Zach Bovee

Diversity Statement

Growing up, my parents moved around a lot. They were divorced before I was even born.
If one of them didn’t move that year, it was the other one to do so. This led me to meet many
different people of different cultures, traditions, races, socioeconomic backgrounds, and even
some unique physical and mental abilities. Due to myself having the opportunity to meet all
these different people, it helped shape my moral values and my identity. This has led me to be
able to know what goes on in others’ traditions or lives that may need some light to be shed on it.
Diversity has been an upbringing in my life as I never blended into the crowd and always
stood out. From mentioned earlier, I move around a lot all through my school years. Towards the
end of my school years is when it got much more difficult. During the beginning of my junior
year, I moved in full time with my father and would go visit my mother on weekends. This
meant I was transferring to a new school. While I was there, it was great. I completed my junior
year with doing better in my academics and was a top athlete for Track and Field. During my
senior year, it got a concussion during Football season. This lasted from October to March.
While living at with my dad, he ended up moving out basically and moving in with his girlfriend;
meaning I was alone at the mobile home. I got $20 a week for food from him to eat, luckily, I
was now able to get the free reduced lunches. In March of my senior year, I moved in with to
Potsdam and transferred school there. I was emancipated and got a college apartment where they
only charged me $500 for the remaining few months I had left. My fiancée at the time was going
to SUNY Potsdam so we used part of her refund from college to pay for it. We got married when
I was still in high school. We shopped at Save-A-Lot to get the cheapest food we could for the
money we had.
I was accepted into SUNY Potsdam when I graduated from Potsdam Central High
School. During the summer after high school ended, my wife was pregnant with our first child.
We both went to college full time, and we had Elliott in my second semester of college.
Following that time, we had our second son, Foster, while we are both going to school full time.
My wife graduated shortly after, and we moved to the Cortland are for me to attend SUNY
Cortland for Physical Education. Here, we had our third child, our daughter Olympia. My wife
works and I go to school full time while the children go to daycare while I’m at school.
As a Physical Educator I would have reform in the schools to make it more diverse. This
would include setting up programs (if not already made) to enhance the experience of students
who made fall under the diversity population. Thus, creating clubs introducing others from
experiences of the diverse students, letting their fellow peers know (anonymously) of their
experiences.
My Physical Education class is about being included no matter the situation and being
able to be active in the little amount of time we have together.