricultural runoff, carrying fertilizers and chemicals downstream. Every camping trip to White Dog Campgrounds reminded me how much I loved being outdoors, but also how fragile these systems really are. Eventually I realized I wanted to do more than just appreciate nature.-I wanted to protect it. Going back to school as a single parent in a low income household, hasn’t been easy. Between financial strain and life throwing curveballs, I’ve had to withdraw from courses and scramble to find ways to keep moving forward. But I haven’t quit because this work matters too much. My goal is to become a wetland delineator-someone who protects the areas that filter our water, sustain wildlife, and keep entire watersheds healthy. The hands-on work is what drives me. When I worked with Professor Kent Montgomery at Central Lakes College on GIS and ARCmapping projects for the Minnesota DNR, I wasn’t just looking at data on a screen. We were designating old forest status and mapping ecosystems that needed protection. I realize this is how conservation actually is-one parcel at a time, one delineation at a time, by people willing to show up and do the work. Living near the Mississippi headwaters has taught me that everything’s connected. What happens upstream affects communities hundreds of miles away. Protecting wet lands here means cleaner water in Iowa, healthier ecosystems in Missouri, and a more sustainable Gulf Coast. That’s the kind of tangible impact I want to make with my career-not just studying environmental problems, but being part of the solution on the ground. Irv Berman’s story resonates with me because he understood that hard work, curiosity, and love for the natural world can coexist with obstacles. Financial hardship and being a single parent doesn’t disqualify someone from making a difference. I might just be more determined.I’m committed to finishing this degree and building a career that protects the waterways and wetlands I’ve spent a lifetime caring about. Information and spreading information through community resources and any way we can helps. This scholarship would help me get there by lowering the stress level and help me concentrate on school and the kids.Thank you.

Hello, Growing up near the Mississippi River headwaters I’ve always been drawn to water. But it wasn’t until I started noticing the agricultural runoff clouding the river each spring that I realized how vulnerable our water systems really are. That’s what pushed me towards Natural Resources and Conservation .-I wanted to understand how to protect the waterways I grew up around. Working with Professor Kent Montgomery on GIS mapping projects for the Minnesota DNR showed me the practical side of conservation. We were designating old for status and mapping ecosystems and I realized this work actually matters. It’s not just about studying problems-it’s about creating solutions on the ground My goal is to become a wetland delineator protecting the areas that filter our water and sustain ecosystems. Every wet land I help preserve means cleaner water downstream, healthier habitats, and communities that can depend on their water sources. That’s the kind of tangible impact I want to make.-one watershed at a time. Thank you.

Hello, Living near the Mississippi River headwaters in Staples, Minnesota I’ve watched firsthand how our choices upstream affect everything downstream. Every spring, I see agricultural runoff turning the water murky carrying fertilizer and chemicals that don’t just disappear-they travel hundreds of miles impacting communities and ecosystems all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. That reality is what pushed me to pursue a degree in Environmental Science with a concentration in Natural Resources and Conservation. My goal is to become a wetland delineator. Sustainability isn’t just an abstract concept to me. It’s about recognizing that we’re all connected through systems like watersheds. What one farmer does in central Minnesota matters to someone in Louisiana. International cooperation is critical because pollution doesn’t respect borders-rivers cross state lines, air currents carry emissions globally, and climate impacts hit everyone differently, but hit everyone eventually. We need countries working together on emission standards and conservation practices because isolated efforts aren’t enough. The government can’t do it alone. Individual actions matter too. When I worked on a GIS mapping projects for the Minnesota DNR, I saw how small parcels of protected wetland add up to major water quality improvements. Every person who reduces chemical use, supports conservation policy, or pursuits a career in environmental protection contributes to the larger solution. My goal is to be part of that.-protecting waterways one delineation at a time, because sustainable water systems are foundational to everything else we’re trying to preserve. Thank you.

I will succeed in changing the world. Our wetlands are a source of biodiversity, habitat, and also a filter for our ground water. With this scholarship I will continue to learn laws , regulations, and conservation management to save these much needed areas. The pandemic we all had to go through was a eye opener for this unconventional student. Everything went online. A computer was only in libraries when I was in high school. It stopped my learning instantly. College was a dream that came true when my children were off and in colleges in the big city of Minneapolis, Minnesota. I'm very proud of my boys. I was at a lose of what to do when they left. I knew I wanted to make a difference and help our environments that I taught my children in. They appreciate our planet and are aware of the destruction that can occur with ignorance and not taking care of the world they live in. One accomplished earned for me. I then realized I had time for me and my dream of saving our wetlands. I started college and 2nd semester the terrible coronavirus had us all isolated. I found a love of restoration of player pianos that kept me busy and learning a new skill. Now I've taken computer skill programs so I'll never be left behind in our technology driven world.In my time at Central Lakes College I worked with much of the DNR sectors. Forestry, fisheries, and my favorite, GPS Intelligence. We worked with ARC mapping and accomplished helping areas become Old forest status. My professor Kent Montgomery would be my role model as he is a biologist and taught and helped me continue to learn my skills of accomplishing my goal of Wetland Delineator. I feel blessed just being able to write to you today for this scholarship on my computer. Smile Thank you, Julia Burton A blessed college student of today changing the world one day at a time