The Girl in Ewell

What is something that you want the campus to know as a whole?

Sometimes at William & Mary people don’t feel like they are enough, but the truth is that you are more than enough. Like really more than enough. I feel like we all pull together this application and someone looked at it and was like, “Oh wow, this person is gonna do some pretty great stuff with their life. I feel like we should give them a William & Mary degree, so they can continue doing that awesome stuff.” And that stuff could be really anything – running for office, starting up a nature reserve, or even just being a really great friend. They all saw a lot of potential in us, and they just really wanted to make sure that we could carry that potential forward with our William & Mary degrees. We sometimes beat ourselves up, but we are all so much more capable than we know or what we think we can do.

Was there a time that this motto helped you get through a rough spot?

I feel like it’s something that you kind of realize after the fact. When you’re in the thick of it, you’re just like, “Oh gosh, I don’t think I can do this.” Sometimes you do pull yourself into a hole, but somehow you get through it by whatever means necessary, but then you’re like, “Wait a second. I totally did that, and I could totally do that again and again and again.” I think that that tenacity is really in all of us. Maybe you don’t remember it in the moment, but you have to make sure that you try to remember it at least in those moments when you are not in the thick of it just so that you can have that moment to yourself.

How did you choose William & Mary?

I actually transferred here. I’m from JMU, and I just felt like I was going to graduate from JMU, and I wasn’t going to know the things I was supposed to know after college, which is like the vaguest statement ever. I had the feeling inside of me, so I started to look into transferring. I knew I wanted a smaller school that wasn’t going to make me go broke, so I was like, “Oh my gosh. William & Mary!” So, I came here, and I think that I just really fell in love with some of the people, even prior to transferring here. Those people are still some of my housemates, some of my best friends on campus. I just think that this is a really welcoming community that wants to see you shine, honestly. Everyone is just so fantastic.

At the end of your life, what’s going to be most important to you?

I think those moments of reflection are going to be the most important. Obviously spending time with friends, doing really well on tests, and trying to do your best at everything you can do is really fantastic, but even when I am going to walk out of here today, and I am going to walk back to my house, I am going to reflect on what happened today. Even this interview, you know? I am just going to really think about it. I think that there is always a twist or a spin that you can put on something to replicate that in another dimension of your life, but I don’t think you can do that if you don’t reflect. The reason why it made me really happy at the end of my life is because I just took a lot of time to reflect. I think it’s also my fear that some people don’t necessarily reflect here. We do a lot of things, but reflection is so essential, but it sometimes gets lost in translation as well.