 My name is Nancy Afandi. I am a first-generation student. I transferred from California to be able to study material science and engineering and I'm thankful for financial support I received from the College of Engineering. That helped me speed up my graduation time because I was to graduate in 2022 due to financial issues that I faced being a first-generation student. So scholarships do help first-generation students reduce the burden they do have. It helps them focus on their education and it also gives them the motivation that someone else out there also cares for them. Someone else out there wants them to succeed and it helps us improve our GPS because we are now more focused on our inner education and we also have more time to be able to join study groups, be able to go to the library, be able to go to professor's office work and not work two or three jobs. First-generation students have family members they take care of. They do create the paths for themselves because in their families there is no one to support them or give them any form of guidance towards achieving educational goals and when they do get support like the financial support I received it enables them it gives them that boost that they need to be able to succeed and actually open doors for other family members they have or other people that never knew getting a college degree is actually something very possible. Being a first-generation student to me does mean a lot because it does show the resilience I've had to endure the perseverance and also the hope because it's all about hope it's all about dreams without that you really can't scale up any mountains and being a first-generation student there are so many mountains you have to scale up. I'm really thankful and ever grateful for the support Padu has given me so far I'm excited to graduate and my only hope is one day I'll also be able to give back to Padu. Thank you