Eliana Amanuel
Eliana Amanuel grew up all over Los Angeles. Her family moved five times, always chasing better schools and more fruitful communities. The neighborhood where she went to kindergarten has since been converted into USC student housing. She had no idea that the campus she would one day call home was growing up right alongside her.
Her parents came from Eritrea in East Africa and were among the first in their family to come to America. By the time Eliana reached middle school, they had landed in Cerritos, where she enrolled at Whitney High School, ranked number one in California. And in 8th grade, something happened that would set the course for everything that followed.
A teacher led a simulation to teach students about slavery. Wrists and ankles taped. Students assigned roles. The incident went viral. Eliana stepped forward. She co-founded the Young Black Scholars chapter at her school and became student representative on the district’s legislative board. She was 13 years old.
“I’m just a student,” she says, “but there’s still so much you can do as a student.”
