Annie Wong is the third child out of four highly opinionated and pushy daughters. She credits her boisterous voice to the need to be loud in order to compete for her mother’s attention. Growing up in a female dominant family led by a progressive mother has shaped Annie as a feminist and nurtured her passion to fight social injustice. Her six-grade year at Umana Barnes middle school was also a major turning point for Annie as she was fully exposed to the racism, prejudice, and stereotypes that come with being Chinese American. It was also in this school that she met the most influential teacher of her life, Mrs. Brady and her greatest friends, Jessica Yang and Estella Soohoo—through whom Annie found the confidence and strength she needed to confront racism and speak out against what she felt was wrong.
Annie has lived in Chinatown all her life and is deeply involved with the issues that threaten her community—namely gentrification (where land values are raised by luxury housing and push lower income people out of their neighborhood) and the red-light district. Thus she participated in rallies and protest as a part of the Chinese Progressive Association in seventh grade and joined the Coalition of Asian Pacific American Youth to combat the discrimination in ninth grade. Annie has also been a part of Chinatown Adventure summer camp from grade one to seven as a camper and grade eight to ten as a junior counselor. The camp is directed towards low-income families living in Chinatown and brings children on regular field trips (including camping in Maine), tutors the children from each grade level and gives them an active and positive attitude for their community.
Annie currently attends Boston Latin School as a rising senior and while her academic career has been stressful and sometimes painful she is grateful for the numerous opportunities her school has offered her—including the Ward Fellowship. Annie participates in Public as well as Prize Declamation and hopes to place in her senior year because she loves public speaking and wishes to hone her skills for a future career in politics (her aspiration is to become the first Chinese-American female U.S. Senator from Massachusetts). She is the President of the Debate Team in BLS and hopes to bring in enough talent and a larger number of students to return the Team to its former days of glory. Lastly and most importantly she is one of the two captains of the beloved Mock Trial Team in her school. Annie joined the team in tenth grade and has learned so much about law and court demeanor from the team’s lawyer coaches Sean Cronin and Lauren McDonough that it has thoroughly inspired her to attend law school. Mock Trial was, is and will be very hard and intense work—but the people that Annie’s has met since joining has made the work all worthwhile. As captain she hopes to take the Team further and at least advance to the Elite Eight round of the statewide competition. Ward Fellows Helen Tu (captain), Monica Mleczko, and Lisa Jing are members of the Team.
Annie Wong’s sponsor this summer is the Assistant-Director of Civil Rights at the BHA, Michelle Waters-Ekanem.