Even before I could talk, my life presented hurdle after hurdle to me and my family. But through all of it, I overcame them and became stronger. I was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in May of 2003 to a healthy family and a loving community. People always say it takes a village to raise a child, and I doubt that there is another place on the planet that could host a community like New Orleans. My parents told me that everyone there knows everyone, and that thought always excited me. I love the idea of having a friend everywhere I go, and I have grown into that lifestyle at Baylor University, making friends in everything that I do. After having grown up there, my mom truly thought that New Orleans would be "our forever home." Unfortunately, though, hurricane Katrina had other plans. In August of 2005, everything changed for my family and the hopes that they had for us. In the wake of the category five storm that wrecked southeastern Louisiana, my immediate family was uprooted and the course of our lives had been altered. My parents eventually found jobs and a house for sale in Garland, Texas, which soon became the place I call home. As I began to find my way around this new place, my sister and I received the worst news that we have ever been given. We were always told that good things happen for good people and the announcement of my dad's incarceration challenged everything we knew. Our dad was a hero and a role model for us, and to know that even he could go to prison was a shock that none of us were ready to handle. We became a different family, one without an important figure for many reasons. A wife was left without a husband, two kids were left without a father, and the household was left without a voice of reason. For seven long and toilsome years, we were forced to continue our life without my dad. My grandmother had to become an emergency parent again, my mother had to learn how to navigate her life effectively as a single mother, and my sister and I had to learn to grow up without our father, who had been our guide through our entire lives up to this point. This caused my mother to become a different person. She began to put up walls that I had never seen before, for everyone outside of our lives and even some of those inside. She was slow to trust people, and she was much more paranoid about the world. My dad's absence changed how she saw everything, including her kids. However, through all of these life-changing events, we survived. And more than that, we thrived. We were able to build a new community in Texas, beyond the family we already knew. We turned our house into a home, one that would know the struggles of fatherlessness, floods, and freezes galore. And for me, I found my way in life. I found stable communities in my neighborhood, my schools, and many other places around Garland. I joined Boy Scout Troop 57 and became so much more than I ever thought I could. Nowadays, I am an Eagle Scout, a mentor, and a noteworthy figure around my council and across the nation. The challenges I faced throughout my life have shown me that I can make it through anything that life throws at me, and that belief follows me to this very day.

Engineering was an interest of mine dating back to the summer before my senior year of high school. I had finished IB Physics 1 and was preparing for IB Physics 2 when my uncle, an aerospace engineer, encouraged me to look into engineering as a possible path for college. As I understood physics more and more, the possibilities opened up in my mind. By understanding physics, which I consider to be the fundamental science and the raw language of the universe, we humans can and have manipulated the world around us to change it in ways that were impossible just decades ago. And as an engineer, I firmly believe that I could help change the world. On the small scale, I am developing a better understanding of the systems that make my community function. The basic know-how of systems like circuits, hardware, and plumbing have helped me fix small problems in my own home and other who have similar issues. If my biggest dreams do not come true, I could comfortably live my life in service through local engineering and helping improve the quality of life for those around me, and maybe even more. On the larger scale, my dream job and ultimate career goal is to be an astronaut. What started as a stretch of my imagination as a kid has evolved into more of a possibility with each passing day. And one day, I hope to be in the cosmos doing research that will make life better for everyone in the near and far future. As a black engineer, I know that in some way I can be a source of inspiration for others in the black community. Growing up, my parents made sure I knew that I could do anything I set my mind to, and they pointed to many black leaders, inventors, and scientists to show me that if they could change the world, then nothing could stop me from doing the same thing. I am an active member of several organizations where we simply do not see many minorities, like Scouts BSA. Because of my position as one of the few black scouts around, I have an unspoken responsibility to others who may not know their place in the program to show them that a black scout just like them has been successful, so they can be, too. Throughout my time in Scouting, I have been able to be that role model for other up and coming scouts, and I believe that a path in engineering is another opportunity to be that person for people all over the world. I have come to understand how much representation in the world matters to families just like mine, and I would lead a happy life to know that my name could be placed beside some of the greatest examples of success in the black community. Whether as a mechanical engineer working for my local community or an astronaut doing work for the entire world, I hope to use my career to help the world become a better place.

I never really understood the full value of diversity in everyday life until I started working with children. This past summer, I worked at a Cub Scout summer camp, and the experiences I had this summer opened my eyes to a new viewpoint. One session, I was assigned to watch out for a pack made entirely of black scouts in unfavorable financial situations. Throughout the session, I connected with the kids, and they made me realize something incredible. There aren't many black scouts in the Scouting movement, especially not in Cub Scouts, and I got to be one of the first people to look like them that they had ever seen in the organization. I showed them why I loved Scouting, and that they could keep going and enjoy it just as much as I do. For that three-day camp, I was an example that those kids could live up to in a way that not just anyone could be. As a black scout, I rarely see other black scouts anywhere. From my home unit's meetings to national events, I could count every black scout in attendance on two hands. I never realized the strangeness of it all at the moment, but looking back on it, I have a different perception of everything. I always thought I was just some kid, just a tiny part of a bigger whole in my troop, crew, and lodge, but I was more than that. From the inside, I was almost a representation of the black community to those who didn't know better. I didn't think anything of it in the past, but I now know that my words, behaviors, and actions were much more than just a reflection of me, but a reflection of my family and black people nationwide. This changed perspective has adjusted how I carry myself, not only as a scout but as a leader and a person. As a minority in most organizations I'm involved in, I bear the burden of representing many others I will never meet or know, and I know I will not be the last person to feel this way. That's why diversity is such a powerful tool in the world. This responsibility eases on every individual as it gets shared among many. As it spreads to more and more people, it dissipates, allowing every individual to be themselves. In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., they are not "judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." Those people then become not an outlier, but another part of the group. Through diversity, they're able to contribute to the group to improve the experiences they provide and strengthen its core values. When a group embraces the value of diversity, it embraces a better future for everyone involved.

Confidence at some level is almost a superpower to me. It's believing in yourself and your abilities in the face of whatever comes your way. I've always believed that my confidence is one of my biggest strengths, and it's been able to carry me through a lot in my life that I wouldn't have otherwise. Through a ton of different situations in my life. There have been plenty of setbacks that have come my way, and there has been next to nothing to really pull me through, save for my own belief in myself. Since I was a kid, my dad had always taught me to believe in myself. He'd tell me not to let anything that anyone would say to shake who I am. The day he left my life for 7 years, I had lost my biggest supporter. Even still, I never forgot the things he taught me. Having to live without my dad for some of the most formative years of my life was the toughest thing I ever had to do, but I knew that he would never let me just give up. What got me through those years was the confidence that he instilled in me. He never let me be a quitter, he never let me give up on anything I put my mind to, and I knew that I couldn't either. Those lessons have carried me through life to this day, and of the many things I know about myself, I know that I'm confident in everything that I am, and I can only keep pushing myself to be better. Every setback I face is a new opportunity for me to show who I am, and show what my dad taught me.