Senior Rayanne Attar became the president of Human Rights Club this year after being a member for the previous three years. She encourages others to tackle various social issues she observes around the LFHS community and global world.
What inspired you to join human rights club?
“My sister, Alia Attar, was the president my freshman year, and I started going because she went and it was super fun. Then, Sophia Zar was president last year and she was also friends with my sister, so I followed their legacy. Honestly, I really care about a bunch of issues like the refugee crisis and other things, so it kind of just became embedded in me to join.”
What are the responsibilities of being president of a club? Are there any specific responsibilities to being the president of human rights club?
“For me, I’ve had to make presentations for the meetings and present at them, which is kind of scary. You are the person that’s always talking, recruiting, presenting and voicing the club… It’s a lot of prep work, prepping speeches and organizing different things and events.”
What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced while being a member and/or president of human rights club?
“There are just so many clubs, so it’s so hard to be a president of one because I think I actually face this for every single club I’m a part of… Everyone has their own thing and only a couple of people are going to come to each club meeting every time. I think sometimes it’s really defeating to not have that many people go to clubs, especially with sports.”
What human rights causes are you most passionate about and why?
“I’ve been really passionate about the refugee crisis for a long time because my mom has a nonprofit organization supporting Syrian refugees. My whole family is from Syria, so when the crisis happened and all of my people were displaced, I really started caring about it. I also care about education and education equality. I see this so much in my day to day life, even with the refugee crisis; it all kind of ties into each other. I volunteer at Big to Little, so I see how they don’t really have access to the same education we do, and that happens all over the world with refugees.”
What goals do you hope for human rights club to accomplish? How do you plan to achieve these goals?
“I’m really excited for the new year. I talked with my board earlier and we decided to help out with the California wildfires, which I think is really important because I don’t think people really realize the intersection between environmental health and human rights… We also have our Community Day, which is a really fun event. I really hope that a lot of younger kids and generations come to Community Day to teach them about different global issues. I also think about leaving a good legacy for the juniors, sophomores, and freshmen behind me so, by the end of the year, we set up the new board for success.”
How have you impacted the LFHS community with your club? How have you impacted the wider world?
“For the LFHS community, we held a really good Community Day last year. We volunteered with North Chicago Community Partners and we were able to make a bunch of care packages and snack packages for kids who don’t have those resources at home, which I thought was really cool, especially coming from a leader at Big to Little. We also have done so many different clothing drives, thrift stores days, and monetary donations… This year at Day of Compassion we taught people about the refugee crisis, which I thought was really exciting. Our impact goes from getting money from other students and donating it to getting volunteers to being able to teach them about social issues.”
Why should people join human rights club?
“I think Human Rights Club is really special because you get to learn about so many different issues that you wouldn’t have known about before, and at the end of every meeting we have different resources… there’s just so many different ways to volunteer and show up for any human rights cause. It’s also a club for everyone; we do a ton of fun activities, and we’re always welcome to ideas!”
As a senior, you will be graduating soon. What do you plan to do in the future? Are you planning to continue your involvement in social justice issues?
“At a lot of the colleges I applied to, I put in my interest for social justice clubs and all the clubs that volunteer at nearby elementary schools. I’m very interested in the environment and the intersection between environmental justice and human rights. I’ve been thinking about taking an environmental law track in college or urban planning, so we’ll see where that takes me!”
