News

(Winter 2025) – Adriel, an 11th grade SMART Scholar currently attending the Bay School SF, hopes to pursue a career in business, following in his parents’ footsteps. His parents run a street vending business in the Mission District, selling handmade Ecuadorian jackets, scarves, and other goods.

When San Francisco issued a street vendor moratorium, Adriel and his family immediately felt the effects. The temporary ban was initially intended to improve street safety and accessibility, as well as reduce the sale of stolen or illegal items. While it seems to have successfully decreased the number of assaults and robberies, street vendors like Adriel’s parents have experienced fewer sales and increased mistreatment, making it significantly harder to earn a living. “There are organizations that have helped place little stands indoors for street vendors, but there’s not a lot of motion or circulation of people… it hasn’t been going too well for us.”

Driven by both a passion for leadership and a desire to make a tangible difference in his community, Adriel spent his summer working with his friend, Max, to draft a proposal for creating a District 9 Youth Council. The council aims to engage a group of 15-20 local youth weekly in learning about and addressing issues affecting their community, such as those faced by street vendors. “We’ll be talking with each other, figuring out common problems and adversities that each district in the Mission has been facing, and from there, we will bring that up to the supervisor to figure out potential solutions.”

Having already met with and received approval from the Mission District’s new supervisor, Adriel and Max are now working on the logistics, “making connections and ensuring we can secure our budget.” They anticipate some flexibility in their planning, depending on new challenges faced or restrictions placed in the year ahead.

Adriel credits his development into a confident and capable leader to his experiences at SMART. He recalls one unit, Financial Literacy, as particularly impactful in furthering his interest in business administration. The unit’s focus on self-sustainability through money management resonated with his own ambitions: “I was able to connect what I’ve seen my parents do with how they manage money and the goods they sell.”

SMART’s impact on Adriel extends beyond academics. His favorite memory with SMART is from the pandemic when after-school programming moved to Zoom. Despite the uncertainty of life at the time, Adriel could always count on seeing his SMART community every week. He appreciates his advisor for continuing to hold a safe space for learning every Thursday. Just as SMART remained a steadfast community space to him, “SMART taught me not to give up, to always keep trying, and to stay committed,” emphasizing how SMART instilled a sense of persistence in him.

When he’s not working on the District 9 Youth Council, Adriel plays sports, is an active community leader at school, and is very involved in his church serving on the media team and playing piano in the band. His involvement in these roles align closely with the lessons he’s learned through SMART, particularly around community engagement, teamwork, and leadership.

As he looks to the future, Adriel is excited about what lies ahead, confident in his abilities to pursue a career in business and continue working for positive change in his community through the Youth Council. Though he hasn’t finalized his college plans, Adriel aims to attend an Ivy League school. Through SMART, he’s learned to “always try my best in everything I do,” which he hopes will help him in both his future work with the Youth Council and his ambitions in business administration.