Most of my extracurricular activities have been service oriented; I enjoy helping people. I feel that it
has been through helping others that I have helped myself to grow and develop, so that to me,
service is not one sided, but mutually beneficial to me and those I serve.
As historian for the Roy High Key Club, I have had many opportunities to serve those in my
community. My responsibilities have included public relations affairs, informing members of
upcoming activities, and the publication of our "scrapbook" at the end of the year. I have enjoyed
my involvement with the club in that it has taught me how to plan, organize, and carry out service
for others, while at the same time being prepared to help those in sudden need.
The past three summers of my life have been spent in the mountains as a volunteer staff member
for Camp Kiesel, a Boy Scouts of America operated Cub Scout day camp. My first year was spent
as a mere general staff member, and my second as an area director. My third year, this most recent
summer, though, has proven to be the most challenging as I took on the responsibility of managing
the camp trading post. It was in this position that I was able to take a back seat to the younger staff
members who assisted me in my store so that they could help and interact with the cub scouts
while I managed the shop.
Another way I try to serve is through preparedness. During my first year at Camp Kiesel, I taught
elementary first-aid to the cub scouts in attendance. I have taken first-aid and other medical
courses, as well as joining HOSA (Health Occupations Students of America), in order to be
prepared for any emergency which may require medical experience, and have, on occasion, been
granted the opportunity to use my knowledge to help others during emergency situations. I plan to
continue my medical education so that I might enter the medical field as either a general practitioner
or a cardiologist, just so that I might continue to help people.
Not all of my activities, though, have been service oriented. I have taken the time to enjoy
performing for people through two dedicated years in the Royal Marching Band, and during my
senior year, as "Reggie", the Roy High School lion mascot.
My three summers spent as a volunteer staff member at Camp Kiesel, a Boy Scouts of America
operated Cub Scout day camp facility located in the mountains above Huntsville, Utah, are what I
consider to be the most significant days in my life. Not only was I given the opportunity to develop
and mature physically and mentally in the Wasatch Mountains, but I was also able to try to be an
example to hundreds of cub scouts.
It was during this time in my life that I believe the majority of my development took place. Isolated
from the rest of the world by the mountains and peaks, I was able to learn more about myself and
others. There were no parents or guardians, save the adult staff, to care for or discipline us, so we
learned first hand and very quickly the skills necessary to survive on our own. We learned self
discipline through early mornings, late nights, and long hours of labor in between. Through our
interaction and isolation, we also formed a type of unwritten social contract; rules to be followed
by all for the mutual benefit of each member of the staff. We also developed a big-brotherly attitude
towards those children who attended the camp and we tried to set an example for them that there
were alternatives to what a person must do when they got older, and that Boy Scouting was a
positive group affiliation, compared to a negative one such as a gang.
All in all, I believe that my time spent at Camp Kiesel was my crash course in humanity. Through
my interactions with the various staff members, I learned about other cultures, other beliefs, and
other ideas, and I began to search for more. The experience broadened my mind and got me close
to nature as well as myself. It is an experience that I try to encourage each fourteen year old boy I
see to take part in, in the hope that they might get out of it what I did.
I was born in Pocatello, Idaho, on April 6, 1978. I was raised in the small town of Arco, Idaho,
and then later moved to Utah at age five. In school, I excelled in all of my studies, yet teachers
found me to be distractable, inattentive, and unsociable. However, my test scores were among the
highest, my understanding of the curriculum complete, and so nothing was ever suspected.
During my ninth grade year, I became aware of a problem that my sister had. She had been
diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD). As I paid attention to the signs and symptoms of
this disorder which possessed my sister, I began to realize that I had many of the same traits. I was
later tested and clinically diagnosed with ADD. For the next year, I was placed on a prescription of
Ritalin-SR time release pills. I was forced to discontinue when it became apparent that I had
become overly dependant upon the drug. I was forced to give up my safety blanket and mental
crutches and learn to walk on my own mental legs.
It has taken the past few years for me to learn how to control my mind. I chose not to see my
condition as a curse, forever slowing me down in life, a disease to be cured; instead, it is a gift
which I must learn to control in order to use. It has taken many countless hours of meditation,
metacognition, study, and even prayer, and I know that it will take many, many more before I am
past this "disorder". However, I know that I can succeed, and take control over my mind. Once I
do, then I will find a way to help others with similar conditions, so that we may not be seen as the
intellectually crippled that we are sometimes characterized as.