My name is Grace Zaucha, I am 14 years old and I am a sophomore at Nolan Catholic High School. I am fluent in Italian, English, Spanish, and I am in my second year of learning French. I skipped first grade, I am a straight A student, eligible for National Honor Society, and I play piano at a competitive level. I won third place in a solo competition for piano and I take lessons at TCU. I altar serve at least once a week at my parish and I am applying for my high school’s service program. I completed the MENSA reading program and I am currently taking one AP class and four honors classes, while being granted permission to take three AP classes, apply for two dual credit classes and summer classes at TCC, and two honors classes. I have been able to do all this thanks to my hardworking, immigrant, single mother. I am a former military child (April is the month of the military child!) and my mother is a Navy civilian. All my accomplishments have been made possible thanks to my mother’s sacrifices, my teachers, and lots of hard work.


Someone once said, “Sometimes the things we cannot change end up changing us,”. My earliest recollection of cancer was when I saw my paternal grandfather lying, in fetal position, on a hospital bed. It was the first time I saw him, little did I know, it was the last week of his life. I later learned from my aunts that my grandfather was a Navy veteran who had served in the Vietnam War. In his prime years, he was a 6’2”, strong man, yet his casket was way smaller.


  I would later encounter cancer in 7th grade when a brain tumor was detected in my best friend’s skull. Thanks to the early intervention of her mother, a doctor was able to detect the tumor and refer my friend to an oncologist who performed surgery on her and saved her life. Although the surgery was initially successful, the tumor came back and she had to undergo another surgery, which impaired her balance, and made her quit ballet.

These two meetings with cancer were the ones that affected me the most, but there have been many others including my friend’s daughter who was going to be a professional tennis player, but died; numerous friends and their parents. This is why I want to be an oncologist: to save those I can save like my best friend and alleviate the suffering of those I cannot save, like my grandfather.

Pediatric oncology is the field of medicine that I would like to specialize in. Pediatric oncology focuses on treating and researching cancer in children and young adults. Due to the field’s specific focus on children and young adults, treatment is difficult because while chemotherapy does tend to be effective in children, it also has long term effects that can be dangerous if a child survives treatment. Additionally, childhood cancer is mostly caused by mutations in DNA, not environmental or lifestyle factors. This can make treating cancer even harder, since the problem lies within the body, which cannot be solved by changing an individual’s lifestyle. In summary, pediatric oncologists need to be well informed when choosing treatments for their patients.

In conclusion, I would like to be an oncologist because I want to help people like my best friend and grandpa to, if not heal, feel less pain. I specifically want to be a pediatric oncologist so I can work with children who are battling cancer. Treating them will be hard due to the long term effects it can have on them and the fact that the cancer is a product of their body, not choices. In brief, I seek to be a pediatric oncologist in the hope that by treating them, they can grow up and live a healthy life, or at least be in less pain at the end of their short lives.

I created this GoFundMe  account to hopefully be able to attend the Wake Forest Online Immersion Cancer Medicine Program designed for High School students from July 10th to 25th, 2021. The Online Immersion+ Live tuition is $1595.
There are no additional fees.
My 15th birthday is coming up in May. Please consider donating so I am able to take this course. Thank you very much in advance for your help!