| The Frederick Douglass Academy’s Class of 2005 Salutatorian Xavier Del Rosario is the 2005 National Hispanic Heritage Youth Award recipient in Sports, sponsored by Subway. Xavier is more than just a star athlete; he has found ways to combine his love of sports with his dedication to his community, and balance it with strong academic priorities. Not only did he help start his school’s varsity baseball team, which is now in its third year, he has consistently led the team to victory, spent long hours after practice helping others work on their trouble academic areas, and driven his team to earn their standing of boasting the highest team GPA. This year, with Xavier as the captain and founder, Frederick Douglass Academy’s varsity baseball team won its first championship at Yankee Stadium. Xavier has also volunteered with the Special Olympics for the past four years. A first-generation Dominican-American, he believes his experience with negative stereotypes about Hispanics will help him educate others “I will always make sure to represent my Latino origins wherever I go. Yes, in college I will encounter racism and ignorance but I will strive to discourage and end bigotry by teaching others the wonders of the Hispanic culture.” Xavier recently organized a conference called, A Student Perspective on Male Academia. In the conference, 40 participants -- including students, faculty, and media -- engaged in a discussion about the disproportionate number of Black and Latino males that do not graduate from high school. Xavier will study Applied Mathematics in Economics at Harvard this fall. |
