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Help Melora Go To NSLC This Summer!

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Please help Melora go to NSLC! Melora has been recommended by her previous high school and invited to the 2024 National Student Leadership Conference, which is held at 13 universities across the U.S. She is so excited to have the chance to attend the Marine Biology 9-day intensive at the University of Miami.

Ever since Melora was very young, she's been obsessed with sharks and marine life. We gifted her her first college-level marine biology book in 6th grade, she has spent countless hours researching and learning all she can about sharks and their ecosystem from the resources she can find, and she even developed a prosthetic shark fin! If you've ever spoken with her, you know SHE LOVES SHARKS!! She plans on studying marine biology, and specifically shark biology, in college, and wants to earn her PhD so she can spearhead her own shark research team. She has worked hard to maintain a 4.0 GPA, and strives for excellence so she can accomplish her dreams!

The NSLC program will give her the chance to participate in hands-on marine biology workshops like sea life dissections, water filtration projects, gathering seaside samples, shark tagging on a boat, beach clean-ups, Marine and Atmospheric Science Lab tours, seafloor mapping, learning about and snorkeling coral reef ecosystems, etc. She'll also attend leadership trainings that will help her develop confidence, knowledge, and practical skills.

When she completes the conference, she'll be awarded a Letter of Recommendation, Academic Transcript, and Certificate of Achievement that she can use in her college applications for 2025, and it will give her a good foundation of experience to take to her college education.

The funds raised will be used to help pay for the program tuition, as well as airfare to Miami, laundry, souvenirs, and any meals not provided on campus. Thank you for considering supporting her in this wonderful, life-changing opportunity!

A NOTE FROM MELORA:
"Sharks are the most beautiful creatures I have ever come across. If human religion should fail, sharks would be the closest things to gods nature has ever created. I am told by people whose memory stretches further back than mine that I have always had a fascination with the water, my memory of it places it around age nine, the time I first picked up a book on sharks. Now, I am twice that age and what once was fascination has swelled into a love and dedication.
Just a handful of weeks ago I received a letter from the National Student Leadership Conference (NSLC) inviting me to attend one of their numerous conferences spanning multitudes of occupations. I had no idea what that letter would entail and thankfully opened it backwards, placing the list of occupations in front of me. Whether it be coincidence, fate, or a subconscious effort to constantly locate words describing that which fascinates me, my eyes immediately fell upon the words “Marine Biology” among the courses offered. The NSLC was offering to indulge in a lifelong dream that had only ever been temporarily satiated by infrequent trips to the aquarium and printed images of sharks found within books.
I love sharks. I will always love them and will likely die with the same sentiment. Few people are ever dealt their dreams with only more to gain and I would be a fool not to attempt to grasp at what is so easily within my reach.

Thank you for considering to help me make my dream of shark research a reality, and should you choose to donate, I am eternally grateful.
Thank you.
-Melora S. Serrano



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Donations 

  • Tracey Martin
    • $50
    • 6 mos
  • Michael Sylkatis
    • $100
    • 10 mos
  • Sylvia Serrano
    • $300
    • 10 mos
  • Cristin Headrick
    • $100
    • 11 mos
  • Adam Rippe
    • $50
    • 11 mos
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Organizer

Terra Serrano
Organizer
Newcastle, OK

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