Imagine you are a young woman in early america, you marry and become pregnant. You make it through the trauma of birth and find yourself a mother of a beautiful baby girl. Over the next few weeks, you notice she isn’t gaining weight. Though the baby latches to your nipple well enough, she doesn’t seem to get enough to eat. You try everything, supplementing with everything from cows milk to wet bread, but nothing helps. You are the only nursing mother for miles, there is no one to help you. Despite your best efforts, your baby wastes away, dying of starvation because your body didn’t make enough breast milk. The invention of nutritional infant formula has had a profound positive impact on infant mortality, as well as providing new mothers with more freedom and less guilt. No one can truly know how many infants have been saved by the invention of formula, but I would hazard a guess at millions. Breastfeeding may work for some mothers, but it is a taxing and frustrating journey for many. Many birthing people’s bodies either do not produce enough milk, or they have trouble getting their babies to latch. Not only has formula prevented infant deaths, but it has also saved mothers from the horror of blaming themselves for something out of their control. We cannot imagine the depth of guilt and shame that must have been felt by mothers who’s bodies weren’t up to the task of breastfeeding. Not only for infants, but also for birthing people, formula has been the most important scientific discovery in the last three centuries.

One of my earliest memories of elementary school was career day in first grade. I wanted to be a pediatrician because I liked my doctor so much. The night before career day my mom printed out and laminated a badge for me that read 'Dr. Megan,' and bought a little white blazer from a thrift store. I wore my costume proudly. That was just the beginning of my mom's unconditional support of me and my career goals. In fact, right now she sits next to me going through paperwork to help me prepare to apply for work loans for medical school (which I won't be attending for another three and a half years.) Her influence is actually a large part of why I want to be a physician in the first place. For my entire childhood, she brought me with our church every first Saturday of the month to the Garden City Rescue Mission, a Christian homeless shelter that provided food, shelter, and life skill lessons. Our church's role in this establishment was to provide food once a month. My role was to serve drinks and help pass out meals. From an early age, my mother taught me, both passively and actively, that there were people who needed help, and that they deserve all the help we can give. As I grew older, this message didn't fade, and in fact, was reinforced by my growing experience and knowledge of the world. When I was in eighth grade, we moved from North Augusta, South Carolina to Kansas City, Missouri. This was a hard time for me, which my mom helped me through, but I will get to that later. I had always known many people couldn't afford shelter, much less medical care, but my experiences as a junior in high school with the street medicine group Care Beyond the Boulevard completely solidified my life mission, my purpose. I am supposed to provide free or affordable care to those who cannot afford it. Beyond my career and the reason I am here on this Earth, my mom has supported me through my worst mental health struggles. She is a psychologist, which I'm sure didn't hurt in her ability to appropriately handle my issues, but you cannot, even with a Ph.D.'s worth of training, teach the amount of empathy and compassion that my mother exhibits. As I mentioned, my move across the country was rough for me. Actually, that's an understatement. I developed problems with self-harm and suicidal ideation. The instigation for me to get therapy and completely recover was the night my mom saw my wounds. I was in the bathtub downstairs, and she came down to make sure I had a towel. Her immediate reaction upon seeing me was to sit down next to me and ask me why I had done that. We talked through my loneliness and isolation, my feelings of being out of place, and my seeming inability to make friends. I cried a lot, and that night I vowed to get better. The look of heartbreak on her face was one I never wanted to cause again. She brought me to therapy appointments and made sure I never felt that alone again. My mom is the most important person in my life and always has been. She has been there for me through everything and does everything she can to help me meet my goals. Without her unconditional support, I don't know where I would be, but it certainly wouldn't be here, a freshman in college on the path to success.

The ability to articulate complex or nuanced information in an easy to understand way is a skill that is too often overlooked, especially in academia. There are too many researchers who freeze or fumble when asked to explain their work to someone without a cursory knowledge of the field. There are too many doctors who fail to adequately explain diagnoses or treatments to patients. Communication with a lay audience is an undervalued but extremely important skill for anyone who does highly academic work. The inability of scientists to communicate their discoveries to the public results in a barrier between academia and the people to whom research might matter in the future. The inability of doctors to explain treatments or procedures results in a deficit in informed consent. As someone who has been in Speech and Debate for 5 years now, I believe this is one of my greatest strengths. I had a lot of practice, especially during high school, in bringing politically complex topics and arguments to the judges, who were usually parents of debaters or faculty at a high school. This is not to say the judges wouldn’t be able to understand the topics on their own, but the extremely limited time structure of debate meant that you had to ensure the judges understood your arguments within a short amount of time. My greatest strength in debate is catering to lay judges. Even in college when most tournaments are judged by debate coaches or attorneys, there are still some weekends when lay judges are the majority. This past weekend our judges happened to be mostly lay, which frustrated most of my teammates, since they couldn’t just make statements like “their plan is extra T” and win on that. I however, excelled in that environment. Communication is my greatest strength.

