Feet planted firmly on the ground, hands on her hips, eyebrows slightly raised—Divya Rajasekharan (12) examines the world with a critical eye, constantly ready to enact change.

Participating in the dress code forum last year was her first step into activism and feminism in the Harker community. Despite her apprehension to speak out against the judgement of administration, Divya pushed past her uncertainty because she truly believed her words and opinion would help advocate for a worthy cause.

“The first time that I took a stand and stood up in that auditorium when we were having that school-wide discussion forum,” she said. “Just proclaiming that I thought there was something inherently sexist about the dress code was a kind of leap of faith moment.”

From there, she and a group of friends launched the Feminism Roundtable, a discussion group that focuses on the issues of gender inequality in the Harker community. The organization hosts weekly discussions in order to tease out problems that students have encountered on campus.

“We want it to be focused on the students and their experiences, and we want to make people feel as if they’re being heard, that they’re not alone,” she said. “If things are maybe uncomfortable to talk about, we want it to be a supportive environment.”

In order to further express herself and pursue her interests in activism, Divya writes for redefy, a youth run online publication that focuses on all issues of inequality. Introduced to the program  by a peer she met through speech tournaments, she has written pieces for the past two years about her own personal experiences as well as common acts of microaggression on campus.

“There’s a receptive audience [at redefy], and it was a way of collaborating with like-minded people to define my thoughts because I think that ideas tend to be amorphous until you try to write them down,” she said. “Once you do, they start to become more concrete and start to fully take shape.”

Her desire to rid of feelings of discomfort and isolation in certain social situations motivates her to pursue feminism.

“If all of a sudden, you feel like you can’t live in the way that everyone is entitled to, I think that’s a kind of deprivation that’s unjust, and a lot of why I [participate in activism] is because I want the next girl who’s on this campus to feel just a little less uncomfortable and a little more free to be exactly who she is and a lot less apologetic about her nature,” Divya said.

Sana Aladin (12), Divya’s close friend and co-founder of the Feminism Roundtable, describes Divya’s mentality when it comes to fighting for her beliefs.

“[Divya’s] constantly so on top of things, and you can tell she’s so genuinely passionate about what she does,” she said. “She’s just constantly there for you and always there to do what needs to get down and beyond that. She’s always just excited to do what she’s doing.”

Divya hopes that contributions to the community like Feminism Roundtable are remembered and continued by underclassmen after she graduates.
“We’re definitely not at a point where we’re anywhere close to solving [issues at Harker], and it’s not something you can do in a year’s worth of work,” she said. “We really hope there are people who believe strongly enough in our mission that they feel compelled to continue organizing sessions like we do.”