The Rainbow Alliance by Brooklyn

The Rainbow Alliance by Brooklyn - January 2024 Scholarship Essay

I was the child who always had retaliation whenever someone told me to shut up, resulting in me gaining a rep as the uptight kid on the playground. It always angered me when someone tried to silence me or other children's voices with a lousy 2-word sentence.
My main goal in life has been to advocate for communities with oppressed voices. During my junior year of high school, My friends and I collaborated to create our school's first Gay-Straight Alliance club. We noticed that our school lacked allyship with students and staff who are a part of the LGBTQIA+ community, so we took the opportunity to change that.
It was not easy keeping this club afloat amid the negative talk we received from our school’s community, but we did not back down when told to shut up. We used that as fuel to amplify our voices and continued to yearn for change. We collaborated with a local university-based club similar to ours, which provided us with extra resources to help us gain the attention of the school positively.
My friends and I have all graduated from high school and are currently pursuing collegiate-level education. We are continuing to amplify the voices of individuals in the LGBTQIA+ community, but now in the real world.