When I close my eyes, I can envision my dream life so clearly. It involves the privilege of waking up debt-free, healthy, and giving back to the people and communities that have poured into me. To be financially free would mean that I was able to achieve my goal of becoming a marketing director, and the hard work that was put into pursuing my education paid off. All the late nights and early mornings that were dedicated to studying and completing assignments would be worth it. I wouldn’t be living paycheck to paycheck and the financial burden of student loans would be absent from my life. I would be able to make financial choices out of my own desires rather than necessity, and I would be investing the money that was being put towards student loans into savings accounts and stocks so I could plan for retirement. Health is often overlooked but to be healthy is truly one of the biggest blessings. I would want not only myself but for my family and loved ones to be healthy too. Living out a quality healthy life would mean routinely exercising, focusing on self-care, and partaking in healthy eating habits. Getting adequate sleep and just taking care of my body would allow me to show up every day as authentically as I could. Any success that I’d be able to achieve could be attributed to those that believed in me and took the time to invest in my educational and personal development. This includes my parents who sacrificed for me to be able to attend college as a first-generation college student, and my teachers whose vital work is often overlooked and undervalued. Being able to express my gratitude and appreciation to those that have believed in me would mean absolutely everything to me. I would financially support my parents and teachers and sponsor the youth programs and clubs that helped me grow. Additionally, I want to provide scholarships for young black women that want to pursue marketing at both the undergraduate and graduate level. Creating the scholarships would sincerely be a full circle moment for me and would help plant the seed for empowering the future generations of young black women that were looking to achieve their goals. I would truly be living my life out to the fullest. For now, the dream life that I strive to cultivate living out someday exists only in my wildest dreams, but until then I will continue to work hard to make it come to fruition as my reality.

Let’s keep this Short ’n Sweet, Sabrina Carpenter is the epitome of having your hardwork pay off at the right time. I was in the process of aging out of watching Disney Channel when Sabrina was starring as Maya in Girl Meets World so I didn’t watch her acting. However, I have always paid attention to her music. I have to thank Disney Channel for blasting Wildside during so many commercials to promote Adventure’s in Babysitting because that’s how I found out that Sabrina can sing. I genuinely became a fan when Singular Act I and Singular Act II came out. Those songs helped get me through studying in undergrad. I like how playful Sabrina can be in her music, but I also can appreciate when she shows more of her vulnerable side. Now at 26, in graduate school Exhale takes on a whole new meaning. Sabrina sings “I put too much on myself thinking I don’t deserve what I’ve earned”. Getting accepted into a the Digital and Integrated Marketing Communications Master’s Program at the University of Kansas after not attending school for four years was an accomplishment in and of itself. I am a first generation college student and I know that I am capable of succeeding in a graduate school program. However, being in school while navigating the financial burden that comes with paying for school feels suffocating knowing that I already have multiple student loans that need to be paid off. The song just asks for some form a relief or break and I feel that deeply. Even in tough times, Sabrina’s music is empowering and reminds me to keep pushing and work towards my goals and dreams of being a Marketing Manager. I hope to be in the scholarship committee’s Good Graces with this Nonsense outro. How quickly can you take your clothes off pop quiz? Everyone knows learning’s fundamental. This scholarship it really is essential. Winning it would be monumental. Thank you so much for considering me!

