Tinesi

My name is Tinesi and I’m currently a student at Kingsborough Community College. My major is Liberal Arts and I’m part of the Honor Society at Kingsborough. I was born and raised in Old Mill Basin, Brooklyn, New York. I am the only child. My mother is American able to trace her roots for slavery and Native Americans tribes. My father was born in raised in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. He immigrated to this country when he was twenty-one and settled in Brooklyn.  

I attended an all girl high school in East Flatbush called Catherine McAuley High School. There I learned to have patience, tolerance and compassion for others no matter how they may treat you. In my senior year of high school, Haiti was hit with an earth quake and when I honestly thought my situation could not become any worse; my father lost his job a month later. When my father lost his job it was the worst and best year of my life. He was frustrated and took the frustration out on my mother and I. I had to endure severe verbal abuse while trying to find him another job and focusing on school. It was hard for me to concentrate, but I knew failing or giving up would only affect me. I graduated third in my class with scholarships and acceptance letters to many of the colleges I applied for. I learned not to give up on hope and to believe in myself, a confidence I never had before.  

“I am only one, but I am one.  I cannot do everything, but I can do something.  And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do” -Edward Everett Hale. This is one of my favorite quotes because my passion is helping others. Since I was in junior high school I did community service by helping my fourth grade teacher with her students and grading papers. I did not have to do this but I wanted to help out because she was such an amazing teacher. When making decisions about the career path I want to take I always tell myself I want to make a difference. I intend to change my major to Pharmacy and minor in Journalism. When I graduate from Kingsborough Community College, I plan to transfer to Long Island University for Pharmacy and Journalism. I want to pursue a doctoral degree in Pharmacy and a bachelors degree in Journalism as a future goal. Being a pharmacist means helping my community and conquering my fear of not being able to reach my goal. Many people advised me not to choose Pharmacy as a career path because it will be too difficult for me and my response to them would be the sky is my limit. Writing is a passion of mine dating back since I was younger. I image myself one day working as a pharmacist in a hospital, writing novels and articles in the Advance science magazine. 

Every session I have with NYNY Fellowship program leaves me breathless with the amazing people I meet and the new ideas I come up with. I learn skills many people might learn after the start of their career or many years into their career. The NYNY program focuses on the positives your strengths whereas all of my life I only focused on how to improve my flaws. Being a Fellow means finding the great talents I possess while having the faith in myself to succeed and having the connections to make it happen.