I have a really cool story associated with Spider-Man, and I'm so excited to share! My favorite Spider-Man (or.. Spider-Woman) actress is Hailee Steinfeld. Hailee voiced Gwen Stacy, Spider-Gwen, in the animated spiderverse movies. She also plays Kate Bishop in Hawkeye and she voices Vi in Arcane League of Legends. Back in the 1990s, my dad attended East Carolina University, which is where I'll be attending this fall, by the time the winners of this scholarship are announced, I'll already be at ECU's School of Art and Design. While my dad was at ECU, he was playing basketball with a group of friends he'd met, they wanted to have a full-on game on the court but they were short one player. My dad (Shane) looked around to hopefully find someone to join their team, and lo-and-behold, he found Jason Latour, the co-creator of Spider-Gwen. This first interaction between Jason and Shane happened before Jason became famous for his widely known character, Jason was attending the School of Art and Design. Shane asked if he would fill in the extra spot they needed to be able to have a full game and Jason agreed, but he told Shane to give him a few minutes while he finished up an art project. The project was to draw a tree from the outside, which is why Jason was outside at the same time Shane was. From then on, Jason and Shane became good friends and even gave each other nicknames. I don't entirely remember the story but Jason nicknamed my dad "Catfish". I believe it had something to do with an incident that Shane had in one of the dining halls. Anyways, when I told my dad that I wanted to go to East Carolina, we started looking at the notable alumni just for fun, and we found Jason Latour as #37 on the list. My dad laughed, he didn't even know that Jason actually went on to animate great things for Marvel and DC. I'll copy and paste ECU's description of why Jason is in their notable alumni list: David Jason Latour is an American comic-book and comic-strip artist and writer known for his work for Image Comics, Dark Horse Comics, Marvel Comics, and DC Comics on titles such as Wolverine, Winter Soldier, Southern Bastards and Spider-Gwen, co-creating Spider-Woman / Gwen Stacy (Earth-65) in the latter, later adapted to the Spider-Verse film franchise. It's no surprise that Spider-Gwen is my favorite spider hero, I have someone to look up to and I have hope that the education I'll receive from ECU's School of Art and Design will be worthwhile!

A piece of technology that has always inspired me has been a video camera. This piece of technology is interesting because it is old AND new. Old film cameras held the ability to film in black and white and be copied onto film tapes which, at the time, were widely known as 'motion pictures'. New cameras have the ability to film in color on many different other pieces of technology known more recently as 'videos'. My future career is solely based on the ability to film, I plan to record in a studio with the knowledge of editing, animating, filming, and building cameras. I will video short films, movies, commercials, and TV shows for the current and future generations. If all is lost, at least I'll have several recordings of life in the first half of the 21st century. I want my videos to be researched and experimented on by historians and behavioral scientists in the next few hundred years. Today there are very very few video or audio recordings from the early 1900s, I believe the oldest audio recording that I have ever heard dates back to the late 1800s. I want my recordings to have that same effect in the future, I want to record life in the 2020s, 2030s, and 2040s while making film productions that could be talked about for centuries. I like to think of my creating videos now as a form of research, but more like a form of research that will be studied in the future, I'm just helping to set the foundation.

A woman in my life who has inspired me is Cleopatra, although it's been many years since her death her impact on the world hasn't changed. In her time, it was already very difficult for any woman to gain recognition, let alone power. She was able to ascend to the throne in 51 BCE after the death of her brother, and she was known to have such insightful thoughts and strong leadership that she was able to make a partnership with Julius Caesar. Cleopatra expanded Egyptian territory, strengthened their economic standing, and secured a connection with Rome and their Navy. A lot has happened to me because of me being a woman, and a lot of it was unfair, but instead of lashing out or going into depressive episodes I stayed strong because I remember how Cleopatra fought through every unpopular opinion of her ruling Egypt. One of her quotes stays in my head, "I will not be triumphed over" and this quote gives me motivation to stand up for myself when there are challenges ahead. Even when Cleopatra was alive she was an inspiration to her people, she grew up in the royal family and all the while she was given internal and external threats because she was a woman in power, but it didn't stop her from being the last active ruler of Ptolemaic Egypt. She was only 18 years old when she became Queen and ruled for 21 years before committing suicide by snake venom before the fall of the kingdom. There could have been many, many other women that I would have written about such as Harriet Tubman, Marilyn Monroe, Kamala Harris, etc but I chose to write about Cleopatra because of the deep mark she left on history. It was rare for a woman to be written about or remembered, but Cleopatra was put on a coin and is taught in schools today. Although she is strongly remembered for her relationships with Julius Caesar and Marc Antony, she herself had great accomplishments that to me, are highly valuable. I feel that since she was able to climb in power during such a harsh time that I can get through my harsh times just as she did. She inspires me to not depend on others for my own self worth, and when it's my time to prove my worth, that I can do it with confidence!

