I have always intended to work with children, specifically with younger children. Being able to have early intervention and help each child reach their full potential is extremely important to me and something I crave to be a part of. I aim to be a Speech Pathologist and one thing I love about speech is the multitude of ways people can communicate. When, in the future I work with a child with similar circumstances as Rebecca; a nonverbal child with a rare syndrome the first step I would work towards is educating myself. Learning all I can about the syndrome, what enate struggles will that child face because of their disorder, and how others have approach intervention. I would also focus on educating myself on the child. Learning their entire background and personality is vital in creating therapy sessions that will interest and engage the child. Knowing a child’s limitations and when limits aren’t being pushed will create the most affective session. I would work with a non-verbal child to create strong abilities in using an AAC device. The type of device being a simple pointer, or a verbal device trigger by buttons or eye tracking would all depend on the child’s abilities and preferences. And with the support of an AAC device I would work to develop a child’s non-verbal communication skills. I have always believed in the idea that a smile can tell 100 different messages. The role of the family is unreplaceable. I have unfortunately witnessed what it looks like for a child when their family isn’t involved or doing the proper support for the child at home. Not evolving therapeutic methods, or dietary restrictions can be very harmful for the child if it isn’t being implemented through their life. As a SLP, I would only have a section of time in the child’s life, accumulating to a couple of hours a week, but a family’s impact is always major. It is very important for SLP’s or anyone else to develop a relationship with the family. Not interacting with the family could cause blind spots in the child’s development and their individual culture. I think about a child with a multi-lingual household receiving treatment but the fact that their family at home speaks another language is overlooked. The kinds of issues or opportunities missed for treatment would be extremely troubling. I have volunteered at a pediatric physical therapy office that showcased to me the importance of build connections with both the child and their family. I also volunteered at a school called Gateway education center that has children k-12 and most with special needs involving speech, mobility, and learning. Those opportunities solidified my decision involving my career. Every day I came home after volunteering I would sit down with my dad and tell him everything that happen and that I learned. I cried after the first year of children I worked with graduated cause I had grown so much love and unwavering proudness for them. My intent in applying for this scholarship has always been to take a chunk of the financial burden off my dad. He has been my only caretaker my whole life. I have two older half-sisters from my mother side that my dad, their stepdad took in and support through their educational career. We have gone through FASFA and only have received loans that will have to be paid back. Any type of scholarship I can get to go towards my education and loans takes the pressure off my dad and builds more confidence in me to continue my dream.

As an undergraduate student, a question that many people pose is "how do you plan to get a job, that matches your degree when you graduate college?" and during this time, after the effects of the pandemic, securing any kind of job has become very difficult; even though it seems every company and business is displaying production issues due to understaffed environments. To help solve this modern-day dilemma I would create a three-person task force consisting of Franklin D. Roosevelt, John D. Rockefeller sr., and Madam C.J. Walker. For their philanthropy, business, and economic prowess. Franklin D. Roosevelt, who is one of histories most noted presidents of the United States for his ability to stay in office for so long and for bringing America through WWII. But I would choose him for my task force for his major plays through The Great Depression. His legislation, like the New Deal Acts, which helped bring relief, reform, and recovery to the everyday American economic needs; Civil Conservation Corps, and Civil Works Administration, which created jobs for Americans to gain security all shows his understanding of the economy. It also shows his abilities to create opportunities for not only growth but for stable success. His experience being president would help round out a plan that could actually pass through the complicated web of congress and have rooted ideas from his past failures and successes through his time in office. Secondly, I would have John D. Rockefeller Sr. who was the founder of the Standard Oil Company. He is recognized as a successful American businessman and philanthropist, who created generational wealth for his family making them a working empire. His philanthropy focused on yearlong initiatives that revolved around large-scale issues that threatened humanity's well-being. He had involvement in reorganizing America's public health systems, helping develop life-saving vaccines, revolutionizing food production, and creating renewable electricity for lower income areas that have never had a reliable source. Because of his skills in addressing major conflicts and being able to come to successful resolutions I feel he would be a strong asset to the team. Also, his experience in the business world would definitely be impactful in creating a plan in tackling job security and availability. My final choice would be Madam C.J. Walker who is recognized as the first female self-made millionaire, and not only was she establishing herself as a woman but as an African American coming off the ends of slavery in very uncertain times. She created a successful business around her own product for hair care for African American women. Her marketing was surrounded with self-confidence and empowerment. And with her successes she spread her power to her social beliefs and was a powerful social activist. She was able to donate and support many organizations like the NAACP and the Black YMCA to support education and advancements in the civil rights movements. Because of her achievements as a self-made legacy I feel she would be a great symbol of perseverance, and with her own experience and through her experiences as a philanthropist; I feel she would be a great voice and advocate for those who could be overlooked. With Franklin D. Rosservelt, John D. Rockerfeller Sr., and Madam C.J. Walker, I feel I have a balanced and affective team that could tackle the modern-day issue of job availability and security. They all have skills in the economy, politics, philanthropy, and business that would be needed to solve this issue.

