1 . Growing up in one of the poorest communities in Atlanta, US and being raised by a single _________ mother, I was not expected much by many people, so I had to expect_________of myself.

On my 13th birthday, I bought a _________of Harvard and put it on the wall of my room. Being at Harvard became what I_________: I kept picturing myself studying in Harvard. Even when my electricity was_________, I knew that my poster of Harvard was still_________only two feet away from me. I’d_________my day by asking myself these two questions: “What do I want in my life?” and “Are the things I am doing today going to get me _________ to that life?”

Reminding myself of my _________each day made it __________ for me to say no to the choices my peers(同龄人)making, because those paths wouldn’t have __________ me to my goal. Nothing could__________ my power to decide what I chose to do with my__________.

Every day I could __________ myself moving towards my dream university__________my writing got better, SAT score __________, and my scholarship checks started coming in. On March 31st, 2011, an email arrived __________Harvard. The first word was “Congratulations!” A month later, Harvard flew me up to visit the campus where __________I got to see my dream university face to face.

Who you are today is the __________of the decisions you made yesterday, and who you will be tomorrow will be up to the choices you make __________. Who do you want to be tomorrow?

2 . I live near an abandoned (废弃的）house in New Orleans. I always thought about how I could make it a nicer space for my neighborhood.

In 2009, I ______ someone I loved very much. She was a mother to me. Her death was sudden and unexpected. And I thought about ______ a lot, which really made me ______ for the time I’ve had, and brought clarity (清晰）to what are meaningful to my ______ now. But I ______ to maintain this perspective (视角）in my daily life. I feel like it’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day, and forget what really ______ to me as we grow and change.

With help from old and new friends, I ______ the side of this abandoned house into a giant ______ with a fill-in-the-blank sentence:   “Before I die, I want to ...”Anyone walking by can pick up a piece of chalk, ______ their life, and share their personal ______ in public space.

I didn’t know what to expect from this experiment, but by the next day, the ______ was entirely filled out, and it kept growing. This abandoned space became a ______ one, and people’s hopes and dreams made me ______ out loud, tear up, and they comforted me during my tough times. Later, I started receiving hundreds of ______ from passionate people who wanted to make a wall with their community. So my friends and I helped make walls in countries around the world.

______, we’ve shown how powerful our public spaces can be if we're given the opportunity to have a voice and share more with one another.