The Story of Me

My story starts and ends in Colorado. I was born in Englewood, but spent most of my life in Fort Collins. One of my portfolio pieces comes from my time growing up there, when I went to the same elementary school as the infamous Balloon Boy-- a story I recounted in my Memoir writing class and included in this portfolio. I had a great childhood, but in retrospect it was pretty sheltered. I have spent the last four years at the University of Denver unlearning many of the things the education system erroneously taught me. My majors were Public Policy & Socio-Legal Studies, with minors in Psychology & Writing. One topic of particular interest has been the history of indigenous people in this country, and how the truth varies from what I was taught. That is why two of my pieces included in my portfolio are about Native American culture and policy. The Romani people in Europe have a similarly depressing history, full of relocation, oppression, and poverty. I learned about this during my time studying abroad in the Czech Republic my junior year. I wanted to compare the culture between the homogenous Czech population and the nomadic Romani population, which is another piece I included in my portfolio. 

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I spent the last three years working on campus as a Peer Health Educator, training other students on topics like bystander intervention, alcohol harm reduction, and gender violence. Gender violence prevention became a great passion area of mine, which was particularly interesting as it took place alongside the resurgence of the #MeToo movement. My final piece in my portfolio looks at the rhetoric of the #MeToo movement, which encompasses another element of my college experience.