MTHS is saying goodbye to many great seniors this year, but one who’s impact and advocacy will never be forgotten is Amaya Brazil.
Brazil was involved in many extracurricular activities and programs such as BSU, ASB, and the President Advisory team. As part of the President Advisory team, she was part of a group of students who met with the principal to help bring awareness to the principal about student issues and how to benefit the school community. “That’s kind of like a group . . . where we’re actively working with students and making sure that the school policies were more inclusive.” Brazil said about her role in the team.
Similar to the President advisory team, at the district Brazil was part of the Student Superintendent Committee. They don’t just deal with school matters at the committee though, in fact Brazil says “(At the committee) we also kind of work with community members as well. Sometimes they will come in and get our input on certain things,” mentioning a specific program who “works to help students who are living on their own or suffering from unstable housing and other mental concerns.”
When asked about what sort issues these committees tackled this year, Brazil said “This year, I think we’ve had more concerns on the mutual respect between the staff and students . . . that’s kind of the things that we’re trying to tackle for our student advisory team, like, what is a common ground that we can find? Because obviously, there are times where students can be disrespectful, but there are also times when a staff member isn’t showing the respect that a student deserves.” Brazil says that the committee was tackling these issues by “Trying to bridge the gap by policies that we can incorporate.”
A lot happens in 4 years at high school, but there’s a few moments that stand out among the others. For Brazil, those were the Multicultural Assembly and BSU collaborations. Brazil says that the reason they see the Multicultural Assembly as a “highlight of every school year” is because “it’s that big assembly that everybody is able to participate in . . . it’s not like, oh, you have to have this or you have to wear this certain thing. It’s kind of like, show up how you are.”
This year BSU got to collaborate with other BSUs from schools in the North Seattle area. Brazil says that at the event “We played games and had a potluck, it was really fun.” There are also a lot of struggles that come from high school, and Brazil says that one of the hardest things to deal with was speaking out against ignorance due to the school’s predominantly white culture. “Being at a school, or even just being at a district that is predominantly white, you know, there’s not a lot of people that look like you, and it reflects in the culture of the school, but it also reflects in things like a classroom setting.” Brazil says, “A lot of the time I would have to speak out against wrongdoings or another student’s ignorance. And as much as that’s the right thing to do, it gets frustrating when you’re the only person that’s willing to speak up for what’s right. I think that was one of the hardest things, just kind of having to stand alone a lot of the time because I knew what was right.”
Brazil says that the thing shes going to miss the most about school, however, is the opportunities and support they received from staff. They said that, “I think had I gone to a different school, I wouldn’t have gotten the same opportunities that I have here. I think that being at this school has set me up a lot for the future.” They also added, “I’ll miss the community like BSU and even our collaborations with other clubs such as LSU. I’ll miss that sense of family and sense of community.” After graduation, Brazil plans to attend the University of Washington Seattle campus, to major in political science and minor in education. They said the reason is because, “I definitely want to continue to work within the community and just find ways that I can help, but I hope that I can somehow come back to education and help make changes.”
