Growing up in a divorced parent household, I found myself navigating the chasm between my parents' world, balancing my time between them. This fostered an early sense of independent as sort of a coping method to ignore the turmoil surrounding me. In high school, I worked three different jobs and played two sports. This seemed to be a solution initially, but I realized that I was digging a deeper and deeper pit in my relationship with my parents and my brother as I blinded myself with my selfish desire to remove myself from trials. It was during my senior year that I realized the importance of investing in relationships. Delving deeper into my commitments and intentionally allocating time for my family, I discovered the healing power of conversation, humility, forgiveness, and extending myself beyond personal boundaries. I was greatly humbled through this experience, and now carry this same attitude today. Humility is crucial to being successful, especially as a future healthcare professional, so that I don’t become complacent and forget that the person in front of me is more than their diagnosis. This scholarship opportunity will help me pursue my career be relieving some of the financial burden and help me to recognize the areas that I need more practice and help in so that I can become a more well-rounded and proficient physical therapist. While working three jobs during my senior year, one of them was tutoring kids on the autism spectrum. There were two kids in particular that I saw twice a week for an hour at a time. Typically, for kids on the autism spectrum, attention is difficult to maintain for long periods of time. This required me to get very creative to capture their attention and complete the work. The kids ended up loving the time that we got to spend together, because I worked around their disability and made it a strength as we incorporated their interests with their schoolwork and ultimately guided them on a path of success. As I reflect on this time of tutoring and how I found success with these students, I was greatly encouraged by it as it helped strengthen my critical thinking abilities and ingenuity to learn how to guide them to use their “weaknesses” as strengths for life. As I went to college, I continued to pursue service in my community, and especially in my local church. I was involved in my local church’s children's ministry for 3 years, and I can’t imagine my college career without it. Kids ministry has taught me patience, leadership, and endurance like none other. This opportunity presented me with more challenges than I initially imagined. I grew to learn that people, especially children, are incredibly dynamic and require a lot of persistence to cater to their strengths and interests. After just one semester serving, I was asked to lead the classroom and was now responsible for both the kids and the other volunteers in the room. Yet, it was through this service that I realized the power of selflessness—stepping out of my comfort zone for others' growth and success. Thinking less of myself and more about the collective well-being led to personal and communal achievements. Overall, my life experiences have taught me that the trials I face are the best opportunities for growth that leads to success. These trials produce endurance which then produces character that has shaped me today. Today, I can only define success by how well I can humble myself and work towards someone else's success. This opportunity would be a tremendous blessing as I pursue my career and work towards other's achieving their own success through health. Through the trails, experiences, and opportunities that I have had throughout my life thus far, I have been refined to face difficult situations with perseverance and perspective. As a prospective physical therapist, there will also be trials of varying magnitudes and weightiness, though I feel that my endurance to maintain a perspective that sees trials as opportunities will lead me to degrees of success I never imagined to be possible.

I always knew that there is a call on my life to empower others through healing that simultaneously beckons me to lay myself down for the sake of others. The spring of 2022 was a catalyst for this calling. I was asked to lead a team of students on a humanitarian relief trip to Warsaw, Poland, to aid the Ukrainian refugees who have fled their homes due to the war with Russia. To put this in context, when asked to lead this trip I was in the middle of studying for finals, I had never been overseas, I had no funding, there was no team put together ahead of time, and we were leaving in 10 days. Daunting doesn’t even begin to describe my outlook on the trip, though I said yes nonetheless. Within 5 days, by the grace of God, I assembled a team of 4, I raised over $8,000, I booked flights, hotels, and transportation, and I finished finals. While immersed in the beautiful country of Poland and interacting with the people there, I learned a lot about the culture of Poland and Ukraine. I was told that in their cultures, men don’t typically engage in a lot of physical touch with their children. When my team and I played games with the kids at the refugee centers, engaged in emotional therapy practices, and had fun throwing the kids up in the air and catching them, the staff were amazed. They saw both the joy that the activities brought the children, as well as a dramatic shift in the emotional healing that occurred. I had always believed in the power of healing through physical touch, but when I saw how this sort of tender and intentional care brought transformation to the children whose lives have been ransacked by tragedy, my whole perspective of my career as a physical therapist changed. As a physical therapy student, I have this same amazing opportunity to bring care that not only provides a physical remedy but seeks to treat the whole person. The key difference that sets physical therapy apart is an approach that necessitates out of the box thinking combined with genuine empathy. I have always been deeply moved to help others, but this experience alongside all the experiences to follow in my life, grew a desire in me to pursue excellence in becoming a physical therapist. As an undergraduate student pursuing physical therapy, I was interested in childhood development, the field’s current research, and the specialized types of therapy for different patients. The technology and research are amazing, but I've learned that a therapist can have all the resources available to them and lack a tenderness that allows them to care for the complexities of the psychosomatic system. This encourages me further in my pursuit of physical therapy to serve as a model of intentionality, humility, and compassion for my patients who not only deserve amazing care but also a chance to feel seen and loved. Through every experience with physical therapy, I have felt more and more called to love, honor, and heal with the skills I learn.