Photo by Manuel Mata-Flores’19| Saul Rascon’19 talks to Charels Gbekia’19 about student council taken on Friday April 13th, 2018.
By Victor Beck’ 20
THE ROUNDUP
Saul Rascon Salazar ’19 has been a continuous student leader in the Brophy community since his freshman year.
He is apart of numerous clubs such as Brophy Advocacy Club, Brophy Culture Project, Photo/Video club and Student Council.
He contributes his gifts of design and photography by making posters and promotional tools to raise awareness for events, especially or clubs he’s a part of.
“All the posters for the walkout, and the ‘Who Are You’ campaign for the culture project, and the Daca posters where done by me, and so were the pictures,” Rascon said.
He gives credit to a YouTube channel that he started with his friend in middle school for getting him into photography and video editing.
“Towards the end of seventh grade, my best friend at the time and I started a YouTube channel, and that’s when I began to get into editing,” said Rascon. “We did the channel for two years and that’s how I became so passionate about digital and visual arts,” His passion eventually lead him to take photography as a class his sophomore and junior years.
“I took photography sophomore year my first semester, then advanced photography the second semester,” Rascon said. Now I take AP photography, so for the past 4 semesters I have had Mr. Jake Kelly as my photography teacher,” said Rascon.
Rascon has used his art as a way of advocating and sharing his views on a variety of social issues and says others should do the same.
“Find your own way of expressing your activism so, like, my way is through making posters, informing people, and being a promotional element for promoting Brophy clubs,” Rascon said. “At the end of the day if it gets two or three more people to the walkout or attends a DACA event then that will be two or three more people who are informed on the issue,” Rascon said.
Yael Balbuena Basto ’19 is a friend of Rascon and also is a member of the Brophy culture project and worked very hard alongside him on the #DreamOn campaign.
“I like hanging out with him because of how talented he is. I’m telling you, this kid can do so many things in photo, video, art and stuff like that and he is also just a natural leader,” Balbuena said. “He is really confident and it just makes you want to be more confident and push yourself more.”
Balbuena is very proud of how Rascon has been able to overcome many hardships and setbacks that come with being a Dreamer.
“You have to be proud of him. He’s a Dreamer, so I think he crossed the border when he was six years old, but imagine six years old and coming to the United States leaving everything behind,” said Balbuena. “Having the opportunity to go to Brophy is insane, because all the odds are against you and so even with all the odds against you and being able to come here while people are telling you, you’re not smart enough, or your not good enough, so I couldn’t be more proud of him.”
Mr. William Rutt is the moderator for the culture project and has known Rascon since his sophomore year.
“I can’t speak highly enough of him, one word that comes to mind is resilience, and just perpetual positivity and hope, said Mr. Rutt.
Mr. Rutt is astonished by how positive Rascon remains even after living through and overcoming so much.
“Given everything that he has experienced, it’s just remarkable that he has been able to keep a positive outlook and has continued to bring energy and love and an open mind to every situation that he is in,” Rutt said. “People naturally gravitate towards him because he is just such an amazing person.”
