Gene Denton Essay 11

Growing up in Kansas City, I have seen things that most people my age have not had to think about. I have watched members of my community go without healthcare because they simply cannot afford it. I have seen people walk into a pharmacy, hand over a prescription, and walk out empty-handed because the medication costs more than they have in their pocket. These are real people, in my neighborhood, living without something that should be a basic right. That is the need I plan to spend my life addressing and I have known for a long time that doing nothing was never going to be an option for me.

Healthcare accessibility is one of the most urgent and overlooked crises in communities like mine. When a large portion of a community is uninsured, the consequences go far beyond inconvenience. People delay treatment until conditions become critical. Preventable illnesses go unmanaged. Mental health goes unaddressed. The weight of poor health compounds every other challenge a family is already facing, and the cycle becomes nearly impossible to break. What makes this even harder to accept is knowing that the barriers are not medical. They are financial, structural, and systemic. People are not sick because medicine does not exist. They are sick because the system was not built with them in mind.

That reality is what drives me. After high school, I plan to pursue a double major in Public Health and Entrepreneurship. I chose this combination deliberately because I believe the solution to healthcare inequality lives at the intersection of those two fields. Public Health will give me the knowledge to understand the systems, policies, and social conditions that create and sustain health disparities. Entrepreneurship will give me the tools to build something new when existing systems fall short. Together, they will allow me to approach the problem from every angle.

I am not interested in studying this issue from a distance. I want to build healthcare solutions specifically designed for underserved communities. That means creating models that work for people who are uninsured, developing affordable alternatives to overpriced medications, and designing initiatives that meet communities where they are rather than expecting communities to navigate systems that were never built for them. Social innovation is the approach I believe in most because it prioritizes impact over profit and measures success by how many lives are changed rather than how much money is made.

I have already begun moving in this direction. Through my research experience at Children’s Mercy Hospital and my internship with the Local Investment Commission, I have gained real exposure to both the healthcare world and the community infrastructure that shapes people’s daily lives. Those experiences confirmed what I already believed. Change is possible, but it requires people who are willing to commit to it fully and build solutions that last.

Participating in Air Force ROTC alongside my studies will further ground my leadership and reinforce the discipline required to take on challenges of this size. The military teaches you that the mission comes before comfort, and addressing healthcare inequality is exactly that kind of mission.

Kansas City gave me everything I have. It shaped my values, showed me what struggle looks like up close, and gave me a reason to fight for something bigger than myself. When I think about the people in my community who cannot afford their medications or have never seen a doctor because they have no insurance, I do not feel hopeless. I feel responsible. My education will be the foundation I build on, and the community I come from will always be the reason I build at all.