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My name is Alex Escaja and I’m a recent Big Picture graduate from South Burlington High School in Vermont. My favorite movies are Kill Your Darlings, Amélie, Laurence Anyways, Moonrise Kingdom, and Fargo.
I grew up in a multi-lingual household that brought me around the world and opened up my mind, or “widened my horizons”, making me more socially aware and passionate. Being exposed to different language, counties and living in-between cultures has sparked my undying urge to express the immensity of the world and to overcome ignorance and educate others.
My motivations have led me to seek out opportunities where I can make a difference. Currently I am a Youth Representative Board Member, Peer Educator, and Youth Leadership Council Member at Outright Vermont, an organization aimed “…to build safe, healthy, and supportive environments for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning youth ages”. I am a voice for and of LGBTQIA+ youth and have been invited as a panelist around the state to talk to educators on a variety of topics, all on ways to improve and how to make their learning environments safer and more inclusive.
I’m also a Peer Educator at the Planned Parenthood of Northern New England where I spread awareness and advocate for accurate health education, healthy relationships, and sexuality.
Additionally to that I am the president and founder of my school’s Gender and Sexuality Alliance in hopes to greatly improve our environment and educate our teachers and peers. We have a handful of motivated members and club leaders where we get together and spread awareness of LGBTQIA+ terminology, good allyship, etc.
Within my school and South Burlington community, I am also the Student Representative Board Member of the South Burlington School District alongside Isaiah Hines as of March 2017. It's been an incredible experience taking on a role representing my peers at South Burlington High School and the affiliated South Burlington schools.
I’ve always been passionate to create. Since I was young I’ve loved writing, drawing, and sharing what I do. I created hand-made picture books when I was only in elementary school and won an award for my drawings and story telling. From there on I got into film, where I continued to take advantage of the opportunities given to me and participate in contests. In middle schools I was part of my school’s broadcasting team, I came in third place in NASA’s Optimus Prime Video Contest on how vegetation is grown in space, created a stop motion video that was shown at a film festival in Ohio, and more. Now in high school, my school work has increased, but my motivations and love for film has as well. It’s become a bit difficult to juggle my school work and film, but I’m finding opportunities to do both, especially through the Big Picture program. I’m more motivated than ever to pursue this career and to focus on my future, which hopefully will hold in store many more great opportunities to do what I love to do the most. Last year, I won 2016 Youth Activist of the Year for Outright Vermont, won academic excellence awards at my school for Proficiency in Digital Media and Applications of Real-World Social Studies, and I won the First Place prize and Judge’s Pick Award for the Vermont Freedom and Unity Film Festival and Contest. I'm excited to continue pursuing my passions and creating film!
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