It was the Friday evening of August 6, an uneventful evening I must add, when at 7:39 pm, I received the best news of the year: "Congratulations! We are thrilled to share that you have been selected as a Millennium Fellow for the Class of 2021." I had applied to be a Millennium Fellow back in April and was expecting to hear about the final decision before August 1st. It being the 6th day of August, I was already discouraged and convinced I had not been selected. As such, when I read that email from Sam Vaghar, Executive Director at MCN, tears of many emotions rolled down my eyes. Even writing about it now, still makes my eyes water and my heart fill with joy. I was gifted an amazing opportunity by being selected as a fellow in this year's cohort and so far, it has been an experience I will never forget!
I was motivated to apply based on a takeaway from my participation in the medical mission trip to Colombia and that is that food insecurity is something that needs to be actively worked towards. Even now, with the work I have been doing for the past couple of months since the fellowship started, that notion has been reinforced. I have realized that a mission such as providing meals to a specific group of people is something that needs continuous work, because, while the efforts yield results, those results run out as easily as consuming a plate of food... and the problem emerges again.
So far I have engaged 33 students to work with me towards collecting food items to restock our campus' student food pantry and support the homeless communities of Downtown and Overtown, Miami. Even though my time at the Millennium Fellowship will come to an end very soon, I am now equipped with skills that will help me take my social impact to the next level!
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