My mom took her own life when I was 10 years old and growing up without a mom has been my greatest challenge. After her passing I was forced to move to a new town with nothing but a duffel bag full of grief. My mom was my only support system, and trying to navigate grief and loneliness as a child completely on my own was immensely hard. Although it felt impossible at times, I was determined to carry my mom’s legacy by helping those around me. My mom was a paramedic who served our community with pride. She was widely known for her “bleeding heart” because she believed every person was worth helping, regardless of their background or circumstances. From a young age, I adopted those same values. Throughout my academic and personal journeys, my mom has always been a reminder to keep showing up for myself and others, despite the battles I may be facing. So much of my life had been out of my control, but I knew that education was the only thing I could control, so I got to work. I started taking college courses in the summer before high school and dual-enrollment courses throughout the year. I worked hard and graduated high school with 53 college credits. I attended every guest lecture and field trip my school offered, excited to learn more about the world around me. I was involved in student organizations, and I even mentored lowerclassmen. I worked two jobs throughout high school to ease the financial strain college would bring. Balancing these responsibilities at such a young age was difficult, but every opportunity brought me closer to my goals. I became drawn to public service during my two years studying abroad in the Czech Republic. Studying international relations and human rights, I was no stranger to the atrocities that occur around the world, but living so close to a warzone gave me an entirely new perspective on the importance of advocacy and justice. Seeing the real-life effects a war had on my friends, colleagues, and classmates weighed heavily on my mind, as well as my heart. Meeting people from around the world gave me new insight into how essential kindness and empathy can be to someone in their time of need. These experiences led me to my current job as a volunteer English teacher and mentor to people living in Ukraine during the war. Although I’m the teacher, my students teach me humility and gratitude. Despite the fear and uncertainty that war brings, they show up to every lesson eager to learn and determined to make the world hear their voices. Working with them has shown me that public service isn’t just rooted in policies but consistently showing up for those who need support. Although my path has been shaped by grief and hardship, my experiences have strengthened my commitment to compassion and public service. My mom taught me that compassion is one of the most meaningful forms of service, and I carry that lesson into everything I do. Through public service and advocacy, I hope to continue creating meaningful support for communities impacted by hardship and injustice. By pursuing further education, I hope to not only honor my mom’s legacy, but build my own through a lifetime of public service.

In 2023, I moved to the Czech Republic to study, but living among displaced Ukrainians changed the way I understand relationships, justice, and human dignity. Due to the proximity of the war in Ukraine, the Czech Republic is home to one of the largest Ukrainian refugee populations in Europe. My friends, colleagues, and neighbors were Ukrainian. Seeing the real-life effects of war and learning their stories profoundly shaped my personal development and my perspective on human rights, war crimes, and relationships. During my two years in the Czech Republic, I developed deeply meaningful connections, especially with the Ukrainians in my life. Over time I developed close bonds with them and learned their harrowing stories. My former colleague Leila, for example, left shortly before the war started, and now she has no home to return to. Vanya, the 17-year-old I used to work with, escaped the draft by moving to Prague by himself at 16. Irina was from a village outside of Odessa and most of her family was killed in drone strikes. Before I returned to America, I made a promise that I would spend my career helping people like them, and that promise is what motivates me. Working in the city center also exposed me to people from countless cultural backgrounds. Through those conversations and experiences, I learned that meaningful relationships are not built through similarity alone, but through curiosity, empathy, and the willingness to listen. More often than not, you don't need to know everything about a person to have a relationship with them, you need to be a listener of great compassion. Though my time in the Czech Republic has ended, building cross-cultural relationships is still a top priority, as well as giving back to Ukrainians and anyone else who might need aid. Currently I am a volunteer English teacher for people in Ukraine. I work tirelessly to give my students the language resources to be heard by the world, despite so many people attempting to silence them. Although I am the one teaching, my students continually remind me of the importance of humility, resilience, and cross-cultural connection. I am often moved by my students’ resilience and commitment to learning a language that connects them to a large part of the world. They show up for our lessons with smiles on their faces and a readiness to learn despite their cities being attacked the night before, having lost friends and family and still trying to maintain a sense of normalcy. Teaching English has been a humbling experience that has deepened my understanding of resilience, cross-cultural connections, and human dignity. I am motivated by opportunities to help people get justice and rebuild their communities, despite their backgrounds. In my future career as an international human rights attorney with a specialization in war crimes, I know that to effectively advocate for people impacted by war crimes, I must first understand them as individuals rather than cases. As it stands currently, the system for documenting human rights violations, especially war crimes, is outdated and reductive. Human rights work fails when people become statistics instead of individuals, and relationships are what prevent that dehumanization.

