By Cameron Rasmusson
Reader Staff
One question above all stood out to Curtis Hauck when he neared the end of high school: What do I want my life to be?
Curtis Hauck, left, and Liam Orton, right, celebrate his selection as a scholarship winner by the Live Your Dreams Foundation.
The answer to that question centered on family and loved ones. Beyond the scholastic and career goals that come standard with high school graduation, Hauck’s commitments were, above all, to the people he loves.
It was his emotional intelligence that impressed members of the Orton family, which founded the Live Your Dreams Scholarship. It’s also why the Live Your Dreams board selected him as its 2019 scholarship recipient.
“The fact that he was thinking about his relationships beyond his career really touched us,” said Kristina Orton.
That’s not to say that Hauck doesn’t have ambition to spare when it comes to his studies. He intends to attend the University of Channel Islands, California to study engineering. He hopes he can use the skills he picks up to assist underserved communities and countries.
“Looking toward the future, there’s going to be a need for good engineering,” he said. “And I like to think I’d be able to go somewhere where the infrastructure is really bad.”
Part of his natural compassion stems from one of the darkest moments in his young life: his friend’s suicide. Hauck is haunted by memories of how, just hours before it happened, they had made plans to go to soccer practice the next day. But after a period of intense darkness and depression, he resolved to do something useful with his pain. The result was Walk for HOPE, a suicide prevention and awareness walk.
Hauck is honored to receive the Live Your Dreams scholarship, which was established in memory of Patrick Orton following his tragic death. He is hopeful he can follow in Patrick’s footsteps as a young man who is guided by his dreams.
“I don’t want my life to just be a life,” he said. “I want to affect other people.”
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