Cocoro Kudo, better known as Coco, is one of the friendliest seniors you’ll ever meet at Terrace.
Her vibrant personality and contagious happiness is hard to miss.
From volleyball, track and field, to HOSA and ASB, her happiness spreads everywhere she lands. Her two years at Terrace taught her leadership, kindness, and maintaining a positive attitude no matter what life throws at her.
During her years at Terrace, Kudo has shown creativity and determination through volleyball and track and field. She participated in track and field for two years, and volleyball for one year.
Kudo made varsity for volleyball her senior year, trying out during the summer. She truly enjoyed playing with her team. Through volleyball, she gained friends, leadership, and sportsmanship, making underclassmen welcome and appreciated, as well as setting a good example.
An volleyball teammate reported that Kudo helped her gain valuable knowledge about the volleyball team and the community at Terrace. Kudo taught them how to show camaraderie, enthusiasm at games, and participate in team bonding.
“For volleyball specifically, I guess it was…team building and getting to know a lot of the girls, especially the younger girls. I really do love the younger kids. I’m so glad that they tried out. It’s a long process, but everyone gets to know each other and get some team bonding in there,” Kudo said.
Track and field showed Kudo’s strength, competition, and team bonding. She’s participated in shot put, discus, and javelin. Through her events, she prioritized individuality and brought others and herself up. She made connections through track and field with her contagious joys and tears that continuously improved the lives of those around her.
“For track and field, it’s definitely a team sport, but it’s also like you focus mainly individually, and so I was able to grow and not criticize myself too much, but [rather], congratulate myself for the progress I’ve made,” Kudo said.
Kudo is involved in HOSA and Interhigh, aprogram through ASB leadership. Kudo helped with Interhigh for one year as co-president with junior Mifa Tran. Through the help of ASB Advisor Jeannie Brzovic, Kudo and Tran organized fantastic and engaging events with other high schools; these included the Spike the Drive volleyball tournament and canned food drive.
Speaking on Spike the Drive and Interhigh, she said,“We did 3v3 volleyball for the first semester, and then second semester, Mifa mainly did this but she did [the] talent show.”
Another interesting thing about Kudo is that her first two years of high school were as an exchange student in Japan.
Her experience there wasn’t very enjoyable, unfortunately; she had difficulty getting used to the environment there and later moved back to the United States to attend Terrace.
Kudo was scared of moving back to the United States, worrying about making friends. However, she ended up making new friends at Terrace while also being heavily involved in the Terrace community.
“I lived there [in Japan] for two years for high school, and then, I didn’t like it, so I moved back [to Washington]. Last year was my first year at Terrace, and it was interesting because I was nervous that I wasn’t gonna make any friends, but I ended up making a lot of friends and just joining all of these activities really helped me to broaden my horizons.”
Kudo demonstrates that change is scary, yet beneficial. Through change, she broadened her horizons and experienced new things. Kudo’s valuable contributions to Terrace, driven by her determination, helped shape her as the person she is today.
Kudo was the director of Senior Assassin for her class, which is a game where seniors try to target people with Nerf guns. She posted on the @mths_seniorassassin account, helping to make the rules and targets, picking out safety items as well as purge dates, helping to keep seniors on their toes.
Kudo is a very influential person and will always be known at Terrace for her caring and kind demeanor.
After high school, Kudo wishes to attend a four-year university and potentially major in business or healthcare.
Giving advice for incoming students, she said, “Join as many activities as you can. As a freshman, I feel like the best thing for you is to find friends and find people you can relate with and find similar interests to, and don’t be afraid because there’s a ton of clubs, sports, and ASB stuff, and you really find your crowd of people,” she said.
“So, I really recommend going out there and trying as many things as you can and not being scared to fail because that’s part of growing!”
