Ms Bower is in her mid twenties with a secure job at a high school. As a young girl, her parents were never home so she and brother were left to make frozen pizza and TV dinners. She got along well with her older brother until he started high school, then things took a turn for the worst. Her father and her brother constantly got in fights and she played peace-maker through it all.

“Since my brother didn’t do anything, I turned into the Golden Child,” Bower claims.
Once she got into high school she was in it all.

“I was a band geek, a jock, student council president, National Honor Society member,” she says. “I feel like I was making up for all of the things my brother didn’t do.”

Bower was involved in many sports such as soccer, basketball, and cross country. The reason she started running in the first place was to get out of the house for a while. This past year she ran in the Boston Marathon and finished with good ranking.

“When I first started running, I couldn’t even make it down the end of the block!”

She has come a long way since then. Is a steady teaching job in the mathematics department the life Ms Bower wants to lead? She says she feels like this is not long term.

“I want to make a difference in someone’s life,” she says, “Not just teach math to kids who don’t even appreciate it.”

Bower sees herself in a foreign country teaching people how to learn English or helping unfortunate children in big cities. She says when she went to a summer camp while she was in college, it changed her life.

“I write in my diaries and each year I read, day by day, that summer every year. That was one moment that changed my life forever. It was difficult and the kids there would test you, but it was all worth it.”

After interviewing Ms Bower, I can’t wait to see how she makes a difference somewhere else and impacts other people’s lives. She has a long way to go and is looking forward to ever second of it.

“Life is supposed to be enjoyed, not spent doing something you don’t want to do. I know I won’t be teaching math for the rest of my life.”