For the longest time, the addition of Minecraft bees always had a strong hold over my heart, I fell in love with the way the bees would fly around and buzz. I adored finding hives in the trees and just knowing that there would be bees buzzing nearby. Every time I would log onto my server I would always hold a flower so that the bees would be drawn to me and follow me around. I figured out how to collect honey safely from the hives, by placing campfires underneath and using empty glass bottles to ensure the bees would never be angry. I was given a giant stuffed Minecraft bee plushie for my 16th birthday and it still sits on my bed, it was no secret that I loved the Minecraft bees. Ever since June 30th, 2022 my perception of what aspect of Minecraft held a special place in my heart had changed. If whoever is reading my essay knows about any Minecraft Twitch streamers, or maybe you even know what news the Minecraft fandom received on June 30th, you may know who I am talking about. Technoblade. Technoblade was an incredible man, he always knew how to make everyone in his Minecraft streams laugh and he had the most intelligent sense of humor. He was an absolute champion at Bedwars and he was part of an ongoing story called the Dream SMP. Technoblade was so good at playing Minecraft that he eventually was given the motto, "Technoblade never dies!". I first found his channel in the summer of 2021, and he became my favorite Minecraft streamer, his character was so cool that one of my other friends and I would draw fanart and give him different cool outfits and swords, as well pig masks. His Minecraft avatar (or character?) was a pig with a red cape, sword, and crown. I would never kill pigs in Minecraft out of respect for Technoblade, I would actually take care of any random pig I found in the wild. In August 2021, Technoblade announced his cancer. His cancer began with sores in his arms, he thought the sores were from playing Minecraft too much so he took a few days off and when the sores didn't go away he went to the doctor. The doctor diagnosed him with sarcoma cancer, where abnormal cells grow between tissues in the bones. He suffered a year-long battle with cancer until his father announced his passing in June 2022. He was only 23 years old. He didn't even get to live to see the live-action Five Nights at Freddys movie. I cried for days, and it took awhile for me to accept that I will never hear a new Youtube video notification saying 'Technoblade posted a new video...!', I never got to meet him either. After his death, the Dream SMP started to split up and I think just the mention of his name brought tears, his real name is Alexander. It took me awhile to want to play Minecraft again, because if I saw a pig I would've cried. When I did reopen the app, I saw a little pig at the top of the screen on Minecrafts home page wearing a crown, a symbol for Technoblade. A lot of fans built memorials for him on Hypixel, and Techno's Discord server became a community grave for the fans to leave final prayers and memories. This essay asks what aspect of Minecraft currently holds a special place in my heart? It's the pigs. It will always be the pigs. Technoblade never dies.

As I was reading the 'Ode to Millennials-Gen Z' text I couldn't help but think of a few stories my great-grandmother would tell me about her previous salaries and bills. She told me that she had a job as a cashier at a corner market in the 1940s, where she would make roughly 45-50 cents an hour. This is where she met my great-grandfather and they married and moved in together, their monthly bill at the apartment they were staying in was around $60. She would have to work 120 hours a month to be able to afford rent, not including food and gas. My Aunt Steffanie currently works at a casino, she makes $10 an hour and her monthly bill is $1205. This means she would have to work 120 hours a month just for rent, not including food and gas. This is a perfect example of how much inflation has impacted how much we spend and receive. Both my great-grandmother and aunt would work the same amount of hours but my aunt is spending $1145 more for rent. The minimum wage should be at least $15, there are so many Americans living paycheck to paycheck, me being one of them. So how are Millennials and Gen-z supposed to fix the inflation problem? My guess is either we pay more in taxes or we spend less. For the longest time, I believed if every single business all at once were to lower their prices and if hourly pay went down then we would be slowly curing inflation. I know that I can't fix the growing troubles that America will continue to have as the years go on by myself, but I can still very well put my ideas out there for anyone of higher power willing to help.

