BMHS Senior Roshni Yousuf Awarded First-Ever Rising Star ImpACT Award

The Norwalk Commission on the Status of Women awarded Brien McMahon High School senior Roshni Yousuf the first-ever Rising Star ImpACT award as part of the City of Norwalk’s Women’s History Month celebration.

Roshni was honored alongside State Representative and former Norwalk Common Council member Dominique Johnson, who received the Adult ImpACT Award, at the awards ceremony on March 11 at the South Norwalk Public Library.

The ImpACT Awards were designed to recognize two outstanding gender equity advocates in the Norwalk community whose actions have had a positive impact on women, girls, and other marginalized members of the community such as transgender people and gender non-conforming people. The Commission was reinstated by Norwalk Mayor Harry Rilling in 2021 after being inactive since the early 1990s.

When BMHS Principal Barbara Wood received the public nomination form for the ImpACT Awards, Roshni immediately came to her mind.

“She is always thinking about her peers and others. I know that when she brings issues forward, it’s never about her,” said Wood, who honored Roshni alongside Lt. Governor Susan Bysiewicz and Norwalk First Lady Lucia Rilling.

Roshni is a member of the Center for Youth Leadership at Brien McMahon and quickly credited the entire group for the work they’ve done to find solutions to several issues in the school. She and her peers have also raised some of these issues to the state level.

• Roshni testified in front of the Connecticut State Assembly to advocate for the passage of Connecticut’s Menstrual Equity Act that requires schools to have free feminine products available in restrooms.
• She advocated to the Norwalk Board of Education to develop a policy for gender non-conforming and transgender students.
• She also advocated for the inclusion of training on endometriosis for school nurses.
• As part of the Center for Youth Leadership, Roshni and her peers have created posters informing students of their rights based on board policy.

“The (Center for Youth Leadership) really focuses on the work that we do, not so much of the recognition, and I’m kind of speaking on behalf of myself and the club because I wouldn’t have been able to do it without the club,” Roshni said.