Every year, two student leaders from every state in the U.S. as well as Washington D.C. and from the Department of Defense Education Activity, are selected for the United States Senate Youth Program (USSYP). A high school junior and senior in every state who have passions in public service, leadership, and government, have the chance for an all expenses paid trip to Washington D.C. for a week to meet and speak with state senators, government officials, and experience the national government in action. Along with this experience, nominated students also received a $10,000 college scholarship.
From the around 40 applicants in Missouri, Emily Nguyen (12) was awarded with one of the two scholarships. Between March 7-14, 2026, Nguyen, will join Rahman Adekunle from Hickman High School in Columbia, Mo. and represent their home state in D.C. during the USSYP.
The amount of work that was needed to apply for this scholarship as well as the process that had to happen was astronomical. However, the rewards that are given for this scholarship, are ones that are wished upon by many.
“For my initial application, I had to submit a long 2,500 word essay, 3 shorter 250 word essays, a list of my extracurricular activities, one letter of recommendation from a teacher and signatures from a counselor and school principal,” Nguyen said.
While Nguyen applied and went through the process all by herself, it wouldn’t have happened without some of her teachers guiding her and working with her through all of it. Publications teacher Jonathan Hall has only taught her for one year with this current school year being the first official time Nguyen has been in one of Hall’s classes, and there have already been signs of hard work and dedication.
“She has been writing stories for the website since her freshman year on her own and as I’ve gotten to know, I’ve found her as just really an outstanding student, and very dedicated,” Hall said.
The United States Senate Youth Program Scholarship is an award that takes years and months of hard work to achieve. This is Nguyen’s second time applying for this scholarship.
“I applied to the USSYP during my junior year and was rejected, so I knew that I definitely had to step up my game this time around,” Nguyen said. “I spent about a month before the deadline working on my application.”
The extra work paid off.
“That was personally one of the highlights of the semester for me, knowing that she got accepted,” Hall said. “When I was doing my lunch supervision, she came up and gave me a little card saying that she got accepted. It really made my whole day and week, knowing that she got that because I know she worked so hard for it, and the program was extremely competitive,” Hall said.
Nguyen will join the 64th annual United States Senate Youth Program in Washington D.C. along with 104 other student leaders from around the country, in a prestigious event only very few get to experience.
