Carmen Courtad, 16
High school sophomore
I’ve lived in Aurora my whole life. On my dad’s side, everyone’s lived in Aurora. How he talks about Aurora and how much it’s changed is really interesting to me, seeing how much the people have changed. The city itself has gotten a lot bigger.
When I was younger, my neighbors and I would do a lot of lemonade stands. We did them once a month in the summer. We had a little picnic table and a few chairs. It was always really fun, making signs and yelling for the cars to come get lemonade and talking and having that connection with other people that I wouldn’t normally see.
Everyone’s always willing to help people and support each other. With my Hoops for Hope fundraiser, everyone supported me during the pandemic. Even people I haven’t heard from in a while contacted me after and said they would want to help in the future.
When an encampment for homeless individuals in Kent burned down, very quickly people in Aurora were so amazing. We had enough money to repair and buy them new tents and sleeping bags.
Visit clevelandmagazine.com/bestplacestolive to read more about Cleveland’s 77 Best Places To Live.
