Extracurricular Activities

My extracurricular activities are dancing, horseback riding, and photography. I have been dancing ballet for fourteen years and dance at INSYNC Center of the Arts. I have been horseback riding for nine years and have come in third in my competitions. I do not compete anymore, but I do continue to ride and train my skills. I picked up photography in my eighth-grade year, taking a class. Ever since then, I have loved picking up a camera and taking photos of scenery. I like to use my photography to express myself and for the joy that it brings others. I want to push boundaries with my photography to help more people understand problems around the world.

​

Community Service:

For community service, I volunteer at my dance studio. I have been volunteering at my dance studio for two years.

​

Anticipated College /Course of Study:

My academic interest is in public health, and making a change in the world heavily motivates my drive to succeed. I love learning about worldly issues relating to health and wellbeing, and trying to find solutions to them. I want to create a change in the medical field where physicians are unbiased towards certain races or ethnicities, and people’s medical needs are heard. The holistic approach will not only help me understand diseases and how they affect people, but also how certain environments can lead to bad outcomes. Being around family members who are in public health, I’ve always been taught that you can’t treat the disease without treating the person’s environment. I am unsure about what college I would like to attend, yet I am confidant wherever I go I want to make a difference.

​

Career Aspirations

My dream job is to become an obstetrician. This decision was heavily influenced by my mother's research for her Doctoral degree and my love of working with children over the years. My mother’s research study was about trust between patients and their physicians. Her study showed that the trust level between patients and their physicians varied depending on where the patients lived and their race. The statistic that interested me the most was the comparatively low levels of trust between physicians and their black patients, and between black patients and their physicians. In her background research, she found a history of black patients lying to their doctors, but additionally, black patients being neglected by their doctors and mistreated. This long history has heavily influenced the healthcare world today. This is why many black people don't often trust the healthcare system. I want to change this statistic so that more people in underrepresented communities are heard for their medical needs and are not deferred by doctors. I would do this by prioritizing and advocating for these underrepresented communities, and challenging the stereotypes that minorities cannot trust their physicians. Medical school is a long way away; that is why choosing to start now by volunteering in these communities while educating people about advocating for themselves will build these relationships and hopefully improve their well-being.

​

Favorite Quote/Scripture/ Author:

My favorite quote is "We've learned that quiet isn't always peace and the norms and notions of what just is isn't always justice." - Amanda Gorman. My favorite scripture is Proverbs 3:13-15 "Blesses is the one who finds wisdom, and the one who gets understanding, for the gain from her is better than gain from silver and her profit better than gold. She is more precious than jewels and nothing you desire can compare with her." My favorite author is Chimanda Ngozi and my favorite book by her is "The Thing Around Your Neck."

​

What do you like to do for fun?

I express my creative side through dance and photography. I have been dancing ballet since I was three, and I have always looked up to Misty Copeland. The way she moves so gracefully and confidently on stage has always inspired me to pursue dancing. I get nervous when I have to engage in public speaking in front of my class. It sometimes causes me to stutter. When I dance, I am most confident in expressing myself. The characters that I play on stage fill me with emotion and energy. I feel no fear of messing up, and even if I do, I know it’s not the end of the world. One misstep pushes me to work harder and do better. If I am having a bad day at school or just feeling a little down, I play music and dance. My body would suddenly become loose to the sound of the music, and I feel extremely confident, and I am able to face any obstacles. I also like to express myself through photography. I enjoy taking photos of images that represent me or relate to me. These images are often pictures of my heritage and my family. My favorite photo that I’ve captured was a shot of a ripped picture of boats from my trip to Cap-Haitian, Haiti. It shows the boats in the photo in black and white and in color, layered on top of each other. When I took this photo, I wanted to show the beautiful side of the country but also its flaws. The picture of the boats represented Haiti’s beauty, but the rips represented the broken systems of the country. My pride in my country is what influenced this photo; although there is a flaw behind its beauty, the country remains rich in strength and history.

​