Noel Quinones

Hometown: Queens, N.Y.
High School: The Fieldston School
Intended major: English literature and natural sciences
Possible career: Undecided

Born and raised in New York City, the experiences Noel had growing up influenced his passion to fight for social justice and to write about uniquely inner city topics during his high school career. He was the co-chairman for the Hilltop Collaborative, a mini-conference between Fieldston, Horace Mann and Riverdale Country Day to pool resources to address diversity issues within the three high schools. He regularly visited local middle schools to inform and assist low income students of the opportunities and process for applying to private boarding high schools. In his junior year he began to advocate for social justice issues of all forms in his school and community. He also represented Fieldston at the National Student Diversity Leadership Conference. That same year he began to truly pursue his writing as an art form, becoming an intern at Urban Word NYC, a not-for-profit youth poetry organization. As a senior he led numerous clubs, school and community events, and youth projects concerning equality in race, religion, and sexuality. This passion for social justice found its way into his writing and sparked his political poetry, earning him a spot as a finalist in the Youth Poet Laureate NYC Voter Slam. He was the leader of the Students United for Multicultural Education club, founder of the Poetry Club, and co-founder of a Fieldston Diversity Leaders Collaborative.

He plans to continue his work in diversity related issues and become a better writer at Swarthmore. He is currently working on his second poetry album and finding new ways to deliver his art while continuing to write performance pieces.