Renee's Blog

I’ve always wondered why I was born into the family and environment I was while others were born into the families and environments they were. It’s not as if I did something to deserve my place; it was merely luck. It’s always seemed so unfair to me that everyone has different starting points in life, but if I had to choose one thing that could potentially place us all at the same starting line, I’d say it’s education. I believe that education is the key to breaking the cycle of poverty that currently exists in our world. While perhaps not sufficient in itself to transform communities, I believe it’s the first step to any sort of sustainable change. I particularly believe in the power of literacy. When someone has the ability to read, both literal words and financial figures, I think they gain so much power in a world that takes advantage of people who don’t have those skills. This newfound power, then, opens the doors for bigger hopes and dreams, both for those ...

Sort of as a follow-up to my previous post, I have pictures and stories from my trip to New Zealand! The trip was as great as I had hoped it would be and more; I plan on going back one day to explore all the things I didn’t have time to see and do all the things I didn’t get to do. My favorite road trip was to a place called Milford Sound. I got to take this boat tour around all the mountains and rock formations in the national park, and the place was seriously beautiful. The day I went, apparently the waterfalls were “smaller than usual” because they hadn’t gotten rain in 5 days, but they were still amazing – take a look at the pictures and see for yourself. I also got to see all sorts of animals up close – flying fish, seals, and even a small shark. I’m so used to living in or near cities that I forget how much wildlife exists out there. The one thing I regret about my trip is not bringing the proper hiking and camping gear to do some over...