For my leadership project I spent a week in Oregon with my Youth Group doing various service projects. One being Project Transformation, a literacy program for at risk elementary school kids. During this project, we helped younger kids read a choice book. We would encourage them to sound out words themselves and participated in other activities that helped the kids focus and learn. In addition, we cleaned books at The Children’s Book Bank; a place for donated books to be examined, cleaned, and put in bags to give to children who need them. Books have always been a significant part of my life. Knowing that I was helping other kids be able to read and have their own books was a highlight of my trip.

Third, we volunteered at the Blanchet House. A program providing nutritious meals to homeless men in downtown Portland; people volunteer to serve the men three meals a day, 6 days a week, every week. I worked to clean tables and restock appliances whenever someone new came in. It was a fast-paced job that required communication with everyone in the room. I had a similar experience at Bethlehem House of Bread, where we assisted in the food pantry. I worked to direct families around and help them choose their food. We also picked vegetables in the community garden and repainted their entryway.

We also helped at Clark County Farm, spending an afternoon weeding, planting seeds, and harvesting radishes and squash. The farm is one of many that donates fruits and vegetables to the Oregon Food Bank, where we also volunteered. When we arrived at the Food Bank we had to put on aprons and keep the work space sanitary by washing our hands and wearing gloves and hairnets. We put apples from crates into mesh bags to be packaged and shipped to various locations. I enjoyed this because everyone was experiencing the same sense of accomplishment when looking at the apple crates we had emptied. When a small group of volunteers manages to pack hundreds of pounds of apples, it’s not so hard to believe it will make an even bigger difference to the people they’re for.

For our final project, we volunteered at Nightstrike. An organization that hosts the Portland community homeless every Thursday night under Burnside Bridge. Volunteers are assigned to stations such as hosting, sewing, food prep, foot washing, hair cutting, and clothing replacement. Hosting, the station I was in, means initiating conversations with people and making sure they know what every station offers. Overall, I appreciate being able to go on the trip and discovering differences between my home and Portland. This coming summer, I’m taking a service trip to Guatemala and hope to contribute even more to those in need.

I hope to be the kind of black belt that someone of any rank can feel comfortable around. I know that when I first started, black belts looked intimidating and I was terrified of messing up in front of them. I want to be a black belt that makes others feel confident and strong. Encouraging them to not be afraid to reach their own goals. This way, they can continue practicing and pass along the advice and lessons they’ve learned on their journeys to others as well.

Upon receiving my black belt, I would want to continue training to improve my flexibility, endurance, confidence, and focus. I would also want to become more precise in doing my forms and in sparring. Practicing Martial Arts has provided me with skills I never thought about seriously. Such as, knowing I can defend myself in an unwanted situation. Although it’s nice to feel safe, my main reason to keep practicing is because I simply enjoy it. Taking part in a physical activity is what I do to de-stress and improve my focus. My overall goal is to improve and work off of what I've already begun to become more proficient in sparring, forms, and self-defense.

Katherine Johnson is an African-American mathematician whose work as a “computer” at NASA resulted in the first U.S. manned space flights. “Computers” were women who performed calculations by hand with pencil and graph paper. This often took more than a week to complete and filled numerous notebooks with data and formulas. In 1962, Johnson did calculations for a flight research team plotting the flights of John Glenn’s orbital flight. Her knowledge of analytic geometry and use of Euler’s Method helped launch Glenn into orbit, turning the tides in the U.S. vs. Soviet Union competition. She defied racial and gender barriers, earning the respect of her male teammates. Her assertiveness is inspirational and in becoming a black belt I hope to gain a fraction of the confidence that she has.

https://www.nasa.gov/content/katherine-johnson-biography

Lin-Manuel Miranda is a play-writer, actor, lyricist, and singer. He wrote the Broadway musical Hamilton which has won many awards and raised money for the arts. He is supporting the relief efforts in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria by bringing Hamilton to San Juan, January 10 – 16. Performing to raise funds and awareness on his birthday. Tickets for the shows range from $10 - $5000 and he has held numerous giveaways, ensuring that anyone who wants to can go. He is one of my living heroes because he uses what he has earned to ensure those in need aren’t forgotten or overlooked just because their problems are out of our sight.

http://www.linmanuel.com/bio

My mom is the most amazing person I know. She’s always supportive and kind, not only to me but to everyone she meets. She encourages me to do my best and I always strive to make her proud. She’s generous and As I’ve gotten older, I realize how much she does for me and I’m so thankful. I love her for always being patient with me and gently pointing out my mistakes. I’ve learned so much about caring for others and always trying to be a good person in general.

Greta Thunberg is a 15 year old climate change activist who had made the headlines by spending her school days protesting. She sat outside the Riksdag (the supreme decision-making body of Sweden) from late August until September 9 every day during school hours with the sign Skolstrejk för klimatet (school strike for the climate). Her demands were that the Swedish government reduce carbon emissions as per the Paris Agreement. After the September elections, she continued to strike only on Fridays, which gained worldwide attention. She inspired school students across the globe to take part in the strikes. More than 20,000 students have held strikes in at least 270 cities in countries around the world. In Australia, thousands of students were inspired to strike, ignoring Prime Minister Morrison's comments of "more learning in schools and less activism". This is important for my generation to hear because we know that we can make a difference. It’s just more of us need to act on it, calling attention to important issues that aren’t going to be solved by solutions we came up with decades ago.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/30/world/australia/student-strike-climate-change.html

J.K. Rowling wrote Harry Potter which has sold over 500 million worldwide, becoming the best-selling book series in history. Aside from Harry potter, she has written 5 adult books under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. She used a fake name so that the crime books she wrote would be judged on their own merit, and not from her previous successes. However, when she wrote Harry Potter, she only provided her last name because since her target audience was boys, she didn’t think they would read the books if they saw they were by a woman. I find it inspiring that after she became a billionaire author, she didn’t hide her name to conform to her audience. She withheld it so her writing could be judged fairly. She has earned her success through perseverance and dedication, she rose even higher with her talent, not her reputation.

https://www.jkrowling.com/about/