Harvey teen lands highly selective Bank of America leaders internship

Growing up, Margaret Gonzalez never really considered herself a leader. COVID-19 and Harvey’s educators changed all of that.

A middle schooler at Coolidge Middle School in Phoenix recovering from recent surgery, pandemic-induced remote learning made the transition to high school cumbersome. She faced a “mental [health] challenge,” Gonzalez said.

Now, chosen from hundreds of applicants, she’s one of only five high schoolers across the Chicago region named to a prestigious national internship aimed at training the next generation of leaders.

In its 20th year, the Bank of America Leadership program provides a full-time, paid internship so young people can gain hands-on experience in civic engagement, leadership, financial literacy, and workforce development.

Gonzalez graduated from Thornton in May. This fall, she’s headed to Northwestern University in Evanston. 

Before then, Bank of America’s placed Gonzalez at social services nonprofit Metropolitan Family Services for eight weeks. It’s fitting for the first-generation college student. A proud “daughter of immigrants,” she noted, she’ll be helping new arrivals secure legal documents, such as Social Security cards. 

With her freshman year at Thornton remote, Gonzalez was “feeling alone and feeling trapped,” she said. Teachers inspired her to get involved in school clubs, she said.

Gonzalez chose a flurry, heavily influenced by the speech team. Galvanized, she pursued the Thornton Township High Schools District 205 Student Board of Education, the only of its kind in Illinois. As board president, she helped use bilingual skills to organize “Hands Across Harvey,” a yearly anti-violence event. 

She’s also volunteered with the Dolton’s Back-to-School festival, nonprofit Restoration Ministries, and Alderwoman Shirley Drewenski’s (1st) Christmas celebration. 

“A leader should always have empathy,” Gonzalez said about qualities of sound leadership. She’ll be the first to admit, she hasn’t always done that, she said. But a sound heart and solid communication skills, she said, are critical to one’s leadership foundation.

Gonzalez, a profound believer in the power of knowledge, noticed oddities about her own communities. While learning about food deserts, for instance, she realized she lived in one.

Through resources leveraged through Thornton’s International Baccalaureate studies program, she’s conducting a quantitative study to identify prime locations for a grocer. “When you start wondering,” Gonzalez said, “you start fixing.” She “love[s] the idea of being able to learn while doing,” also attracted to a career in broadcast journalism.

All leaders “don’t come from backgrounds of privilege,” Gonzalez emphasized. And schools, she elaborated, are an appropriate place for young people—those without capital but wildly ambitious in nature—to create tangible change.

Impact is local, but for Gonzalez, Harvey and the south suburbs are just the beginning. 

She intends to study statistics or journalism in college, inspired by the ways the speech team reflects the power of communication and dangers of misinformation.

Thanks to the Bank of America program, which Gonzalez urged others to apply for, she will take a trip to Washington, D.C. this month for a summit. Meeting with policymakers, she’ll learn how the government and the nonprofit sector collaborate.

She’s never been to the east coast. But going to D.C., much like going to NU, she likened, is like a rollercoaster. It’s a wild ride, but “when you get off, it’s worth it.”