The thing that changed my life happened when I was 15 years old, a sophomore in high school. This is losing my dad, my protector, my provider, my hero, my hype man and so much more. The person I had shared so many good times with was gone. The person I would run to as fast as my feet could carry me was just gone. When I was told this, I felt numb, felt my body fall to the ground and all I could do was sit there in disbelief hoping and praying that my mom was lying to me, it was some sick joke because I couldn’t believe that my person was gone forever. Having to live my life without him and having to make life decisions without him has been so hard. This is the thing that keeps me going, I have to make him proud. That’s why I stayed in school. I didn’t give up. I know that he would want me to finish high school and be able to take care of myself. Going through this has shown me that I can go through anything, I will never not miss him, and I will never stop wishing he was here, I do this for him because I might not be able to see him, but I know he's watching over me, so I will keep going and working hard to make him proud. I’m from a single parent household. My Father passed away unexpectedly when I was 15 and my sister was 13. My mother has no financial help to support me or my younger sister. I want to go to school. Our financial strain is why I am working very hard to get scholarships, to pay for school and importantly to help take stress off my mom. On top of that, I’m also working a part-time job and taking college classes. I don’t want my mom to worry about having to take care of me and school, when she needs to be focused on putting food on the table for her and my younger sister. My ultimate career goal is to get my BSN. My steps to achieving this goal are to attend Umpqua Community College and finish my nursing prerequisites. After I finish my prerequisites, I want to apply for the nursing program. I have done a lot of research and I think UCC offers one of the best nursing programs in my state, Oregon. UCC has a relationship with Oregon State University, and I can take classes through OSU to get my BSN. During my research, there was one constant piece of advice: work in the healthcare field to decide if I really want to go into nursing. I took that advice seriously and while I was still in high school, I took the Phlebotomist Program though UCC. I graduated from the Phlebotomist Program; I also took the national test to become NHA certified as a phlebotomist. I plan to work as a phlebotomist, hopefully at the hospital, to get a feel for how everything runs. I have also had a sit-down meeting with UCC Nursing Program Director, and she has given me a layout of what to expect as a nursing student and what to expect as a pre-nursing student.

Hello to whoever is reading this my name is Kinley Rainwater. I'm a graduating senior. If receive this scholarship it would help with school expense. When it comes to paying for classes, apartments supplies and so many other things. I have been an active part of my community all of high school. I have over 450 hours of community service. One of my favorite past times is being a mentor to the youth of my 4-H group. I’ve spent the last six years working at a local ranch and I've worked with this family being a mentor to their four young kids. I have shown 4-H lambs for five years, and the last three years I have gotten to do it with their kids, as they’ve gotten older. This has been so fun and good for me, helping them achieve their goals and in doing this I have accomplished being a positive light in these young kids' lives. I love being their mentor. Over the past few years, I have spent many hours out at our town’s Cemetery cleaning headstones. This hold a special place in my heart, after losing my dad when I was a sophomore in high school, it is very important to me he has a nice place to rest, and it makes me happy to know so many people visit his headstone and leave behind things that remind them of my dad. One thing that changed my life happened when I was 15 years old, a sophomore in high school. This is losing my dad, my protector, my provider, my hero, my hype man and so much more. The person I had shared so many good times with was gone. The person I would run to as fast as my feet could carry me was just gone. When I was told this, I felt numb, felt my body fall to the ground and all I could do was sit there in disbelief hoping and praying that my mom was lying to me, it was some sick joke because I couldn’t believe that my person was gone forever. Having to live my life without him and having to make life decisions without him has been so hard. This is the thing that keeps me going, I have to make him proud. That’s why I stayed in school. I didn’t give up. I know that he would want me to finish high school and be able to take care of myself. Going through this has shown me that I can go through anything, I will never not miss him, and I will never stop wishing he was here, I do this for him because I might not be able to see him, but I know he's watching over me, so I will keep going and working hard to make him proud.

The thing that changed my life happened when I was 15 years old, a sophomore in high school. This is losing my dad, my protecter, my provider, my hero, my hype man and so much more. The person I had shared so many good times with was gone. The person I would run to as fast as my feet could carry me was just gone. When I was told this, I felt numb, felt my body fall to the ground and all I could do was sit there in disbelief hoping and praying that my mom was lying to me, it was some sick joke because I couldn’t believe that my person was gone forever. Having to live my life without him and having to make life decisions without him has been so hard. This is the thing that keeps me going, I have to make him proud. That’s why I stayed in school. I didn’t give up. I know that he would want me to finish high school and be able to take care of myself. Going through this has shown me that I can go through anything, I will never not miss him, and I will never stop wishing he was here, I do this for him because I might not be able to see him, but I know he's watching over me, so I will keep going and working hard to make him proud. I'm motivated by not wanting to disappoint myself or my family. I want to become a nurse and help people. When I lost my dad no one could really tell us why I wanted to expand and study about the body to give people help with taking care of themselves. One of the nursing wings I'm most interested in is labor and delivery. I like the idea of helping moms bring their little ones into the world. I have spent many hours out at our town’s Cemetery cleaning headstones. This holds a special place in my heart. It is very important to me that my dad and others have a nice place to rest, and it makes me happy to know so many people visit my dad's headstone and leave behind things that remind them of my dad. Some of the ways I have been working towards my goals of nursing is that I am taking a phlebotomy course right now to help gain knowledge of the medical field.