Knovva Interview with Alessia C., an MG20^® Alumni

The below text is from an interview our EdTech company held with Alessia C., an alumni of our Model G20 summit. She talks to us about her experience at the high school leadership program and gives a little bit of background about why she decided to attend the event. Read the full interview below, and learn more about attending the Model G20^® summit.

Knovva Academy: For opening’s sake, please tell me what your name is, where you are from, how old you are, and a fun fact about yourself!

Alessia C.: My name is Alessia, I’m 16 years old. I’m from Brooklyn, New York, and a silly fun fact about me is… I hate eating raw tomatoes.

KA: We just got out of our climate change summit. I presume you had some interest in climate change going in. Can you tell me about that interest? What inspired you to join this big group of kids trying to find a solution to global climate shifts?

AC: I’d say the main thing is just the prevalence of the issue. When you listen to the news, when you read the newspaper… everything's about climate change. My friends and I organize walkouts in protest in the city. It’s all about the encouragement from your peers and everyone else being involved, and everyone thinking that it’s such an important issue is largely what drew me to taking action.

KA: From the smallest to the largest example you can think of, what’s one way that sustainability influences your decisions?

AC: My family was recently in the market for a new car, and I refused to drive a gasoline car, so in the end, my parents sprang for a Tesla. I didn’t want to be adding a lot of CO2 emissions by driving any car with an outdated energy source.

KA: Key takeaways from your experience at the Summit?

AC: I think one of the best things about it was just… working with people from all over the world, and to have this one common goal. Working together to come up with solutions to this massive problem. Normally, you hear about climate change from people in your own neighborhood, in your own country, where everyone’s basically impacted the same way, and we all kind of experience it to the same degree, whereas people in different countries experience it in different ways and to different degrees.

KA: Tell me about what you do in terms of other extracurriculars!

AC: In a regular school year, I’m very involved in sports. That’s kind of limited at the moment because of COVID-19. But typically, I’m on the varsity soccer team softball team. I do a lot of humanities-related extracurriculars in school: I run the student newspaper, I run Model UN, I’m part of Mock Trial. I volunteer to tutor in my free time. And a new thing I’m really proud of is that my friend and I just started a website for spreading awareness of mental illness. It’s a lot of fun to look into research, interview psychologists, all that kind of stuff.

KA: How do you think your Model G20^® experiences are going to influence your life going forward? Maybe in future schooling, or your ultimate career?

AC: I feel like, since I was, I think in middle school, I always wanted to be a lawyer, but recently, that’s kind of dropped off a little bit to where now I kind of want to be more involved in politics on the front end; maybe a journalist. I think the Model G20® Summit was great exposure for work like that: working with other representatives from different countries, and working on solutions for your country based on your economic resources, the government’s rules that are already in place, and all the different factors globally.

KA: Fun question now: If you could invent anything that would make life easier for people, what would you invent?

AC: This is kind of interesting because me and my dad were just talking about this the other day. We were spitballing this idea of having glass — glass in like a building, or what you install in a car — that could absorb sunlight like solar panels do, and be used to mine energy. Those big solar panels on top, especially in Brooklyn, they’re very protruding and unattractive, and then you only get the benefit of what you can fit on a roof. Glass would be more visually appealing and I think there’s more potential for where it could be installed.

KA: What’s the wisest thing anyone ever told you?

AC: I was just writing one of my college essays yesterday, and one of the prompts was exactly like this. What I was answered with was that axiom to never judge a book by its cover. And I feel like that’s such a cliche statement, like everyone all over the world hears that. I feel like that’s something that people’s parents tell them at, like, the age of four.

You make friends, and you don’t really have prejudices against them. But I was just thinking about how it’s so true, and how most of my life, I have judged so many books by their covers, and I’ve missed out on so many opportunities and lost so many friendships over it. And I think just this piece of advice, and really applying it to my life recently, has allowed me to kind of utilize those opportunities that I may have missed if I let my prejudices deter me from them immediately.

KA: What is your own perspective on what good leadership is? And what does it mean to evolve as a leader?

AC: I think a good leader needs to respect all of the people around them; really taking into consideration and respecting the ideas of those in their group. Not showing dominance, but showing their prominence without being disrespectful or rude. As far as evolving as a leader, I think all good leaders need to be able to admit when they make mistakes, and learn from those mistakes. And then as you learn from those mistakes, you evolve your own character.

About Model G20^®

The Model G20^® is an annual leadership program for high school students hosted by Knovva Academy that welcomes students from all around the globe. Through mirroring the real G20, students take an innovative and simulatory approach to developing their leadership skills. Students play active roles among key G20 participants, and gain firsthand experience on diplomacy and addressing global challenges. As the leader in online learning, Knovva Academy provides the tools necessary for future global ambassadors.