Students in Youth and Government participated in the annual State competition over Zoom this weekend, with three delegates bringing home awards and receiving recognition. 

Usually held in Austin for a three-day state conference, where students get to debate on the real house floor at the Capitol building, this year was vastly different for the debaters. 

“My favorite part about YG is State,” junior Pranavi Chavva said via text. “State happens in Austin and we go for three days. It is so much fun, we get to meet people from all over Texas and get to debate at the actual State Capital. Unfortunately,  State was held online, but I was able to win distinguished delegate in House which is one of the four chambers.”

Chavva was one of three delegates recognized, along with juniors Aleeza Hussain and Shrika Guda. 

Students who participated in the conference were all tasked with creating their own bill and then defending their piece of legislation with the end goal of getting it signed by the Texas Youth Governor. Hussain’s bill was one of the seventeen chosen out of hundreds of bills over Texas to be signed into law. 

“My bill was about mandating implicit bias workshops for all members of law enforcement,” Hussain said. “These workshops essentially talk about different ingrained biases that people may hold and bring attention to these biases so police officers are more aware of prejudices they may hold in their day to day work.”

This year was the third time Hussain brought this particular bill to the State conference, but she says the subject was more pertinent than ever. 

“Even though I actually wrote this bill my freshmen year, it was especially important after BLM in 2020 because it was really obvious that the problem was rooted in our corrupt system and that we needed to take the first step to repair our broken system,” Hussain said. “Even though my bill didn’t actually guarantee that biases that police officers hold would completely disappear, which I actually don’t think is possible with any bill, it took the first step in that direction and brought attention to the root of the issue.”

Finishing her third state conference, Hussain encourages her classmates to join the club.

“I really like YG because I just feel like it’s a great opportunity to talk about different important issues in our society,” Hussain said. “You also get to hear a lot of other kids’ opinions from all over the state so that’s also really cool as well.”