At 18, I started my first semester of college. I entered college with 53 general education credits and no declared major, so my advisors placed me into a variety of courses. One of them was Intro to International Relations with Professor Hidalgo, a class that changed the trajectory of my life. I had always been interested in politics and the way the world works, but I never thought it would be anything more than an interest. When the course first started, I was incredibly shy and I never discussed my thoughts and opinions in class out of fear of sounding silly. After every lesson, we were required to write a private discussion post that only Professor Hidalgo could see, and in those posts, I expressed my every thought and opinion freely, not expecting to get a response from the professor. But shortly after the first post, the responses started coming, and they kept coming until the end of the semester. Those initial responses gave me the courage to start sharing my thoughts during class and made me decide to pursue International Relations seriously. Professor Hidalgo was not a very friendly man; he was in his sixties and from an area of the world that was ravaged by war and cruelty. During an essay defense appointment halfway through the semester, I was expecting him to harshly tell me what I could have done better to get a higher grade, but he didn’t. Instead, after I sat down, he looked me in the eyes and said “If you were my daughter and came home with anything less than an A, I would be disappointed because I know how your mind works. You have a brilliant mind, don’t disservice yourself in fear of what others might think.” For the first time, I stopped viewing my voice as something that needed permission to be heard. Professor Hidalgo inspired me to embrace my mind and use it as an advantage, despite what others may think. He inspired me to further pursue International Relations, and I have carried his words with me for the last three years. My motivation for speech and debate stems from wanting to understand the world around me. So many people believe that speech and debate must result in a “winner”, but to me, it’s a way for people to learn to trust their voice, just like Professor Hidalgo taught me. In discussions about politics, law, and human rights, people often focus so heavily on opposing positions that they stop trying to understand the person behind them. I love debating regardless of the topic because it encourages people to speak passionately and thoughtfully about issues that matter to them. I am motivated by the connections debating can develop, rather than by the differences it can display. Speech, debate, and mock trials have become more than academic activities to me; they are tools that help me to understand and advocate for others, while preparing for a career dedicated to international human rights. None of this would have been possible if it weren’t for Professor Hidalgo teaching me the value of trusting one’s own voice, and I intend to use my skills to help people around the world.

Growing up, my mom always used to say that I was never allowed to follow in her footsteps. I used to laugh because in my eyes, my mom was my superhero. But after she passed away in 2016, I was thrown into a new reality, one that made me understand exactly what she meant. Even though my mom is not here physically, she has been a source of support through the life she lived and the values she instilled in me. My mom dedicated her life to helping people in her career as a paramedic. She worked long hours for little pay and often carried the emotional weight of situations many people never face. Unlike me, she never had the opportunity to attend college. Instead, she raised my cousins and me, took care of her terminally ill grandfather, and navigated personal hardships, all while continuing to serve our community. She wanted a different life for me because she knew how difficult her path had been. I honor my mom in every aspect of my life. Every day, I try to be a person she would be proud of. I try to show kindness, empathy, and resilience, all of which are the traits she taught me that mattered most. One of the most important ways I honor my mom is not only by continuing to further my education, but also through the major I chose. I chose to study international relations, and I intend to work as an attorney for human rights violations. While my path looks different from hers, it is still rooted in the same purpose: helping those who need it most. I feel as though my future career is a way to honor her legacy. I know that my mom would’ve supported me in all the choices I’ve made and continue to make, and the way she lived inspires me to keep striving for success. Remembering her strength and the struggles she overcame motivates me to not only succeed in my field, but also to never take anything for granted. Although she is gone, her values and passion for helping people live on through me, and becoming someone she would be proud of continues to drive me. Growing up in a single-parent household all my life has shaped my resilience and independence. I have faced challenges in many forms, but my dedication to honoring my mom as well as pursuing my education has never wavered. While people may associate my background with certain limitations, I have used it as motivation to grow and define my own path, and I intend to keep doing so.

I have always loved oceans. I have been fascinated how bodies of water connect us all to each other, hyper fixated on the fact that we are nothing without water, nor could we have been anything if it weren’t for water. The water has always made me feel calm. Understanding the tides, reasons the ocean is blue, and how salt content effects buoyancy has always captured my attention. When I’m in the water I feel a sense of connection as if i’m touching every continent, I think about how many microorganisms I’m touching , all of the ecosystems I’m in and how many cool things that we have no idea exist, are below me at any given time. I also think about how much plastic I’m ingesting through the water, I think about the wrappers and other garbage that will be in these oceans for thousands of years before they dissolve. I think about how my grandchildren’s grandchildren will have the same plastic in the ocean that my grandparents put there. That thought scare me, but it also gives me hope and passion to be apart of the change, I want to feel the adrenaline and excitement of canning a corporation that contributes to damaging our oceans, I want to be the voice of reason and I want to know what it’s like to look at an ocean and not see a piece of garbage. I, like many others are not naïve to the decline of our oceans. But unlike others I have a plan. I could’ve been a marine biologist, or an oceanographer, but I feel as though my degree will be more beneficial to the overall change of not only our oceans, but our planet. I want to help the next generations, I want to give them an idea and plan to go off of, so that my great great great grandchildren will be able to love the ocean like I did. I plan to double major in Environmental Science and Political Sciences, and after that achievement, go on to law school and become an Environmental Lawyer, then place myself within the government to make sure I’m in the right places to provide the most reform to our oceans and planet. I am ready to dedicate my life and career to this cause, along with so many others. My generation is known as the face of change, but I want to be the embodiment of change. When my time is up, I want to be at peace with all of my efforts, I want to be remembered as Kyla O’Kelly, the woman from New York that contributed her life to the reform of our oceans.