As a former track and field athlete, I am a huge superfan of the entire United States Track and Field team. However, my favorite athlete that I cheered for on Team USA this year was, track sprinter, Sha’Carri Richardson. Her journey to the 2024 Paris Olympics was a testament to her perseverance and strength in the face of adversity. In 2021 despite placing first in the 100m dash at the U.S. Olympic Team Trials and qualifying for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, Sha’Carri was unable to compete due to testing positive for THC. After learning that her biological mother passed away, Sha'Carri admitted that she smoked cannabis. Although THC is not a performance enhancing drug, it's still a drug that is banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency. She received a one-month suspension for testing positive and this made her ineligible to run at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. When the suspension occurred, Sha’Carri received an extremely harsh amount of backlash and negative comments from the media and spectators. One of track’s biggest stars had fallen from grace at one of the most inopportune times of her budding career. She took a break from the limelight, stopped paying attention to any negative media coverage, and she focused on her comeback. When Sha’Carri returned to racing some people had counted her out of being a contender to make the team because she wasn’t placing well at her meets. She used her previous experiences to fuel her devotion and dedication to training. It wasn’t until she won the women’s 100m dash at the 2023 World Athletics Championships in Budapest that people really noticed that she was putting in the work to become an Olympian and represent Team USA in the 2024 Paris Olympics. Her hard work paid off big time because Sha’Carri was able to win a silver medal in the women’s 100m dash and a gold medal in the women’s 4x100m relay for Team USA. The fact that she medaled twice in her first Olympic Games is a huge accomplishment, especially considering that she wasn’t even able to compete in the previous Olympic Games. In a post-race interview Sha’Carri said, “I’m not back, I'm better” and you can just tell that she’s in a better place than she was 3 years ago. I love when people are able to work on themselves and I was so glad to see her succeed. We witnessed one of the hardest moments of her life ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, and this year we were able to see some of the best moments of her life representing Team USA on one of the biggest stages at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. I might not run track anymore, but Sha’Carri’s story is beyond inspiring for me to keep working towards my goals and dreams. She taught me that even though the journey to fulfill a dream might not be the most straightforward or linear, it will be fulfilled at the right time due to consistency and wanting better for myself. As I start a Digital and Integrated Marketing Communications master’s program, after a four year break from school, I am going to channel my inner Sha’Carri to be persistent in my studies and achieve my goal of becoming a Marketing Manager. I must rely on myself to enact the change that I want to see to achieve my goals, and I’m hoping that despite any adversity that I might experience in the next three years while completing my program that I will be able to succeed. Thank you for your consideration.

My name is Katrina Nesbit, and I am a graduate student in the Digital and Integrated Marketing Communications (MS) program at the University of Kansas. As a NYT Games subscriber that plays Connections daily, I was excited to create my own puzzle! My Connections puzzle includes the following words: meow, behavior, clear, bill, bark, retreat, snout, cheep, direct, leaves, beak, quack, social media, trunk, consumer, and evacuate. For the yellow straightforward category, I titled it “Animal Sounds” and this grouping includes the words meow, cheep, bark, and quack. I chose animal sounds because they are easily identifiable onomatopoeias. We teach children animal sounds at early ages as they begin to make noise and start formulating words. Animal sounds serve as the foundational step for learning speech and this Connections puzzle as we move into more difficult categories. The green category is called “Get Out” and this grouping includes the words leaves, retreat, evacuate, and clear. Leaves and clear are meant to be a little more difficult to group here because the word leaves is a homonym and could mean leaves on a tree or leaves as in exiting. We also have the word clear which is a homonym that could refer to something that’s translucent or easy to understand rather than removing something. I would like to “Get Out” of having more student loan debt as I continue my academic studies which is why this category is pertinent to include in this Connections puzzle. The blue category is titled “Noses” and this grouping includes the words trunk, snout, beak, and bill. Sticking with another animal theme for this category, the words represent various types of animal noses. This grouping is only slightly more difficult than the green category because it includes a few words that could mistakenly be paired with words from other categories. Every NYT Connections puzzle that I’ve played includes this twist, and I wanted to emulate this in my own puzzle. The words trunk, leaves, and bark might be mistaken as needing to be grouped together because they seem to be relevant to trees. Additionally, I included the words bill, cheep, and quack because of each word's relation to birds. However, within the context of the additional homonyms and onomatopoeias these two sets of word groupings would create an unsuccessful category solution and would lead to a mistake. Lastly, the tricky purple category is “Types of Marketing” and this grouping includes the words direct, consumer, behavior, and social media. As a Social Media Coordinator and a Digital and Integrated Marketing Communications Master’s program student, I wanted to have a category focused on an area of business that is so impactful on my studies and life. This field of work constantly requires using innovative and creative lines of thinking to find solutions for solving problems. This out of the box level of thinking is vital not only for marketing but for finding commonalities while playing Connections. This $500 NYT Connections Fan Scholarship would be beneficial for helping me pay off some of my current student loan debt and would allow me to buy my course materials for the 2024-2025 school year. I hope that you enjoyed my Connections puzzle and I thank you for your time and consideration for this scholarship.