I am a rising senior in college at the University of North Carolina- Greensboro, and I am part of the Speech Pathology B.S. program. I dream of continuing my education to a master's and eventually a doctorates degree in Communication disorders science. When I was growing up, I had to attend speech therapy for childhood stuttering and gliding of my liquid sounds. I also had to witness my nephew go through more intensive speech therapy as he was very unintelligible with an articulation disorder. Going through the service myself and watching my nephew go through it put the profession at the forefront of my mind when I thought about what I wanted to do as a career. I always knew I wanted to help people in some way; I just wasn't certain what specialty called to me the most. I started my observation at a local community access pediatric physical and speech therapy clinic. It was a private practice that also made home visits. It was in an area that had a lot of diverse underprivileged households, and I was able to experience what it was like to work in a multilingual environment. I help facilitate a safe and open environment working with children with club foot and other disorders inhibiting their motor abilities. My favorite memory was in a Spanish English household where the child we were working with had been born with extreme weakness in his legs causing him to be developmentally behind in crawling and walking. We were working on exercises to stretch and work his leg muscles while there was a Spanish speaking show on the tv talking about animal sounds. Now I don't know much Spanish, but because of the video's imagery I was able to interact with the child by creating the animal sounds displayed on the tv. He found my chicken noises to be so funny he started bouncing up and down in the exercise all on his own. I loved the environment of working with children, and it was through this experience that I was able to get connected with the next location I volunteered at. I have volunteered off and on at a school for children who require more care than the typical school systems can accommodate for. This included but wasn't limited to children with motor disorders, requiring motor devices, children with communication disorders, spanned from eye devices to articulate intervention needs, and children who needed special services to facilitate safe swallowing and feeding. I remember the day the school hosted an in-house field trip where they created a planetarium in the gym. I was helping set the children up and keep the active ones in their seats. They were all amazed by the stars and we ended up using space as a theme for our speech sessions that day. These experiences are ones that really help to build my love and certainty in my career pathway. I want to be the person who helps create and environment for all people are able to self-advocate and communicate their needs and wants. With the amount schooling I want to complete I am definitely in need of financial support. The majority of my life I have lived with my single father who has supported me in amazing ways. He wants to help where he can, but I would rather him focus on saving for his retirement as he hasn't been able to do that previously with me. I want to be able to show him that I am finding ways to support my educational journey, so he doesn't have to worry.

Surprisingly the toughest part of my life is the thing I accredit my educational jump to. After I graduated 5th grade, on the first day of my summer break in the transition from being an elementary school student to a middle school student my parents informed me that they were getting a divorce. So, with my two older half-sisters and my mom moved out, I was left with my dad. My dad and me are the closet father daughter duo ever. I always thank my mom for leaving me to him and not trying to take me away. I still have a strange relationship with the idea of motherhood, and I feel like after my parents' separation, I was in search of validation. I wanted to know that even though I couldn't keep my parents together after bringing them together, that I was still important enough for their attention. It also probably helped that my two older sisters are incredible smart. Both tops in their classes taking AP courses in high school while I was being told I was 3 levels behind coming into the 6th grade. I was diagnosed with dyslexia in the 3rd grade and had been struggling with it ever since. But I knew that I wanted to know that I was making my dad and mom proud. So, my relationship with school change from something I resented to something I needed to prove myself with. In the 6th grade, in my first semester I got my first honor roll certificate as an AB student. I remember crying on the drive home because my name was on the golden piece of paper. My mom couldn't make the ceremony, so my dad took me to get ice cream and let me show the ladies working there my award. After that I didn't want to go back to sitting through the whole ceremony and walking out without that piece of paper. I was still being taken out of classes in the 6th and 7th grade but during my 8th grade year my social worker in an IEP meeting with my dad said, "Leah is doing very well in her classes and I think this year we should see how removing the extra instructions goes." I still had a lot of accommodations including extra time on major assignments and tests, separate setting and read aloud if I wanted on my EOGs and unit exams, but I got to sit with my classmates through the whole class. My teachers have probably never seen a more excited student to just sit in class than me. And in 8th grade, I got my first A honor roll award and the character award for self-discipline. Looking back, I find that award to be very fitting, even though I didn't really understand what it meant then. I continued to better and better myself academically and even managed to graduate out of my IEP before graduating high school. I might have not graduated as the top of my class like my sisters. But I knew where I started from and honestly couldn't believe how far I had made it from being pulled out of classes to receiving awards for my performance.

