Aahana Biswal is a senior at Foothill High School.  She is the daughter of Susmita Pattnaik and Dilip Biswal. 

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Her parents are from India and she is now so appreciative of her background, but there were times when she had struggles.  One of these was eating, but she eventually overcame it with her parent’s support.  She realized others were going through similar struggles, she learned more about mental health challenges and founded Foothill’s Psychology Club.

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She is also in the leadership of Science Bowl and the Mathcounts club which hosted a math tournament for middle school students.  Volunteering at Kaiser helped her to learn compassion while helping elderly patients and showing small acts of kindness to others.  For an India Organization for Rural Development, she volunteered as a translator and helped plant crops, construct toilets and received a President’s award for volunteering.

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​​​Sagana Chattanathan is a senior at Amador Valley High School, her parents are Lakshmi Arumugam and Gnana Muthu.

 

Sagana grew up understanding that education is a privilege, so she worked on helping to spread education. She started by organizing and teaching a free Astrophysics and Coding bootcamp for female and non-binary students in her community and soon expanded it into an organization focused on empowering underrepresented students in space and computer sciences, which became TechxNova, an educational 501(c)(3) organization. Through TechxNova, Sagana has organized hackathons, workshops, and classes, reaching many audiences, including younger girls, senior citizens, and Title 1 schools.

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She is also very heavily involved with the American Red Cross and is President of the Amador Valley American Cancer Society Club. Her other community activities include being a Teacher’s Assistant at the California Tamil Academy and volunteering at the Lawrence Hall of Science.

Self-discipline taught Sagana to take initiative in her community and achieve her goals by starting tasks and preventing procrastination.

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​Taylor Cohn is a senior at Amador Valley High School and the daughter of Jennifer Zuanich and Gregory Cohn.

  

Though a positive kid, she felt very sheltered and socially anxious throughout her childhood and early teen years. Amador Valley High School presented opportunities through leadership, clubs, planning committees and student programs and she became a leader in the Diversity, Leadership, Mr. Amador, and Link programs. As Student Body President she helped create events and programs to cultivate spirit, celebrate diversity, and foster community.

 

Taylor directed the Mr. Amador Program which donated over $60,000 a year to the George Marks Children’s House for terminally ill children and their families.

She was also a student board representative to the school board, worked with the PPIE, and was a member of the JustServe club, which performs service projects throughout the community. She aspires to utilize her leadership skills to continue giving back to her community.

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Anisha Dan, a senior at Foothill High School and daughter of Prasenjit and Seemantini Dan.

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Anisha will attend the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where she aims to leverage technology for social impact.  From a young age, Anisha took on responsibilities beyond her years, preparing meals for her infant brother while her parents commuted for long hours. This early experience shaped her passion for care and leadership. After experiencing three concussions, she embarked on a self-care journey that inspired her to develop “Garden Hope,” a mobile game designed to help users learn self-care practices promoting well-being.

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As Vice President of the Foothill JustServe Club, she organized ‘Compliment Days’ to foster kindness and led initiatives supporting the homeless community and special education students. As Co-President of the Local Leaders Club, she worked on environmental initiatives. Through her independent research under Benjamin Li at the University of Michigan, she explored AI applications in American Sign Language detection, further deepening her commitment to using technology for social good.

Beyond school, Anisha founded Art Revolutions, teaching art and raising funds for homeless communities in West Bengal. She co-founded OncoVision AI, a 300k-valued AI-powered diagnostic tool for medical imaging that placed second in a global startup competition. Her dedication to innovation and community service defines her mission to create lasting changes in the world.

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​Hope Fisher is a senior at Amador Valley High School and the daughter of Bryan and Jacklyn Fisher. 

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From an early age, Hope has been volunteering with many organizations such as Special Olympics for 10 years and the Dublin Day of Service for 6 years, helping with many school and park cleanup and maintenance projects.  For the past seven years, she has helped in many service projects through her church activities.

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As President of the Amador Valley JustServe Club, she has led and participated in projects such as the Crayon Initiative, blanket tying, Veterans support though making of cards and placing flags on graves and helping with rescue animals.  At Amador Valley, she has been involved in Leadership, a class officer, Vice President and ASB member supporting students, faculty and campus events including the Mr. Amador event supporting the George Mark Children’s House for young cancer patients. 

