![“[Building nerf blasters] became this outlet of creativity for me that hasn't been matched by anything else. The process [of] making a build complete to your desire is such a painstakingly difficult process, but I've had to learn from [the skills needed from] soldering to proper painting. There's so many different options for everything, if you think about it, it exists. The best part is [that] if it doesn't exist, you can build it yourself," Ishaan Parate said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/DSC_8149-900x604.jpg)
![“When I came into high school, I was ready to be a follower. But DECA was a game changer for me. It helped me overcome my fear of public speaking, and it's played such a major role in who I've become today. To be able to successfully lead a chapter of 150 students, an officer team and be one of the upperclassmen I once really admired is something I'm [really] proud of,” Anvitha Tummala ('21) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Screen-Shot-2021-07-25-at-9.50.05-AM-900x594.png)
![“I think getting up in the morning and having a sense of purpose [is exciting]. I think without a certain amount of drive, life is kind of obsolete and mundane, and I think having that every single day is what makes each day unique and kind of makes life exciting,” Neymika Jain (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Screen-Shot-2017-06-03-at-4.54.16-PM.png)
![“My slogan is ‘slow feet, don’t eat, and I’m hungry.’ You need to run fast to get where you are–you aren't going to get those championships if you aren't fast,” Angel Cervantes (12) said. “I want to do well in school on my tests and in track and win championships for my team. I live by that, [and] I can do that anywhere: in the classroom or on the field.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/DSC5146-900x601.jpg)
![“[Volleyball has] taught me how to fall correctly, and another thing it taught is that you don’t have to be the best at something to be good at it. If you just hit the ball in a smart way, then it still scores points and you’re good at it. You could be a background player and still make a much bigger impact on the team than you would think,” Anya Gert (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AnnaGert_JinTuan_HoHPhotoEdited-600x900.jpeg)
![“I'm not nearly there yet, but [my confidence has] definitely been getting better since I was pretty shy and timid coming into Harker my freshman year. I know that there's a lot of people that are really confident in what they do, and I really admire them. Everyone's so driven and that has really pushed me to kind of try to find my own place in high school and be more confident,” Alyssa Huang (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AlyssaHuang_EmilyChen_HoHPhoto-900x749.jpeg)
Civic Tech Club organized a meeting with former San Jose mayor and civic tech specialist Sam Liccardo in upper school history teacher Karen Haley’s classroom at 3:30 p.m. on Jan. 11.
Civic Tech Club president Krish Nachnani (10) introduced Liccardo and asked him questions about his background and experiences for the first 40 minutes. Afterwards, attendees engaged in a question and answer session. Liccardo started by discussing his own role in civic tech as mayor in 2015. At the time, the city had been recovering from the Great Recession, so Liccardo looked for ways to bring the community in to help support the cause regarding the poor economy.
“We were so badly understaffed,” Liccardo said. “We had to start thinking about ways in which we could reach out in the community and leverage the creative and innovative ideas in our community to help us essentially scale our resources.”
Liccardo also touched upon his experiences helping students at San Jose State University find housing. When Liccardo noticed that some students at the university were struggling with their housing situations, he advocated for them by funding temporary Airbnb homes .
“We actually saw that there are really scary rates of homelessness among San Jose State students, so we reached out to Airbnb with an idea around how they could use their own Airbnb hosts, in partnership with ourselves and a couple nonprofits,” Liccardo said. “We would have the funding to essentially enable students to lease rooms with Airbnb hosts for months at a time while they’re trying to get on their feet and find housing.”
Attendee Amishi Gupta (10) noted that she learned the importance of standing up for one’s beliefs from the speaker event.“
Mr. Liccardo really emphasized the importance of community, especially in his own advocacy,” Amishi said. “When he was trying to solve problems, he was very amazed by the number of people that were able to come and willing to support, along with all the nonprofit organizations trying to solve problems in the community, which was also really inspiring.”
Civic Tech Club Secretary Ram Batchu (10) mentioned that he hopes to have more similar events in the future with speakers being able to visit in person.
“One key takeaway that I got from Mr. Liccardo was how invested he was with the community, and how much he just loved helping them,” Ram said. “He seemed like a genuine guy, too.”
Ram also noted that the speaker event inspired him to engage more in the community himself. He hopes to attend more events similar to this in the future.
“This event inspired me to be a lot more proactive,” Ram said. “Maybe I [will] attend a few of these panels and think about the problems that we have more than usual.”
Civic Tech Club’s faculty adviser Haley mentioned the club’s goal in organizing speaker events was to encourage community members to be engaged with current events. She hopes that through events like these, students will get to think about their surroundings and hear about the events occurring around them.
“The approach was twofold,” Haley said. “We really wanted students to start to become engaged in their community. For instance, the speaker talked about so many issues involving youth. You wouldn’t necessarily have a conversation about youth homelessness, San Jose State College students not being able to find housing. But those are real issues that young adults are facing.”
