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Corey Christopher Edwards

School: I'm not sure yet. I applied to 6 universities. I'm a Senior in High School now.
Major: I will be going for a BS in Education for Health and Physical Education.

My name is Corey. I'll be 18 next week. I'm biracial, with a white, Jewish mother and a black, Baptist father. Because of this mix, I get along with everyone, and I don't judge anyone until I've gotten to know them. I'm a good kid. I don't get into any trouble. I like sports and kids, so I'm going to go to college in the Fall to become a PE Teacher. My dad had 2 strokes before I was 4 years old, so this subject is very personal to me. My mother has to stay home to help my dad with his daily living needs, so she doesn't work. We are living on Dad's Social Security. This limits what we are able to do as a family because of the lack of "extra money". I've spent the last bunch of years helping my mother get Dad's food together, helping Dad in the bathroom, and pushing Dad in his manual wheelchair(when we can't take the power wheelchair). My life is definitely different from that of my friends! I'm fine with it though. It's all I know!

Essay: Communication Board

I know that this has nothing to do with my dad's disability, but I've seen this on TV, and I think that it's a really cool device. I'm talking about the communication boards that help people tell others what's on their mind. The board has words, phrases and letters on it. The person wears a laser pointer on his/her head. By focusing the laser on specific letters/words/phrases, the disabled person can tell others things that they couldn't have told them before they had this machine. It's amazing! I can't imagine being unable to speak! Having my thoughts and opinions stuck in my head would be so frustrating! My mother told me that she had a neighbor with autism when she was a kid. He couldn't speak. When he was in his 20's or 30's, he was given one of these communication boards. He went wild with it! He knew what was going on in the government. He knew that the Red Sox had won the World Series. He knew all kinds of things that his parents never knew that he knew about (or even thought about)! He was incredibly smart! They never knew that all of these thoughts and ideas were inside of their son. From that point on, their whole way of acting as a family was completely different! Something that can make that much of a difference in someone's life just blows me away!