Volleyball: from college to overseas

My name is Kaitlin Costello. I am a native of Rochester, NY and I am a senior at Stony Brook University (SBU). I have the opportunity to follow my passion and compete in volleyball in Europe. I am here to tell you how your donation will plant the seed for a lifetime journey. The last four years at SBU I have dedicated my life to my studies and to volleyball. I was fortunate to play Division I volleyball at SBU. For as long as I can remember volleyball has been my passion and my release from the stress of life. Volleyball is not just a sport to me, but a way of life. Not only have I developed self-confidence, I have also created many lasting relationships. Volleyball has been my life, and I do not want to see that reality come crashing down anytime soon. This May I will be graduating from SBU with a Major in Multiple Disciplinary Studies and a Minor in Spanish. I am ready to take my love of volleyball to another level. In the coming year I hope to move to Spain to teach English as a second language, and possibly play volleyball overseas. While this thought scares me, I am ready for the challenge. Once I finally came to terms with this, I received an ironic yet very awesome text message talking about an amazing opportunity to experience playing overseas before moving my life to Spain. I have the opportunity to travel to Italy, Slovenia and Croatia for 10 days (July 8-19, 2014) to do the thing I love the most, play volleyball. Teams including USA, China, Japan, and all over Europe participate in this Global Challenge.This would be an amazing experience and adventure and would help me break out of my comfort zone tremendously to do something that I have always wished to do. When I arrived at SBU, I was nervous about both academics and athletics and I am leaving with great confidence in both. I have a unique opportunity to represent American college athletics abroad and I need your help.Any little bit helps and is extremely appreciated :)