Name: Samantha L.
High School: Lowell
Programs completed at Enterprise:
Pathways (summer 2017), Youth Council (2017-18)
Plans for next year:
I?ll be going to City College of San Francisco (CCSF) and then going to do the Transfer Admission Guarantee (TAG) program (transfer to UC, not sure which one yet). I will also be working at Gap while taking classes.
What has been your favorite part of Youth Council?
I think the people. The people are really nice and they?re all really different. For the most part, in high school I didn?t really get a chance to interact with people from different schools who had really drastically different personalities. At Lowell, most people have a similar set path, and here everyone is different.
What skills have you learned on Youth Council? How will you bring these skills with you to your future?
Being more organized. It?s something that I didn?t really do in Youth Council, but it?s the lesson that I?m taking away from it. I feel like if I were more organized, I could have contributed more to the groups, but I felt like I was overwhelmed with too many different programs and work and studying, and I should have figured that out before I came in.
What advice would you give to future Youth Councillors?
Be more open to it. When I first started I thought, ?Oh I?m just here, this is just another program.? But after the Winter Bash it became more fun because we all opened up and we were more familiar with each other. It wasn?t like these were just people that I needed to know for now – we could actually be friends.
Tell us about your final project. What was your role during the process?
A statement against gun violence, and how we as youth want to change our gun laws and make a difference, and tell people to listen up and for them to know that we?re not okay with it. We interviewed students and teachers, and we were trying to go with the [#NeverAgain] movement and help push it along, because we want to make our statement as well. The video was to get people in the Bay Area more interested, because for us, we?re in a safe area and this hasn?t happened to us, but people should be more aware of it. If it comes from your peers you?ll pay more attention.
I was the leader of the video production group, and my responsibility was to organize them and make sure that interviews got recorded and edited. I think it ended up really well, and I was actually thinking of having us submit the video to Now This.
In your opinion, what makes a great leader?
Being a good leader is being able to communicate really well, and being available. You need to be assertive, but you also need to step back when necessary. You need to be able to read people who are in your groups, because if you don?t understand them, it?s going to be a lot harder to work with them, and for them to meet the expectations that you have. You should just be more aware of how people are and how they can contribute to the group.