My goal is to graduate from graduate school with a Master's in Cardiovascular Perfusion and go on to become a Certified Clinical Perfusionist. Perfusion is a fairly esoteric field, so most people have no idea what it is. In short, a perfusionist is the person who operates the heart and lung machine and all related peripheral equipment during open heart surgeries. It is a lofty goal, especially considering my backstory. At a young age I was diagnosed with a learning disability. Growing up in the eighties and attending public schools, there were very few effective programs available to kids with learning disabilities. As such, my inadequate performance in the classroom went mostly ignored and I was given barely passing grades so that I could go onto the next year of schooling with my friends. This methodology in the long run did me no favors. Needless to say, I was a lackluster student all throughout high school and never gave college a second thought as I knew I could never perform well enough at that caliber to be successful. It wasn't until 37 years old that I decided to confront my academic shortcomings and figure out a way that I could learn and perform in the classroom. After taking a reading comprehension exam at my local junior college it was discovered that I read at approximately a 6th grade level. I decided to treat my academic life with all the seriousness of a military bootcamp in order to overcome this obstacle. I began by enrolling as a part-time student knowing that the workload would require more time than the average full-time student. I would spend 12-14 hours outside the classroom teasing apart my textbooks, both learning to read whist also learning the material. I learned the power of flashcards, annotating in my textbooks, and incorporating whiteboards into my studying. I would spend many sleepless nights every single week studying up until my exams the next morning. This routine was unwavering for 6 years. In 2017 I graduated from Junior College with a 4.0 in Math and Science and went onto University of California, Davis where I majored in Global Disease Biology. I would graduate UC Davis in the winter of 2019 with a 3.905 gpa and high honors. My family could not believe it. My friends could not believe. I, however, could believe it because I learned to believe in myself. And to answer the second question of this essay, this is my why. I will go onto become to graduate with a Master's in Cardiovascular Perfusion because I can. I will be the best perfusionist I can be, always keeping the patients well being the number one priority in my patient care plan. I will do this for many years and hope that my efforts make a positive impact in every patients life. That, however, is not my grand vision for positive influence. I live my life day to day hoping that at some point someone else who struggles with school, who feels embarrassed or ashamed about how they are perceived in classroom will see me and realize that they are not incapable or dumb. Instead, I want that student to see that those shortcomings are not limitations and they should not allow for themselves to be compartmentalized as such. I want to demonstrate to people with learning disabilities that, with patience and perseverance you can go on to do anything you want.