I wanted to be a lawyer long before I figured out anything else about my life. Long before I graduated from elementary school, long before I recognized that the life of a lawyer is not as actors portray it in TV reruns of Law & Order or JAG. I had this aspiration that I couldn't explain, this desire to serve people and it was always absolutely instinctive. Every single thing that has happened in my short life has happened within the framework of this deep, ingrained understanding that I would get my doctorate in law; that one day I would become a lawyer. As a child, I spent a lot of time admiring the courtroom, mostly because I begged my Aunt Kim to take me to court instead of kindergarten. My curiosity began there — a small courtroom filled with stained oak benches in Henderson, North Carolina — and I knew in that moment I could never stop learning about the law. I was able to address my interest in law during my undergraduate career at the University of North Carolina Wilmington. I had the opportunity to study courses in American Constitutional Law I and II, Legal Philosophy and Jurisprudence, and finally, the American Constitution and the Criminal Justice System. These courses made me feel alive. I became purely infatuated and found myself on a new and unexplored level of intellectual curiosity. It's true that the criminal justice system course gave me a taste of textbook criminal law, but throughout the course I found myself wanting more. I felt like that little girl again, the one who had filled her youth with wild courtroom dreams. My deluded daydream ended when I recognized that it was time to gain real experience before immersing myself in a law school program. By the end of the fall semester… halfway through the assignment… and the other students, as I apply to law school I harbor no disillusionment with the real life of a lawyer. I understand that it is not an easy profession and I will probably earn less in public service than the cost of my legal education, but that is irrelevant. Studying law will provide the opportunity to do something that is deeply etched into the core of my character, a quality that has stood out not only through my work with the undergraduate Leadership Minor Studies program at UNCW, but also through the amount of time and service I have dedicated. I have dedicated to my community over the years. Joining the legal profession will allow me to strive to be a better person and lawyer by serving the public. In my opinion, the passion, understanding, and ambition I have to assist all members of society is what makes me an excellent J.D. candidate for the University of North Carolina School of Law.