I have always known that I was meant to be involved in the Hospitality field. My mother tells me how as a young child I would go up to random people and say hello. Visits to the nursing home to visit my Great Grandma Irene became a social gathering where I would go from room to room visiting with all of my “grandparents” before settling in on the lap of my own Great Grandma to tell her of my adventures. Looking back on that time period, I realize that it was the beginning of my desire to make those around me who were less fortunate have just a moment or two of joy with a simple act of kindness that I was able to provide them. Since then, I have continued to expand on the ways that I help others. When I was in 5th grade, I started raising money for a charity that I founded, Kids 4 Kids at Oishei Children’s Hospital. Every year I research, design and produce a craft that I sell at various events, including my alma mater’s homecoming carnival. To date, I have donated over $20,000 in toys to the hospital and have had the unique opportunity to visit with children on different floors of the hospital, offering them a toy to help make their day brighter. I have learned more about empathy and how a simple act of kindness can change a person’s entire day. There is nothing in this world more fulfilling than seeing the smile on a child’s face as you offer up the chance to pick from any toy they want on a gurney that you take from room to room. There is nothing more heartwarming than having a parent follow you out of the room to hug you and cry on your shoulder as they thank you for your kindness. I believe empathy may be the most important attribute a person should value. Without empathy, you cannot understand what the other person is going through at the time you are interacting with them. Without empathy, you cannot put yourself into someone else’s shoes to be able to feel and understand the needs they are trying to express. And without empathy, you cannot value the accomplishments that come from being a good leader who is making the world around them a better place. This is important because I believe empathy is the most important leadership trait there is and it is important in any field but crucial in the hospitality industry. My mother has worked hard to always provide for my sister and me but she also made it very clear to us that we would be financially responsible when it came to our college education. Her reasoning was two-fold. First, she has never made enough money where she could put aside extra to help us with college expenses. But more importantly, she taught us that it is important to have a vested interest in our future. These are things I learned because of how I grew up and the lessons my mother taught me. This scholarship will allow me the opportunity to keep my financial debt to a minimum and bring me closer to achieving my goals.

Growing up with the Special Education label attached to you can be a daunting situation to overcome for many students. I was diagnosed with a learning disability at the age of 4 and grew up always knowing I was different. From a young age, I was pulled from my classroom to be taken for speech therapy, occupational therapy and physical therapy. I knew more acronyms than sight words and while at age 5 or 6, it seemed fun to be pulled from class to go to a room where I was given fun puzzles to play with and received smelly markers as rewards, the fun quickly changed as the stigma of what that time away from the traditional classroom meant to both me and my classmates. I quickly learned just how different I was from my classmates and it was a painful experience. However, these experiences have also taught me how to take care of myself and those around me. As a Hospitality major, one of my main goals is to create an experience that will take a client’s vision to a new level. To do that, I need to be able to actively read their expressions, listen intently to their words, and understand what they are saying, even when they aren’t saying it out loud. My years of dealing with unkind situations have made me a strong advocate for making every person's experience beyond their expectations. I want to see the joy that my assistance helps create for any given event. My experiences in life have taught me that there is no perfect person. There is no perfect client. There is no perfect situation in life that any of us are privy to. We all have that in common. We are all imperfect. Which is perfect. It allows us all to recognize the good in one another and appreciate each other for the wonderful things we bring to the table of life. I have lots of dreams for what I want my future to look like and what I want to achieve. One of the things that are most important to me is that I work with and for people who believe in the good of those around them. They say you can’t judge a book by its cover and I fully believe in that statement and have made it a mantra that I say every day. I will never look at someone and think that they cannot achieve something. I will never listen to someone and think that they shouldn’t be trying something. I will never work with someone and tell them they are wrong. I will work with them to find a common ground so that both of our voices are heard. It is what makes any relationship wonderful and it is what I strive to achieve for my future.

