The World in LA; Los Angeles in the World

For my capstone project, I plan on completing a grant proposal in partnership with Reading Partners, a national literacy nonprofit with which I have worked for the last four years in various capacities. Reading Partners mainly operates in Title 1 schools and services students who have fallen behind grade-level expectations. I began working with Reading Partners because I am deeply invested in equity in education and also benefit greatly from my engagement and relationship with the school where I volunteer. Though this organization does not directly serve or operate in foreign countries, I believe the work it does in the United States, and particularly in Los Angeles, has global significance in two ways. Last year, I became a member of the regional Tutor Advisory Council, specifically contributing to the Library Improvements committee. In meetings, it has been noted that there is a lack of reading options that reflect the diverse student body Reading Partners Los Angeles serves....

This past Sunday, Kiran Ahluwalia and her band completed the last leg of their West Coast tour in Pasadena at Caltech’s Beckman Auditorium. Several Poly students, including some members of the Global Scholars cohort, and faculty joined her for two hours of sensational performances. In her work, Ahluwalia blends the vocal traditions of India and Pakistan with aspects of jazz, rock, and Mali and Western blues to create a fusion that transcends any of her individual influences. Onstage, Ahluwalia moves—and even seems to become one—with the music she and her bandmates create. Her movements appear loose and spontaneous, allowing the viewer to feel both sonically and visually immersed in her work. She also masterfully utilizes numerous implements and instruments during the performances of her songs. During this concert alone, she used a megaphone, a tambourine, and bracelets; coupled with her soaring vocals, Ahluwalia’s work is sheerly beautiful. Particularly in light of the recent tens...

Jessica Jackley, co-founder of Kiva and professor at the Marshall School of Business at USC, recently visited Poly’s upper school to discuss her path to social entrepreneurship. A parent of two Poly lower-schoolers, Jackley began the event by introducing herself, her two children, and her husband. She stressed something with which many Poly students and parents can likely relate: family, despite all of our various obligations and activities, comes first. Throughout the event, Jackley also emphasized the value and importance of each of our individual stories, which I greatly appreciated. To open her TedTalk from 2010, Jackley said, “The stories we tell about each other matter very much; the stories we tell ourselves about our own lives matter; and most of all, I think the way we participate in each other’s stories is of deep importance.” This investment in the experiences of others seems to have guided Jackley’s pioneering work in the microlending space. Jackley also detailed the e...

Last week, the Poly community had the distinct privilege of hosting Alephonsion Deng, one of the Lost Boys of Sudan and the author of two books, They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky (2005) and Disturbed in Their Nests (2018), and Joseph Jok, his International Rescue Committee (IRC) case manager. Deng and Jok joined the Upper School for an assembly to begin the day and later had lunch with the Global Scholars cohort and other Poly students who had read and were interested in his most recent book. In the evening, the two also presented at a Global Scholars event. During the morning assembly, Jok opened with a brief history of the region of Sudan and the more recent geopolitical trends that led to the fleeing of thousands of refugees, of which Deng was a part. Like other Lost Boys, as they were known, Deng made his way out of his village and to a refugee camp in neighboring Kenya entirely on foot. Jok also touched on the role of religion and resource scarcity that led to the cultural...

For his fifteenth birthday, my younger brother received tickets to an NBA game between our two home teams, the Lakers and the Clippers. With superstar duos and solid supporting players, both teams are championship contenders this year. Lebron James and Anthony Davis helm the Lakers, and Kawhi Leonard and Paul George, who is currently injured, lead the Clippers. A couple weeks ago, my little brother, our dad and I made the trek across Los Angeles to the Staples Center, where the highly anticipated matchup would take place. After a typical half-hour looking for parking, we began the walk over to the stadium. Outside of the enormous arena, we saw the usual array of characters: young men scalping tickets, locals hawking street food, and entrepreneurial vendors selling merchandise. One group, however, stood out from the rest. Their wares, handed out to any willing passerby, were free: bright yellow shirts with the words “Fight for freedom, stand with Hong Kong” emblazoned across the chest....

Last week, Poly middle and upper school students experienced an amazing hour of performance and presentation by the Malawi-American singer and songwriter Masauko Chipembere, who graduated from Poly in 1988. At an assembly that brought the two aforementioned sections of the larger Poly student body together, Chipembere wove insightful thoughts on activism, citizenship, and sustainability between lively renditions of various songs of his. His story in the United States started at nearly the same time as his parents; he was born only months after they arrived as political refugees. His father played a significant role in Malawi’s independence movement, but after disagreements with former compatriot and newly established prime minister of Malawi Hastings Kamuzu Banda, he took up residence in California, where he studied and taught for most of the rest of his life. During the assembly, Chipembere offered various anecdotes about his experience at Poly and as a teenager growing up in th...

Brave Girl Rising , screened this past Monday for members of the community including Global Scholars from both Poly and schools in the Pasadena Unified School District, follows the story of Nasro, a Somalian refugee in the Dadaab Refugee Camp in Kenya. The twenty-minute short film, which blends the artistry characteristic of film festivals with subject matter typical of a documentary, furthers the mission of the original Girl Rising piece, released five years ago to promote girls’ education worldwide. Brave Girl Rising focuses on one girl and her struggle to receive an education in the environment that is perhaps least conducive to such aims. The film has five main segments, each of which depicts a distinct part of her journey to attain an education. The film, per Martha Adams, the producer who spoke at the event, was not wholly reflective of what actually happened during Nasro’s years in the camp. However, the piece did attempt to capture the realities of the refugee experie...