'Community is everything': Waukesha teen wins scholarship after recounting her Christmas parade experience

 

WAUKESHA, Wis. (CBS 58) -- A Waukesha teenager has transformed her pain through the power of words and is now hoping her writing will do the same for others. 

Ella Pittman, 19, still remembers November 21, 2021 -- the same day a man drove through her town's annual Christmas parade, killing six and injuring dozens more.

“I think it was mostly shock at first because obviously it’s not something you expect to happen," Pittman told CBS 58's Ellie Nakamoto-White. "After that, everything was just so much chaos, it was even hard to stop and reflect on feelings.”

Pittman, a Waukesha South High School alum, was walking in the parade with classmates and handing out candy. Her younger sister, a member of the school's marching band, was walking beside her.

"My immediate thought was making sure I knew where she was," Pittman recalled.

Now, years later, the Waukesha native decided to take pen to paper as a way to process her trauma.

“It was really one of the first times I had reflected on it in a written way," Pittman said.

She had stumbled across a new scholarship created by Brite Co., a digital jewelry insurance company. 

"My company puts a huge emphasis on community. We're right outside of Chicago, we're in Evanston, Illinois, and our community has supported us in building our business in a pretty strong way, so we wanted to give back and we were trying to think of like, how do we give back? What's the best way to do that?" said Brite Co.'s CEO and founder Dustin Lemick. "So, we decided that we were going to do a scholarship, and so we last year announced a $3,000 scholarship award centered around community."

Lemick said more than 2,600 applicants nationwide had sent in essays for consideration.

But it was Pittman's that immediately stood out above the rest.

"It was pretty much unanimous that she was going to be our winner. It was so moving and heartfelt," Lemick said. "Sometimes when you read or see something, and you just sort of know like, this is it, like we all kind of had that feeling when we were reading her essay, like okay, this is the winner, and so she just did a great job."

Pittman said she was surprised when she saw the email in her inbox announcing she had won the $3,000 prize.

“At first when I got the email, I wasn’t even sure if it was a real email or not?" Pittman said laughingly. 

Now she's using that money for tuition as she enters her sophomore year at Concordia University of Wisconsin, where she is studying event management.

“I was able to be so vulnerable and share my experience and that it was something that turned into such a positive thing," Pittman said.

Pittman added that she is proud to be from Waukesha, and she hopes people will consider donating to the Waukesha Christmas Parade Permanent Memorial Fund so her community can continue healing. 

Her full winning essay, titled "My Community" below: 

The term community to me has many different meanings. It is both a physical and an
emotional concept. I am a part of the community where I live, but I am also part of a community
with people who like the same things as me or enjoy doing the same activities. I am a part of my
church community, my work community, and even simply my neighborhood’s community.
However, while I am part of many different communities, I have never felt more connected to
one than I do to the community of my city, Waukesha, Wisconsin. It is no secret that my community experienced a horrific event in late November, at our annual Christmas parade. I, unfortunately, had a front-row seat to the tragedy, as I had been walking alongside the Waukesha South Marching Band, handing out candy to the kids watching the parade. The moment seemed to go in slow motion, as I watched things I cannot even begin to describe. But outside of the fear and the pain I witnessed and experienced that night, the most prevalent thing I witnessed was the strength of my community. So many people rushed in to help people they did not even know, I saw kids from school who were not friends hugging each other and supporting one another. Aside from the panic, there was an overwhelming feeling of love. But it did not stop there. I think the first time the strength of community really hit, was the next night, when many members of the community gathered for a vigil, to honor those who had lost their lives. The number of people there overwhelmed me. People of all ages, races, and religions. We participated in prayers of all kinds, there was not an ounce of negativity in the hearts of the people there. Everyone was just there to support one another. This is when I truly knew the strength that my community had and the love that it possessed. Since then, these kind acts have not stopped. People hang signs in their yards, wear “Waukesha Strong” t-shirts, and light blue porch lights in support of their neighbors. To me, after this event, if you ask me what community means, I would say “everything”. This is not an overstatement, because I know the support of the community is truly what got our town through this event, and is still helping people today.