She hopes to pursue a career that will help support others with mental health challenges. She has been surrounded by peers with mental health struggles and understands the need for this profession.

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Colin Gillette, son of Audrey and Bryan Gillette, is a senior at Amador Valley High School. 

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After the Ukraine war broke out, he went with his family to help by taking supplies to refugees, sorted clothing, brought computers to children and helped get medicine into Ukraine.  After arriving home, he found an organization that teaches English to Ukrainians and was paired with a student his age and helps teach English for an hour every week for the past three years.

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During his Junior year, he took a course to become a Certified Nurse Assistant (CNA).  He volunteered in a clinic caring for seniors, some near the end of their lives with feeding, bathing, exercising, playing games and moving them around.

He has also volunteered at Kids Against Hunger, packaging food to be sent to areas in need like Ukraine and Haiti.  For the past three years he has been a Meals on Wheels volunteer driver, delivering meals to seniors.  He has also helped make and place wreaths on graves at the Pleasanton Cemetery at Christmas with the Wreaths Over Pleasanton project.

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​​​​Mateo Molina is the son of Maria Molina and is a senior at Amador Valley High School.

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His parents immigrated from Cali, Colombia 25 years ago. Witnessing the struggles of the people of Cali instilled in him a sense of responsibility from a young age.  Since he was 13, with his sister, they have baked over 24,000 cookies, raised $43,000, donated 25,0000 pounds of food, funded Christmas celebrations, provided 175 pairs of shoes and filled many backpacks. 

Although his sister left for college over two years ago, Mateo has continued to bake and help support the people of Cali.  Through his job as a courtesy clerk and cashier at Gene’s Fine Foods, he bakes 200 cookies each week, which they sell at no margin to support his donations.  There are six kids his same age from Cali that he helps support, who are finishing high school this year, he would like to be able to help them with their trade school expenses.

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He has learned that compassion is not just about understanding others' struggles but also taking responsibility to make a difference.  Compassion is about showing up, paying attention, and having a positive impact on those in need of a brighter day.

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​​​​Carina Montague is a senior at Foothill High School.  She is the daughter of Jennifer and Emory Montague. 

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Her parents have always modeled giving back and serving the community, inspiring her dedication and passion to work towards making positive impacts on the lives of others.  From a young age, Carina has been passionate about sports and working with youth. 

Carina has coached Next Level Girls Flag Football, Ballistic Boys Soccer, and taught swim lessons and water safety to school-aged youth.  Carina suffered a back injury from 10th through 11th grade.  This created problems sitting, standing, and even sleeping. Through her recovery, these injuries taught her grit, perseverance, and adaptability in the face of adversity.  Despite these challenges, she managed to finish with straight A’s, even returning to her sport as Team Captain.  She developed self-discipline and a deeper sense of compassion for both herself and others.

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Carina’s passion for sports and service led her to Girls Soccer Worldwide. Through GSW Carina helps with clinics for young girls in underserved communities locally and abroad, where they can learn soccer skills, confidence and self-respect.  Because many of the girls only speak Spanish, she has taken Spanish the last 6 years to become fluent and be able to connect with them.  She has also volunteered at numerous community service and fundraising events such as supporting the Fairlands PTA and FHS Athletic Boosters, the Night to Shine, Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, HERS Breast Cancer and service events with the Pleasanton Rage Soccer Club. She is also a member of the National Honor Society.

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Crystal Wang is a senior at Foothill High School, she is the daughter of Yucheng Wang and Lei Zhao. 

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Crystal’s parents are immigrants from China, she was extremely shy, could not find her own identity and assimilate into American culture, being afraid of embarrassment and failure.

In the summer of 2023, as a national delegate for Girl Scouts, she participated in the National Council Session. She watched girls, her age boldly advocating for their points of view and returned home committed to embracing her ideas and confidently expressing them. The convention inspired her to trust her strength, believe in herself, and take passionate action.  She ultimately earned the Girl Scout Gold Award and hopes to become an inspiration to all younger girls who feel lost in life.

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Crystal’s community service through the Girl Scouts is extensive, including the Livermore Lions Crab Feed, Open Heart Kitchen, reading to kids in the library, the PUSD Gold Award food waste project, and the Contra Costa ballet.  A project to give food to a nonprofit resulted in over a ton of food, allowing the organization to feed hundreds of families.

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