These are excerpts from the video interview.
On her family and upbringing in North Carolina:
I'm from Wilmington, North Carolina. My family's been there for about 19 years now. My family is pretty outdoorsy. My dad loves going on little trips or adventures, and he loves cooking.
On her father’s accident that changed her life:
Most of my memories of my dad are with him with his injury. He fractured his spine at work. I think I was probably around six or seven.
Even given that, even though he's in a lot of pain, a lot of the time, he still pushes through. He's given me an incredible life, both my brother and I. And he still does all that he can to go on fun adventures and try to make things as normal as possible.
On learning about Kids’ Chance:
When I was applying for college, my mom and I were just looking on the internet for scholarships, any scholarships we could get. We had never really gone through the college application process, and we were like, "Oh, my gosh, like, this is so expensive. So crazy."
We were just trying to find anything. Gosh, we probably applied for dozens of scholarships! So we were so incredibly able to find Kids’ Chance. We were like, "Oh, my gosh, we actually fit the requirements for this. This is awesome."
On her educational journey so far:
I am now an education major, specifically human development and family studies. I'm hoping to possibly get into some social work or nonprofit work. All through high school, I volunteered at a food bank in town, and I just loved working there and getting to work with the community.
On what she’d like to say to the Kids’ Chance community:
I'm just so incredibly thankful for this community and grateful for everything that they've done for me, and just all the love and support they've shown me. There's just always this constant support, like checking in at the beginning of the school year, and checking up throughout the school year, whether it was via email or text, just making sure I'm okay.
It's just very nice to know that I have a community of people behind me and supporting me and I know I'm gonna know these people probably for the rest of my life. It's very reassuring going through college and when there's struggles that I have these people behind me. I'm incredibly thankful for that.