In my entire life, 3 people that I sincerely care about have been diagnosed with cancer. My Aunt Karen, who struggled with cancer for a few years but was able to recover through chemo, has been having trouble coming back from it financially. My Aunt Steffanie currently has skin cancer, and she is taking steps to reduce the spread of the abnormal cells. The third person who was diagnosed with cancer was a man I looked up to, his name was Alexander. I wrote a poem to spread awareness for cancer in Fall of 2021, but unfortunately in Summer 2022 Alexander passed away from cancer. Alexander never knew me or who I was, in fact, he was a Twitch streamer who had an incredible sense of humor and was wicked smart. He won 2 MC Championships and broke the Hypixel 'Most wins' record by over 1,000! Alexanders online alias was 'Technoblade' with the Greek origin meaning, "he who cannot die". He had been a streaming since 2013 until his passing in 2022, he had many friends across the world (who also had great senses of humor) and together they formed a large group called the DSMP where they would create stories and play them out on streams for all of their viewers. Alexanders father was the one who made a video telling all 11 million of his subscribers of his passing, my friend and I were scrolling through Youtube when we saw his video titled, "so long nerds" and we almost instantly knew what that video was going to tell us. I was in tears for days because I never got to meet him and now have stronger feelings for the people suffering from cancer. Here is the poem I wrote in honor of Alexander, it was published into the American Library of Poetry: He cannot shake this deadly disease Will someone set him free please? For the tinkle of hope is far away He may not last another day For this disease is holding him down From wearing that jewel forsaken crown. He may lose the kingdom thats dear But is it the disease that he fears? For the palace is crumbling From the cannons that go rumbling As he lifts up his mighty sword And stumbles as he prays to the Lord. Boom! Boom! The cannons fire Towards the ill king who is called a liar For its not the disease that he fears It’s the loss of his kingdom he holds dear The gracious tinkle of hope is gone And the kings time is almost done. But alas! He wont give up so easy As he stands against the wind so breezy His sword is raised as he yells ‘Charge!’ Towards the enemy who is at large The soldiers freeze in the winter snow But the king tells them to go! Go! GO! The soldiers are too weak to fight this disease And within minutes the king would seize That glimmer of hope from above Flying above him as a dove. The kingdom mourns for the king The Queen forever wears her wedding ring He couldn't shake that deadly disease And alas, the king fell to his knees. - Kensley Greene Thank you.

For my submission, I chose to submit a poem about a time that impacted my life. He cannot shake this deadly disease Will someone set him free please? For the tinkle of hope is far away He may not last another day For this disease is holding him down From wearing that jewel forsaken crown. He may lose the kingdom thats dear But is it the disease that he fears? For the palace is crumbling From the cannons that go rumbling As he lifts up his mighty sword And stumbles as he prays to the Lord. Boom! Boom! The cannons fire Towards the ill king who is called a liar For its not the disease that he fears It’s the loss of his kingdom he holds dear The gracious tinkle of hope is gone And the kings time is almost done. But alas! He wont give up so easy As he stands against the wind so breezy His sword is raised as he yells ‘Charge!’ Towards the enemy who is at large The soldiers freeze in the winter snow But the king tells them to go! Go! GO! The soldiers are too weak to fight this disease And within minutes the king would seize That glimmer of hope from above Flying above him as a dove. The kingdom mourns for the king The Queen forever wears her wedding ring He couldn't shake that deadly disease And alas, the king fell to his knees. - End of poem - This poem is about someone that I looked up to who, unfortunately, passed away in June 2022 due to cancer. This has led me to support and raise more awareness for cancer by donating and wearing pink ribbons. This month is breast cancer awareness month, and I have been supporting as much as I am able to. This poem that I wrote was also published into the American Library of Poetry but still holds the same value when it comes to raising awareness for cancer. When I am older I plan to donate even more to the Levine Childrens Hospital and to the American Cancer Society.

My favorite piece of art is one by American Impressionist, Childe Hassam, 'Avenue in the Rain'. Avenue in the Rain is a painting of multiple American flags on the 5th avenue of New York City in the rain. It currently hangs in the Oval Office in the White House. Avenue in the Rain represents impressionism and emotion depicted through the American flag, which stand through rain or shine.

I'm currently in school, I would have to say my biggest motivation as of right now would be my future. I plan to go to a university and graduate with a Film/Photography major (or Computer Science i'm still in the decision process), I am motivated to live on my own with my own set of rules and a healthy lifestyle. I plan to have a career that will allow me to have a high income for investing and retirement. That is what motivates me on a daily basis.