Mary Coker's Story

Hi! I’m Mary-Coker Green, a senior about to graduate from Auburn University.

As I prepare to graduate and reflect on my college years, I am reminded of times in my life when I had to embody these three words: bold, brave and brilliant, in order to get to where I am now.

I am leaving my time in college as a former Miss Auburn University, 3 year tour guide, sorority member, having held leadership positions in Panhellenic, Student Government Association, honor societies, and now pursuing my dream career. However, as every race has a finish line, so it also has the starting line.

If you rewind to the beginning of my college experience, I felt like I was starting 15 steps behind. During my senior year of high school, I was in a head on collision car accident that took the life of the man that hit me. Suddenly, the act of moving to college was less “the next step” and more like a hurdle to jump over. Instead of college town visits, graduation parties, senior trips, my senior year looked like relearning how to drive and how to sleep and live on my own; I had to be brave.

A few months later, my dad’s position was eliminated and although my parents would have done everything in their power to provide me an education, for it to look as we all dreamed my college experience would be, financially it had to look different. I took the skills that I heard learned in life and put them to use in every scholarship opportunity I could find. Increasing my grades, speaking competitions, The Miss America Organization, interviews, essays; I had to be brilliant.

As I reflect on the “setbacks” it felt I was experiencing in the moment, I now see the accomplishments that were born out of these hardships. My freshman year I wrote a children’s book for children to learn how to process grief, raised thousands of dollars and impacted millions of people in efforts to create proper trauma informed education. I enjoyed my college years and feel that I am leaving a footprint of my time at Auburn as I continue to run the race that is my future. I found the balance, the healthy mental and emotional habits, and took the life that I had walked through and pivoted to impact those around me, all without realizing it, I had been bold.

It doesn’t always look like you would expect, in fact, it rarely does. But learning to be true to yourself, to believe that you are bright enough to do your part to change the world,

and have the confidence to know that your story is worth sharing - that will always exceed your expectations. And before you know it, you’ll turn around and realize that you were bold, brave, brilliant, all while being you, and that’s the best thing to be proud of.