Why I am me by Kayla

Why I am me by Kayla - December 2019 Scholarship Essay

The person I am today is because of my family, the environment I live in, the obstacles I have overcome, and the experiences I have gone through. Out of the many life-changing experiences I have gone through, I believe that my devotion to community service is the most important factor in my growth from a little girl to the teenager I am now, then to the adult I will become.

Community service is the opportunity in life to contribute one’s time to helping others and making a difference in society, making a better place for all people to live. The practice of sacrificing your time to better your community is unappealing to many Americans, and trends show that volunteering is declining among young people. This simple act of kindness can include helping out at a fundraiser event or volunteering at a senior center playing bingo with the residents.

As a Christian, my family has instilled community service in me ever since I was young. At 12 years old I volunteered at my first event. My job was to help cheer on the runners at a 5K race, which I enjoyed getting high fives from the participants. After the 5K fundraiser, the volunteer events just kept multiplying each and every year, and I just kept helping out. As I started my Freshman year of high school, I started realizing the positive effect my volunteering helped the community.

Flashback to July 2018 in my junior year of high school, my church hosted its annual week-long volunteer event. The goal of this week, named “Love week,” was to get people involved in the community and make a change. My family and I signed up for an event hosted by Wheels for Hope, which is an organization dedicated to renovating older cars, giving them to people who have barriers blocking their way of getting a car.

At the event, we washed the cars to prepare them to get fixed. As everyone was finishing up, there was a woman by the name of April who was on her way to get her renovated car. We all clapped for April as the founders of Wheels for Hope handed April her new car keys, and then she told her story. She told us that she was a student overwhelmed with college debt, takes care of her two younger siblings, walks 45 mins to work every day, and does not have enough money to afford her own car.

April’s story has stuck with me ever since that volunteering event. I realized that by lending a hand to wash cars, those cars were able to be refurbished, and given to deserving people. Without the volunteers at the event, the cars would have taken longer to wash, and the wait time to get a car would have been extended Although my volunteering does not directly benefit me, what I benefited from later outweighed my time sacrificed. As of today, I volunteer with my grandma at her church’s food pantry on a regular basis, and I volunteer at church every Sunday.

In conclusion, volunteering in my community has made me who I am today, and has impacted me greatly. After volunteering in less fortunate areas, I also now appreciate the things I have and have learned not to take my daily blessings for granted. No matter what path I take in the future, I know serving in the community and helping others will always be apart of my goal.