The Sweetest Feeling: What My NYWICI Scholarship Has Done For Me
When my college’s Journalism Department chair emailed me about a NYWICI scholarship seven days before the application was due, I thought I didn’t stand a chance. New York Women In Communications sounded so professional, so sleek, so on top of its game. A stressed out, overwhelmed, sleep-deprived junior like me wasn’t what they were looking for.
But I tried anyway. And that night, sending out two frantic emails to a past boss and former professor asking for letters of recommendation was the best decision I could have made.
At the time, I hadn’t had any articles published, I wasn’t yet the professional journalist I hoped one day to be. I didn’t feel I was a woman “in communications.” I felt outside of it, but like a child peeping into the windows of a candy shop, I was enthralled.
The way reporters stretch 500 words to tell a story like a confectioner stretches sugar into a sculpture had me licking my lips and wanting more.
Scrolling the NYWICI website and social media pages in between classes and homework, I was looking into the window of a life I could have. Success and sisterhood in storytelling. Women of every identity marching forward in ever-evolving careers, always looking back to the hopeful young students they once were, and offering a helping hand.
I wanted to be like them. I wanted to dress like them too. Who knew blazers came in so many different colors?
Recommendation letters secured — from two amazing women — and essay written, I sent in my application and waited. Just a couple months later, I was invited to interview.
What I expected to be an intimidating experience was instead a panel of ten women who clearly wanted me to succeed. Something that still shocks me about every NYWICI event is whatever room we’re in, most of us are women. It’s a wonderful thing to get used to.
After answering questions about hopes and dreams, challenges and lessons, I got the email in June that I had made the cut. Ten days after publishing my first article, I was a Woman In Communications. And NYWICI has helped me realize that I always will be.
Having this scholarship, a memorial scholarship nonetheless, has reminded me that I am a part of a rich and innovative legacy while I work to create my own. At the Matrix Awards, I was photographed on a red carpet, joined on either side by young women just like me. Looking to my left and to my right was like looking in a mirror — college students all dolled up, eyes wide, in awe of the powerhouse we were now a part of.
And while I have yet to fill my wardrobe with blazers, applying for a NYWICI scholarship was like taking the first step into that candy shop and knowing my 500-word sculptures would one day adorn its shelves.
To the young women still outside, peeping into the windows, I say this: Welcome.
Written by: 2022 Scholarship Winner 
