During my junior and senior year of high school, I took a class called Peer Assistance and Leadership, also known as PALs. The class was taught by an amazing teacher named Richard Lazarou. He not only taught everyone the fundamentals of leadership and service, but he inspired each and everyone of us to go out into the community and make something good happen by taking the time to get to know us individually. By encouraging us to start with our high school, he motivated each of us to invest in people in the school that we thought we would never get to know. He opened our eyes to what initiative truly was. It wasn’t just talking about what you can do for people, it was going out there, doing it, and getting everyone else involved and invested in it too. If I didn’t take his class, I don’t think I would be the person I am today.