1 in 4 people with diabetes say they ration their insulin due to the high cost (NPR, 2017). The U.S. premium price alone for the top 15 pharmaceuticals generated 163% of the total R&D (research and development) budget for their respective companies (Per Yu and Helms, 2017). These are two statistics that I found during my sophomore year of high school Speech and Debate. Our topic was as follows. Resolved: The United States federal government should impose price controls on the pharmaceutical industry. The research my partner and I conducted to debate this topic was not the first time I decided that my purpose on this planet was to provide affordable healthcare, but it was certainly one of many confirmations I would encounter over the coming years. When I was growing up, my mom ensured I was exposed to people who were not as fortunate as we were. She took me to the Garden City Rescue Mission in Augusta, Georgia on the first Monday of every month, so I could help serve food. I grew up with the knowledge that there were people around me who could not afford food, much less regular doctor’s visits. The statistics I provided at the beginning of this essay are not just to catch your attention. They paint a picture of a country where Big Pharma CEOs line their pockets with the blood of the people they claim to serve. Where profit is valued over human life. That is what I believe to be the biggest problem facing not just America, but the world. As a physician I will provide quality care to those who could not otherwise afford it. Will you help me solve at least some small part of this impossibly vast problem?

Just a few weeks ago, I had job shadowing experience with a physician at the Department of Veteran Affairs Hospital during which we had a long and enlightening conversation about the role of medical care providers in instigating and perpetuating Substance Use Disorder. She is the head of opioid education for care providers at the VA, and she has great passion for the subject. As someone who intends to work with low income and underserved communities, I expect to encounter patients with Substance Use Disorder. My passions of improved provider-patient communication and quality care for those who cannot afford to pay for it align a great deal with the goal of this scholarship. Substance Use Disorder is a public health crisis, and so healthcare providers should be the cornerstone of the initiative to combat the disorder. I want to educate providers about the dangers of prescribing addictive substances, as well as give them tools to aid patient's in recovery. I want to provide to patients thorough and clear information about how to avoid and how to recover from Substance Use Disorder. Many people who suffer from this disorder simply do not have access to the tools needed to get sober. As a physician providing low or no cost healthcare, I will be well poised to aid my patients in their recovery journeys, providing education and tools. Empathy is my central conviction on which I try to base my interactions upon. As a physician I will provide help not blame; support not dismission. No one person can eliminate the undeserved stigma around Substance Use disorder, but as a provider I can do my part in this movement. Destigmatization is a long and arduous process, requiring action from multiple parts of society. However, I know that I can make a difference by joining the push in medicine away from prescribing opioids and other addictive substances, towards safer alternatives. I can also aid patients addicted to other substances by providing resources for recovery and reclamation of independence from harmful drugs. Before I can achieve any of this however, I need to complete college and medical school. Financial aid is a requirement in order for me to pay for school, because I sit in an awkward monetary position. My parents' income is too high for me to get grants or subsidized loans, but they cannot assist me at a high enough value to fund my education in a substantial way. I am doing my best to pay for school, but tuition payments are a significant burden. I hope that you can help me make a difference in the substance abuse problem plaguing our local communities. Addiction is a neurobiologic disease that destroys it's sufferers lives. Treatment of this disease should be a primary concern of healthcare providers. I intend to join the fight and provide empathetic support and treatment for these people. Addiction is not a moral failing, it is a disease. It should be treated as such.

Imagine you are a young woman in early america, you marry and become pregnant. You make it through the trauma of birth and find yourself a mother of a beautiful baby girl. Over the next few weeks, you notice she isn’t gaining weight. Though the baby latches to your nipple well enough, she doesn’t seem to get enough to eat. You try everything, supplementing with everything from cows milk to wet bread, but nothing helps. You are the only nursing mother for miles, there is no one to help you. Despite your best efforts, your baby wastes away, dying of starvation because your body didn’t make enough breast milk. The invention of nutritional infant formula has had a profound positive impact on infant mortality, as well as providing new mothers with more freedom and less guilt. No one can truly know how many infants have been saved by the invention of formula, but I would hazard a guess at millions. Breastfeeding may work for some mothers, but it is a taxing and frustrating journey for many. Many birthing people’s bodies either do not produce enough milk, or they have trouble getting their babies to latch. Not only has formula prevented infant deaths, but it has also saved mothers from the horror of blaming themselves for something out of their control. We cannot imagine the depth of guilt and shame that must have been felt by mothers who’s bodies weren’t up to the task of breastfeeding. Not only for infants, but also for birthing people, formula has been the most important scientific discovery in the last three centuries.

I am in my 5th year of Speech and Debate. It has influenced my personal growth more than any other activity or event in my life, it taught me how to speak confidently, how to dress professionally, and how to be secure in my skill and presentation. I was the president of my high school team for my junior and senior years, and my favorite part of that experience was aiding and comforting younger debaters. One of these experiences that I am still proud of actually occurred at a tournament at which I was only entered in one debate event, so I had quite a lot of free time before my rounds began. One of the younger girls on the team was in girl scouts with me, so I knew her fairly well. She has autism, and was very nervous for her speech event. Since I wasn’t competing in speech, I went with her to each round, and each time she would almost refuse to compete, but I comforted her and made sure she was calm and able to perform. I sat in the back of each round and each time she got nervous she would look at me and continue her speech with greater confidence. It was very rewarding to be able to provide support to her, and her mom was grateful to me for helping her stay calm and compete. My empathy and emotional support for others on the team was my strong suit on the team, and each year my superlative was either “team mom” or “heart of the team.” Now, as I enter the college debate space, it has been difficult to adjust to being a novice, as college debate is much different than high school debate. However, the challenge has enhanced my ability to adapt and overcome even more than my experience in high school. Speech and Debate has impacted my life for the better, and I wouldn’t give up the lessons it has taught me for the world.