Growing up with the Special Education label attached to you can be a daunting situation to overcome for many students. I was diagnosed with a learning disability at the age of 4 and grew up always knowing I was different. From a young age, I was pulled from my classroom to be taken for speech therapy, occupational therapy and physical therapy. I knew more acronyms than site words and while at age 5 or 6 it seemed fun to be pulled from class to go to a room where I was given fun puzzles to play with and received smelly markers as rewards, the fun quickly changed as the stigma of what that time away from the traditional classroom meant to both me and my classmates. I quickly learned just how different I was from my classmates and it was a painful experience. However, these experiences gave me the opportunity to achieve amazing milestones. While I struggled with my academics, my hard work and determination landed me on the merit roll throughout high school and as a senior, I was named to the Orchard Park Pride; an elite group of students who are recognized for their grades, accomplishments and overall community involvement. After completing the Fall semester of my Junior year at Niagara University I am proud to say I have been on the Dean's List every semester with a gpa that can rival any honors student. The work ethic I have practiced since I was young has taught me the tenacity necessary to achieve my short and long term goals. These experiences have also taught me how to take care of myself and those around me. As a Hospitality major, one of my main goals is to create an experience that will take a client’s vision to a new level. In order to do that, I need to be able to actively read their expressions, listen intently to their words, and understand what they are saying, even when they aren’t saying it out loud. My years of dealing with unkind situations has made me a strong advocate for making every person's experience beyond their expectations. I want to see the joy that my assistance helps create for any given event. My experiences in life have taught me that there is no perfect person. There is no perfect client. There is no perfect situation in life that any of us are privy to. We all have that in common. We are all imperfect. Which is perfect, really. It allows us all to recognize the good in one another and appreciate each other for the wonderful things we bring to the table of life. I have lots of dreams for what I want my future to look like and what I want to achieve. One of the things that is most important to me is that I work with and for people who believe in the good of those around them. They say you can’t judge a book by its cover and I fully believe in that statement and have made it a mantra that I say every day. I will never look at someone and think that they cannot achieve something. I will never listen to someone and think that they shouldn’t be trying something. I will never work with someone and tell them they are wrong. I will work with them to find a common ground so that both of our voices are heard. It is what makes any relationship wonderful and it is what I strive to achieve for my future.

Growing up with the Special Education label attached to you can be a daunting situation to overcome for many students. I was diagnosed with a learning disability at the age of 4 and grew up always knowing I was different. From a young age, I was pulled from my classroom to be taken for speech therapy, occupational therapy and physical therapy. I knew more acronyms than sight words and while at age 5 or 6, it seemed fun to be pulled from class to go to a room where I was given fun puzzles to play with and received smelly markers as rewards, the fun quickly changed as the stigma of what that time away from the traditional classroom meant to both me and my classmates. I quickly learned just how different I was from my classmates and it was a painful experience. However, these experiences allowed me to achieve amazing milestones. While I struggled with my academics, my hard work and determination landed me on the merit roll throughout high school and as a senior, I was named to the Orchard Park Pride; an elite group of students who are recognized for their grades, accomplishments and overall community involvement. After completing the Fall semester of my Junior year at Niagara University I am proud to say I have been on the Dean's List every semester with a GPA that can rival any honors student. The work ethic I have practiced since I was young has taught me the tenacity necessary to achieve my short and long-term goals. These experiences have also taught me how to take care of myself and those around me. As a Hospitality major, one of my main goals is to create an experience that will take a client’s vision to a new level. To do that, I need to be able to actively read their expressions, listen intently to their words, and understand what they are saying, even when they aren’t saying it out loud. My years of dealing with unkind situations have made me a strong advocate for making every person's experience beyond their expectations. I want to see the joy that my assistance helps create for any given event. My experiences in life have taught me that there is no perfect person. There is no perfect client. There is no perfect situation in life that any of us are privy to. We all have that in common. We are all imperfect. Which is perfect, really. It allows us all to recognize the good in one another and appreciate each other for the wonderful things we bring to the table of life. I have lots of dreams for what I want my future to look like and what I want to achieve. One of the things that are most important to me is that I work with and for people who believe in the good of those around them. They say you can’t judge a book by its cover and I fully believe in that statement and have made it a mantra that I say every day. I will never look at someone and think that they cannot achieve something. I will never listen to someone and think that they shouldn’t be trying something. I will never work with someone and tell them they are wrong. I will work with them to find a common ground so that both of our voices are heard. It is what makes any relationship wonderful and it is what I strive to achieve for my future.

