Elgin athlete's Olympic dreams undeterred after not qualifying at trials

Anali Cisneros isn't discouraged from pursuing her Olympic dreams despite recently placing eighth in the women's 20,000-meter race walk at the U.S. track and field Olympic trials.

This was the first Olympic tryout for the 23-year-old Mexican American athlete from Elgin. Cisneros said she has plenty of time to train and qualify for the Olympics three years from now as the typical age for Olympic race walkers in the women's field is between 25 and 30 years old, she said.

"I have my goal set for 2024," said Cisneros, a 2016 graduate of Elgin High School and 2020 graduate of Judson University in Elgin.

Cisneros' first international medal was the bronze in the North American, Central American and Caribbean Championships Under 20 category at the 2015 Pan American Race Walking Cup in Chile. In 2016, she set U.S. junior and high school records with her best time of 49 minutes and 31 seconds in the 10,000-meter women's race walk at the International Association of Athletics Federations World U20 Championships in Poland. In 2017, she won the 5K race walk title at the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics outdoor national championships.

Cisneros' time in the trials was 1:48:57 - the Olympic automatic qualifying standard for race walks is 1:31:00. Athletes also can qualify via world rankings.

Cisneros said she wasn't able to improve much in the last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. She is looking forward to next year's world championships in Oregon.

"I feel like I'm just on the verge of something bigger," Cisneros said.

Diverse principals

The Illinois Principals Association seated its first Black president and several diverse members of its executive board July 1.

Huntley High School Principal Marcus Belin will lead the association serving more than 6,000 educational leaders statewide. Raúl Gastón, principal of Jefferson Middle School in Villa Park, is the association's president-elect and will become its first Latino president next July.

New board members include:

• Bridget Belcastro, principal of Johnsburg Elementary School in Johnsburg, the Illinois representative for the National Association of Elementary School Principals.

• Courtney DeMent, principal of Downers Grove North High School in Downers Grove, state director for the DuPage County region.

• Arturo Senteno, associate principal of instruction at Elk Grove High School in Elk Grove Village, is the IPA's representative on the State Educator Preparation and Licensure Board.

The association marks its 50th anniversary this year, culminating with its annual conference Oct. 24-26 in Peoria.

"As we enter a year to celebrate a Legacy of Leaders, I am excited to see the continued focus on furthering the organization's focus on diversity, advocacy, and leadership at the local and national levels," Belin said.

STEM girls

Raised by a biochemist mom and a chemical engineer dad, Anushka Agashe developed a love for math and science early on.

But upon joining the Project Lead the Way STEM program at Warren Township High School in Gurnee, Agashe came to a troubling realization. She was among only five girls in the introduction to engineering class of 25 students.

"I never had a female engineering teacher," said Agashe, now 18, who graduated from Warren in May. "There aren't many women going into STEM."

Agashe, who plans to study bioengineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign this fall, is among a group of female interns at Abbott Laboratories that published open letters to CEOs nationwide sharing their personal experiences as young women in STEM.

At Abbott, Agashe received hands-on engineering experience working on the upkeep of the corporation's Lake County facilities. During the three-year internship, she also learned about patent law, diagnostics and protocols to ensure product safety, capital planning and software engineering.

"Over half of the people in the internship program are young girls," she said. "I got to see the work that female scientists and engineers are doing."

Women comprise 27% of the U.S. STEM workforce, said Vildan Kehr, divisional vice president of human resources, and rapid and molecular diagnostics at Abbott.

Abbott's internship program, started in 2012, to date has graduated 150 students.

"We wanted to make a difference for young girls in underrepresented communities," Kehr said. "We give them a real job experience. Last two years, we started hiring our former high school interns as full-time Abbott engineers. They went to college and studied STEM and now they are part of our workforce."

Black studies

Elgin Area School District U-46 will be launching a new African American studies program at its five high schools in the 2022-23 school year.

The school board recently approved a two-year contract with Kim Gallon, a curriculum writing expert in the field of African American studies, for $65,000.

Her involvement will ensure the voices of African Americans are incorporated and the work is grounded in the latest academic research and culturally responsive teaching methods, officials said.

Gallon will begin working with the district's curriculum writing team this month, helping develop a framework with standards, units, rubrics, assessments, and resources over the next year. In year two, she will help monitoring the implementation and work on curriculum framework revisions.

Last school year, the district formed a team of 18 teachers and administrators to begin writing an African American studies course for each of its high schools. The team lacked the expertise in the field and sought feedback and input from African American employees, students and experts in African American studies.

More than 1,300 seventh- through 12th-graders surveyed urged the inclusion of perspectives of African American historians and people, African American literature, and ensuring the curriculum and resources are fair and accurate.

Harper Pride

Harper College is rescheduling its first Pride Fest, which had been expected to be held Wednesday in honor of Pride month, until the fall when students are back on the Palatine campus and capacity limits likely are lifted.

"The weather just didn't cooperate, so we ended up having to postpone it," Harper spokeswoman Kim Pohl said.

• Share stories, news and happenings from the suburban mosaic at mkrishnamurthy@dailyherald.com.