My relationship with school and education in general was an ever evolving and changing part of my life. When I was in 3rd grade, I was diagnosed with dyslexia and suffered from a developmental speech impediment and stutter. I was one of those students all through elementary school that had to be taken out of class for special lessons and speech therapy. At the time my young mind hated school, I even hated reading more. I was one of those kids that said lunch time was my favorite subject. I never got A-B honor roll, and I vividly remember sitting in those ceremonies and wondering why I couldn't be one of those students and why I had to sit through it and listen to everyone else get awards knowing I got nothing. And surprisingly the toughest part of my life is the thing I accredit my educational jump to. After I graduated 5th grade, on the first day of my summer break in the transition from being an elementary school student to a middle school student my parents informed me that they were getting a divorce. It's always hard to explain to people the dynamic of my parents' relationship as it's not your typical partnership. But simply my parents got married because of me, they had found out they were being blessed, as they say, with me after they had already ended their relationship. They tried the co-parenting style for the first year of my life, but they both felt that it would be better to raise me together and try to give me the healthiest household. So, with my two older half-sisters my mom moved out, and I was left with my dad. My dad and me are the closet father daughter duo ever. I always thank my mom for leaving me to him and not trying to take me away. I still have a strange relationship with the idea of motherhood, and I feel like after my parents' separation, I was in search of validation. I wanted to know that even though I couldn't keep my parents together after bringing them together, that I was still important enough for their attention. It also probably helpped that my two older sisters are incredible smart. Both tops in their classes taking AP courses in high school while I was being told I was 3 levels behind coming into the 6th grade. But I knew that I wanted to be like them, that I wanted to know that I was making my dad and mom proud. So, my relationship with school change from something I resented to something I needed to prove myself with. In the 6th grade, in my first semester I got my first honor roll certificate as an AB student. I remember crying on the drive home because my name was on the golden piece of paper. My mom couldn't make the ceremony, so my dad took me to get ice cream and let me show the ladies working there my award. After that I didn't want to go back to sitting through the whole ceremony and walking out without that piece of paper. I was still being taken out of classes in the 6th and 7th grade but during my 8th grade year my social worker in an IEP meeting with my dad said, "Leah is doing very well in her classes and I think this year we should see how removing the extra instructions goes." I still had a lot of accommodations including extra time on major assignments and tests, separate setting and read aloud if I wanted on my EOGs and unit exams, but I got to sit with my classmates through the whole class. My teachers have probably never seen a more excited student to just sit in class than me. And in 8th grade, I got my first A honor roll award and the character award for self-discipline. Looking back, I find that award to be very fitting, even though I didn't really understand what it meant then. The first-year of high school was very scary and unfortunately and fortunately my freshman and sophomore year was mainly spent online due to covid. I found that I hated the online classes but the environment of doing schoolwork in my room at my pace with no other students around to distract me or make me nervous on how slow I was, was wonderful. My social worker had changed in that time, and I remember her being very confused on why I had an IEP. My first two years of high school I had one goal in, which was to get into an AP classroom just like my sisters. My social worker was very hesitant to let me apply for those types of classes as accommodations for them are a lot smaller, but I knew that I wanted to do it not because I was proving my worth anymore, but because I knew I could do it. I kept my A honor roll statues all through my regular classes, honors classes, and the AP classes I was allowed to take in my junior and senior year. Funny enough my favorite class and teacher was for my AP English class that help rebuild my relationship with reading and is the reason I am a passionate reader and writer today. And my final story is in my Senior year of high school, when my social worker in my second to last IEP meeting graduated me out of the IEP program. Saying with full confidence that I no longer needed services and that I could graduate knowing I was excited out of my IEP. I didn't graduate at the top of my classes in high school like my sisters, but I did graduate knowing where I started and how far I come to get to where I am. Now in college I still maintain my A honor roll status even without the paper.

I dream to become a professional Speech Language Pathologist. I hope to work with adults with acquired disorders like Traumatic brain injuries, symptoms after Stroke, Parkinson's disease, and even more. I would be working in a hospital in the rehabilitation section, working one-on-one with many different types of people. To reach this goal I will have to get a master's degree at least. Previously I attended my local community college to acquire my prerequisites before transferring into a university. I did this because I wanted to make to smartest financial decision for myself. I wasn't sure right out of high school what I wanted to do, but after shadowing a SLP I feel in love with the profession. Going to community college first allowed me to have time to figure out what I truly wanted and where would be the best fit for me to achieve that. I am currently attending the University of North Carolina-Greensboro working on my bachelor's degree in communication science, and it has been a dream come true. This program that I am in has only deepened my desire to be an SLP, all the people I have met, faculty and students have been the best people. They helped make me feel welcomed as a commuter into the program and the campus. To continue this dream I want to go into UNCG's master's program for Speech Pathology. Speech Pathology is so much more to me than just a career, it is an extension of my belief and desire to facilitate clear communication for all people. I believe that everyone deserves a voice to speak up for themselves and advocate, to communicate with their loved ones, and to be able to take control of their future with their voice. I hope through my education at UNCG and the further education I will go through in the future that I will be the best clinician I can be. I hope to build connections with the clients I work with. I want to be a strong figure in people's lives, and I want to make a visible difference to them. Lossing your voice and form of communication and be very scary and having to work to get it back will be draining. I hope that in my time I will become better and better at supporting people's growth and get to witness other's strengths. As I feel there is nobody stronger than a person who is delt a bad hand or given a hard blow and able to overcome it all and be the best version of themselves on the other side of it.