I struggled both academically and socially until the 6th grade, when I was finally able to participate in school sports. This was a pivotal moment in my life. I tentatively signed up for the girls Field Hockey team, not because I knew how to play the sport, but because I grew up with my dad playing ice hockey and it seemed like it would be a way to bond with him. I, along with my coach, quickly realized that I had a natural talent for the sport. Because of my disability, reading and writing never came easily to me. I was always considered a visual learner. That helped me immensely on the field. Show me once how to dribble the ball and off I went, practicing until I was the fastest player on the field. I loved that I finally found something that when I was taught a skill, I could feel success at achieving my goals. Over the years, I found that as I became a more active participant in sports, I was receiving higher grades and had more success in the classroom. I feel that this came from the discipline I was learning on the field. My daily schedule was much more structured when sports became a part of my life. No longer did I go home and watch tv until I finally sat down to work on homework. Instead, I left the classroom at the end of the day to head to the library to work on schoolwork before practice would begin. After practice or a game, I would go home, shower and sit down at the kitchen table to work on homework with my dinner at my side. The more accomplished I felt on the field, the more I wanted to feel that same sense of accomplishment in the classroom. Before I knew it, my grades were improving. By the time I graduated, I was just shy of reaching honor roll status and was named as one of our school's “Orchard Park Pride”, a select group of students who are awarded for achievements in the classroom, on the field, and in the community. I owe this success to my participation in sports. Knowing how important this was to my success in high school made me realize this needed to be something I continued with as I continued my education. I am a Sports Management major at Niagara University and am planning on going on for my master's in Physical Education so that I can hopefully give much-needed support to students in the future.

I was 7 years old when my parents sat my sister and me down to tell us they were getting a divorce. I wasn’t surprised. I knew they didn’t have the happy-go-lucky attitude with each other that many of my friend’s parents had. In fact, I was excited about the idea that I could finally live in a house where I didn’t have to listen to arguing or belittling on a daily basis. I was excited to be one of the kids that got twice as many presents at Christmas and got to do double the celebrating. And I was happy to start what I thought would be an exciting new chapter in my life. However, I was surprised when months later, I found out just what it meant to be the child of divorce. I assumed that when my parents divorced I would just go back and forth between the two homes and live the life of a gypsy. Instead of the gypsy life, I found that my father always seemed to have a conflict with the days that he was scheduled to spend time with me. Mom set up a google calendar that she shared with my father and both of us girls so that everyone knew what was going on, who had doctor appointments, what sports were being played on any particular day and any other important information. Dad seemed to struggle with the calendar and keeping up with our schedules so after a while, we stopped trying so hard to see him. That is, until Jackie came along. Jackie is our Jack Russell who came into our lives unexpectedly one weekend when my dad was trying to find a way to ‘re-connect’ with us. We had begged our mother for a dog for years but because of the small house we lived in, it wasn’t in the cards. So when my dad offered to drive us to the kennel to pick out a puppy, my sister and I jumped on board and came home with Jackie. Jackie became the reason to go visit dad’s house. We couldn’t wait to get down on the floor and have her jump all over us and kiss us with her scratchy tongue. Her stumpy little tail didn’t wag when we pulled up…her entire rear end would shimmy from side to side and if we didn’t open the car door right away, she would do a vertical jump that would impress any high jump coach! Jackie was the reason we began going back to visit with my dad but after a while, we found that while we loved having our time with our dog, we also loved having our time with our dad. I’m not sure what kind of relationship, if any, I would have with my father today if Jackie hadn’t come into our lives!

I grew up with the label of Special Education attached to everything I did. I was always put into special classes, given special accommodations, and told I would be limited in what I achieved in the future. There were many other students like myself who were told these things and became the student that they were predestined to become. I didn't accept this destiny. I chose to work harder and longer than those around me so that I could retain the information that my classmates seemed to learn easily. One thing that I found especially helpful was the simple act of repetition. Any time I had vocabulary to learn, I would manually write out the word and the definition over and over until I finally would be able to write them out in any order without having to think about it. Any time I had a chapter to read, I would use the same philosophy. I have a reading disorder that has me reading and writing phonetically without the assistance of technology so reading anything beyond a couple or sentences can be an arduous task, to say the least. However, I learned that if I used the computer to read the text to me once or twice, then I could go through myself and read it with better comprehension. They say practice makes perfect and while the art of repetition seems simplistic at best, it is a strategy that has worked for me over the years allowing me to hold at 3.85 gpa as a sophomore in college.