By Valerie Velazquez ’20

“Role models are important to keep someone grounded and to make sure you know what your goals and aspirations are in life,” Neeku Sharifi ’20 said.
As adolescents grow up and develop into young adults, they typically have someone to look up to and aspire to be like. One’s role model can be greatly influenced by variables including their gender and interests.
In an online survey sent to the Middle School, 64 percent of boys said they have an athlete as a role model while only 27 percent of girls have athletes as role models. Most of the boys in the survey also responded that they look up to their role models because they aspire to be like them. Boys who are involved in athletics typically look up to other athletes as a model for how they should be performing and to remind them of what they could eventually be with enough hard work and practice.
Instead of athletes, most girls have family members as their role models.
“My mom has taught me everything that I know today. She’s taught me to be the person that I am and everyday she teaches me to be a better person. I aspire to be like her,” Sharifi said.
The survey results also shows that boys have significantly more men as their role models than girls do. Out of the 94 male respondents, 76 percent said that their role models were mostly male and less than 20 percent stated that their role models were an even mix of both genders. Only one student had an agendered role model. Girls also tended to have female role models with 62 percent mostly looking up to women.  Girls tend to look up to more women because of the significance of a female pioneer in a certain field or the importance of their female family members.
However, not everyone has a role model. Around 20 percent of the students surveyed do not have any role models. 26 percent of students believe that it isn’t important to have a role model. Even though role models can be inspiring and insight confidence in us, they can also be a constant reminder of what we lack. That is why some students said they have people that they look up to, but that aren’t necessarily their role model.
Though role models are an important part of many students’ lives, there are a few who don’t have one.
“I am my role model because I do what I want to do and I am my own leader,” Hailey Hameetman ’20 said