Isabelle Florence Jones, a senior at the Academies at Jonesboro High School, and Sojas Sameer Wagle, a senior at Springdale's Har-Ber High School, have been selected as Arkansas' 2019 representatives to the U.S. Senate Youth Program.
Jones and Wagle will be part of a delegation of 104 students from across the country to participate in U.S. Senate Youth Program activities in Washington, D.C., in March. They will also each receive a $10,000 college scholarship.
Jones is her school's senior class president, and is Spanish Honor Society president, National Honor Society treasurer, swim team captain, and a Mu Alpha Theta reporter. She received the 2018 George Washington University Book Award, and is a member of Amnesty International, a National AP Scholar, and a Girls State delegate. She plans to pursue a degree in international studies and pre-med, with the goal of becoming a hematologist and working in the international health field.
Wagle is treasurer of National Honor Society and the president of HOSA, which is an organization for future health professionals. He is co-president of Young Democrats, a member of the Spanish Honor Society, Student Congress captain, and journal editor-in-chief of the International Youth Neuroscience Association. He founded the Brain Club and started a scientific and Spanish bimonthly newsletter at his school. He is a National AP Scholar, National Merit Scholarship semifinalist, and was a first chair violinist with the Arkansas Philharmonic Youth Orchestra. He would like to major in cognitive science and in theater with the goal of becoming a practicing psychiatrist, researcher and advocate.
Arkansas alternates to the 2019 program are Jackson Chandler Parker, a student at Paragould High School, and Walli Zaman, who attends Fort Smith Southside High School.
The Senate Youth Program was created by Senate Resolution 324 in 1962. It has been sponsored by the Senate and fully funded by The Hearst Foundations since then as a way to inform student leaders about the American political process and encourage their commitment to public service.
Metro on 01/30/2019