Golf has changed my life. Golf has taught me many character-building attributes like integrity, sportsmanship, confidence, and perseverance. These traits and values I embody on and off the golf course and I believe are values that align with the vision of a Scholar-Athlete. As captain of my high school varsity golf team, I led my team to the regional championship in 2022. This fostered continued team unity and the great feeling of completing a major goal. Winning this championship earned me a selection to the 2023 GA All-Star Golf Team. Being captain of our team comes with responsibility. I constantly share with the team my experience of balancing tournaments, practice, school, and homework, as I currently maintain a 3.7 GPA and I am a member of the National Honor Society. Many of my extracurricular activities include golf, as a competitive player in tournaments. Golf has afforded me many leadership opportunities, where I have made a positive impact. For example, I was selected in 2021 to hit the opening Hope Shot at the PGA Tour Championship in Atlanta. In addition, I became the 3rd student from Atlanta to be selected for the Congaree Global Golf Initiative, an organization whose mission is to provide well-deserving high school students with the highest level of athletic coaching and academic tools to enhance their opportunities for success. Also, in 2022, I was selected to attend the Pure Insurance Championship in Pebble Beach, CA where I placed third out of seventy-eight junior golfers. During this event, I was paired with the legendary Ernie Els who shared coaching tips with me. Also, during this event, I was featured in a PGA article entitled “Pure Insurance Impacting the First Tee”, which highlighted teens in the program and how they positively impact the community. These experiences helped me to believe that I can reach for the stars. When I am not on the golf course, I am serving in a leadership capacity at my school as a Drew Student Ambassador. As a Drew Ambassador, I represent my classmates when making school-wide decisions. This role helps me to convey the collective ideas of everyone. As an ambassador, I can present problems and solutions to my school administration for the benefit of the student body. I have learned the importance of everyone having a voice and the value of listening. I have also completed community service projects with the YMCA by helping with Thanksgiving food drives and Hosea Feed the Hungry organization. It would mean so much to me to be selected for the Hulede Collegiate Scholarship, because I would think back to how far I have come by surviving the harshest moments of the recent pandemic, such as the loss of my grandmother. I learned a lot about perseverance and resilience during this time. I recalled her passion for reading books, so I shared an idea with my school administrators that we could, upon return to in-person learning, conduct a book drive at the beginning of our school year so we could donate the books to the non-profit called Books for Africa that collects and ships books to people in need of resources in African countries. The book drive resulted in over 11,000 book donations. I learned to use my pain of loss towards giving back to others. This has allowed me to be a better student ambassador, varsity golf team captain, community advocate, and National Honor Society member. If I'm selected for the Hulede Collegiate Golf Scholarship I will use this resource towards attending college in the Fall of 2023. I plan to play collegiate golf upon graduating high school as I have committed to playing Division 1 golf at Alabama State University. While at AL State, I will obtain my bachelor's degree in Business Marketing. My long-term career goals include obtaining a PGA Golf Management Certification which I will use to have a career in the golf industry. I also envision positively giving back to my community through teaching the game of golf to youth, as well as sharing important character-building traits such as integrity and perseverance. These traits and values I embody on and off the golf course.

I hope to make a positive impact on society by being a Game Changer in my actions. I want to major in business or economics in college. The idea of a Game Changer is bringing a thought or participating in an event that affects a shift in the current manner of doing or thinking about something. My initial passion for a career in business stems from watching my father daily. I have seen firsthand how my dad, an insurance salesman in our community, has tirelessly worked his business from the ground-up. It takes a certain strength, grit, and thirst to keep grinding daily for something you are passionate about for yourself and your family. Watching my dad hone his entrepreneurial skills and creative abilities, speaks to his game-changing spirit and continued to ignite my passion for a career in this field. My interest to major in business grew more after completing the 2022 Thurgood Marshall College Fund Fleischer HBCU Scholars Program. It was completing this intense four- week summer program, I grasped a deeper appreciation for economics and business professions. This program was three weeks of classes and business mentorship, followed by a week- long project where a business concept had to be developed and sold to potential customers. This game-changing experience has made me want to pursue this path more in my college classes. The National First Tee Program has called me a Game-Changer in the game of golf, not so much because of my abilities on the golf course but how I use the game of golf as a gateway to achieve my goals and give back to my community. My family moved to the East Lake Community in the heart of the city of Atlanta when I was 8-yrs old, two mins from a professional golf course. It was then I became a member of the First Tee where I developed a passion for golf which has led to volunteer projects- such as the Books for Africa Drive. When my grandmother died in 2020 during the pandemic, I was very down. I began to recall her passion for reading books, so I shared an idea with my school administrators in 2021 about a book drive at the beginning of our school year, for donations to be given to the non-profit Books for Africa organization. Books for Africa collects and ships books to every country in Africa to entities in need of resources. This book drive resulted in over 11,000 books being donated from our school to this non-profit organization. The below article includes a special segment where I am featured. It is special to me because it includes my dad too. I know how hard he works as an entrepreneur to provide for our family over the years through his business. https://www.pgatour.com/champions/news/2022/09/26/pebble-beach-pure-insurance-championship-impacting-first-tee.html If I'm selected for the Marie J. Smith Esq. Social Sciences Scholarship, I would like to have a business-marketing career in the Professional Golfers Association of America. I envision giving back to my community through creating business opportunities via golf pathways that are established in more diverse areas of the country. I will also give back to my community through teaching the game golf to the youth as well as sharing important character- building traits and core values, I’ve too learned along the way and actively display. One of my favorite quotes by former President Barack Obama, ¨Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek¨.

My goal for my life is to never be afraid to follow my dreams and to help others along the way. My dreams include educating future leaders of tomorrow about Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math opportunities to youth in disadvantaged communities. My goal is to attend college where I can major in Math or Technology and then getting a career in a STEM field where I can educate youth in the generations to come.