STUDENT SPOTLIGHT We’re lucky, because Arjun’s boundless energy is focused on an important issue: environmental injustice. His family lived in several lower income communities and environmental problems were visible to him from an early age. In third grade, he and his friends joked about the brown water that ran from their faucets at home. His communities were afflicted with broken sewers, urban heat islands, and once-in-a-hundredyear floods. Environmental issues were everywhere, and because they were everywhere, they were ordinary.
As Arjun grew older, he realized the environmental degradation he was seeing around him wasn’t normal.
“I realized you shouldn’t have to rebuild a city every two years because of flooding. You shouldn’t have trash in rivers, brown water, and slews of dead fish. I was aware of climate change, but I became cognizant that it was secondary to the things hurting my communities right now.”
Arjun is the 2022 William Woods Tate, Jr., National Student of the Year
THE BOILING POINT
ARJUN BANERJEE A Force for Change by Annie Reisener
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ROSTRUM | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2022
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rjun Banerjee relocated 10 times throughout his childhood. His dad was in the military and, as a result, he grew used to adapting to new environments. “It taught me to be proactive and extroverted,” Arjun says. “Being new, I had to put my best foot forward.” This skill is evident. Arjun’s effect is immediate;
he is brimming with enthusiasm, radiates confidence, and is raring to share his ideas.
When he interviewed for the Student of the Year award in June, the committee described his presence in the room as a hurricane in the best possible way. He could talk for hours, flitting from subject to subject but tying them all together.
One night, Arjun was doing research on a water topic for debate and came across a Maryland database with water testing details. He learned that many Maryland schools had elevated levels of lead in the drinking water. Arjun spun into action. He and his friend Harshil Shah were inspired to secure grants to buy water testing kits to inspect community water and enable others to check their water at home. “I applied to the EPA, but they wouldn’t accept two ninth