KEVIN R.

As an ambitious person, I set a lot of goals for myself. My piece portrays my goals and the impact that time and collateral consequences have had on my situation. The black portion, which is my favorite color, shows my personal goals. Personally, I want to be victorious in everything I try to do. I would like my family to be a part of that victory in any way possible, no matter where my success comes from. I want everybody I love to be a part of it. The red portion is my academic goals. I plan on getting a degree in political science, making the Dean’s list, and bringing my team a basketball championship before I graduate college.  Purple represents my career goals. I, like everyone else, wish to have a job where I feel I’m never working because I’m doing something that I enjoy. This will probably come from my artistic ability. I would like to impact the world through my creativity. Politics is my passion and I have always wanted to be a political leader in my community. That leads me to the blue portion– my community goals. I want to serve my community in any way possible and have enough money and influence to give resources, food, knowledge, and other things to my community.

The fact that I did time in prison after being charged as an adult has slowed me down by shattering my dreams, but it has not stopped me.  That’s what the clock with the shattered pieces of my goals represents.  Doing time in prison and coming home with a felony on my record has had its affects. There have been points where my experience in certain fields has made me the perfect candidate for certain positions, but the fact that I had a record destroyed the opportunities before they could manifest. I’ve been on a positive road at times only to be rearrested because of technical violations due to the stipulations of the Violence Prevention Initiative (zero tolerance parole and probation). At times, I feel like I’m behind in what I want to do in life because I was arrested at such a young age. I continue pushing forward, which is why I feel the clock is also a goal in itself—to stay out of trouble and give myself enough time to achieve all my goals and prove that choices determine success, NOT CIRCUMSTANCES!!!!