Alvaro Luque was named Ranger of the Week after a stellar beginning to his senior year in which he has excelled as a leader in the Ignatian Service Corps, all while achieving prolific academic success throughout his Jesuit career.
Competing for the prestigious title of valedictorian, Alvaro is near the top of the senior class and has amassed a vast quantity of academic awards. However, Alvaro’s merit is not limited to the academic domain, as many of his awards are character based, and he is known for his willingness and eagerness to help classmates at school.
When asked about his feelings upon receiving the award Alvaro had this to say:
“It honestly felt pretty great. I was not expecting it at all, and it came as a nice surprise. It made me feel appreciated and happy that someone had thought of me above everyone else in order to nominate me. Even though the award itself does not mean too much on paper, it holds a larger emotional weight that makes the recipient feel noticed and appreciated by classmates and teachers alike.”
In addition to a prolific academic career, Alvaro also is very active in service at Jesuit, with a three year involvement in The Ignatian Service Corps, as well as leading a team at Catholic Charities Legal services. When asked about his most impactful experience he has had during his senior year, Alvaro immediately cited his work at Catholic Charities, saying “Getting to lead my own service site at Catholic Charities Legal services has definitely been the most impactful experience of my senior year. I feel like we’re doing very important work because we’re helping immigrants complete the naturalization process, which can be a huge turning point in their lives. As an immigrant myself I know that process can be extremely tedious and complicated, especially if you do not speak English, so I’m super proud to be helping all these people.”
Alvaro concluded the interview by offering a piece of advice to underclassmen who desire to establish themselves as leaders in the community, warning to not “get into some big leadership position solely because of your resume or to look good for colleges.” Alvaro suggests that one should “Do it because you care about the work you’re gonna do because that will not only make you a far better leader, but it will also keep you from getting demotivated.”
Alvaro was Ranger of the Week from October 19-23. I was able to conduct an interview with Alvaro Luque to highlight his exceptional work at Jesuit. To learn more about Alvaro and his remarkable accomplishments, listen to the audio file attached below. And as always, check back to The Roundup for more coverage of Jesuit student life!
The Interview
“Alrighty. So good morning, Alvaro.”
“Good morning. Major.”
“How are you doing this morning? Pretty phenomenal.”
“So I believe it was two weeks ago. You were nominated for Ranger of the week? I was, yes, it was a great honor. Uh, it was, it was a fun time, a lot of great main information about it.”
“That’s good to hear. So, do you wanna tell me a little bit about yourself, kind of your background?”
“Well, okay. My name is Alvaro Luque. I come from the Highlands down in Irving. Before that, I was born in Costa Rica and I came from Mexico. And well, now I am here, and have been for the majority of my life, well, what do you want me to tell you about? Just kind of where you go to middle school, you know, why you went to Jesuit and kind of how it’s been so far for you? So how I got to Jesuit was I had this friend. He initially told me about Jesuit and we were actually planning on coming here together. And what ended up happening is I got in, but he did not. I had to make the decision of either staying or coming here. And it was a really hard decision because I was the only one from my school that was coming here, but I ended up deciding to go through with it. Solely because Jesuit offered honors and AP classes and I kind of wanted to get the best education I could. So I guess that was what motivated me to come to Jesuit. But then like once I got here, I saw that it was like, Oh, a whole lot more than just that. And I prefer it like a million times more than my old school.”
“All right. What was that old school that you went to? The Highlands in Irving? How is that different from Jesuit?”
“Okay. It’s a very different environment. It’s like my class was 11 people, so a lot smaller.”
“Yeah. Huge, huge change. Yeah.”
“And speaking to your academics, one of the reasons you come here, you’re currently the salutatorian, is that correct?”
“I believe so. Yeah”
“Your resume kind of speaks for itself here with many, many, awards and AP classes, as well as honors classes. And just recently you won the AP scholar with distinction. Can you tell me about that award, what it was?”
“So that award is given to someone who has achieved the four or five on five or more AP tests, and they have an average of 3.5 overall on all their AP tests. So I got that, at the end of last year, at the end of junior year. I actually did pretty well on my AP exams last year. Thank God. Cause I know a lot of people, kind of got screwed over a little bit by the online system and COVID way of doing AP tests. But. I actually ended up doing pretty well. I was really proud of that. I was really happy about that.”
“Yeah. Yeah. That’s awesome, man. Congratulations.”
“Thank you. Thank you.”
“So now onto some more stuff about your role at Jesuit, what leadership positions are you in a Jesuit and what clubs? Stuff like that.”
“So, uh, as far as leadership positions go, probably the most significant one. And the one I’m most proud of is my time with the ISC, um, the Ignatian service Corps. Yeah. And the Ignatian service Corps. I think what I’m most proud of is that this year I’ve gone to lead my own service site at Catholic charities, legal, where we help like immigrants with their citizenship paperwork. And then apart from that, I’m also in some other extracurriculars, like, uh, I’m in honors Spanish society. And I’m in the AI club with you, which is a whole lot of fun. It really showed me a lot about computer science. And I think that’s what motivated me to pursue computer engineering as my major.”
“Really. Okay. So that’s what you’d like to major in, in college computer engineering?”
“Yep. That is what I’m applying for. Predominantly schools in computer science.”
“Yeah. What schools, uh, are you applying to?”
“I have a big list.”
“A top three?”
“My top three schools would be Stanford, Berkeley, and probably UT Austin.”
“Oh, really? That’s awesome. Yeah, those are pretty prestigious schools.”
“Thank you. Thank you. Yeah.”
“So can you tell me a little bit about your athletic involvement here at Jesuit?”
“Yeah, I’ve tried a whole lot of things. Uh, mainly I remember freshman year, I tried out for soccer that didn’t end up too well, but then sophomore year I joined the cycling team with some of my close friends. And it was, it was a lot of fun, but it was also really hard work. And then on top of being on the cycling team, I had also joined powerlifting that same year. So I kind of had those two sports going on at the same time. And that was very conflicting with my time schedule. So I ended up just sticking with powerlifting, uh, for junior year, I dropped cycling that year. And then this year I’ve actually decided to drop out of powerlifting to focus more on other stuff. Like for example, I began teaching myself guitar.”
“Really, really? How’s that been going?”
“You know what, pretty good.”
“Really. That’s awesome.”
“I’ve gone from like making dead animal noises with my guitar to playing somewhat recognizable stuff.”
“Oh, wow. Yeah. That’s awesome. So how long have you been working at that?”
“A year, it’s been about a year, a little bit less than a year, but I’m approaching a year.
Are you learning acoustic guitar or more like-
Acoustic yeah”
“That’s awesome.”
“So that’s what I’ve been trying to focus a lot on, which is why I ended up dropping powerlifting. Wow. That’s awesome. Well, thank you for talking with me this morning, Alvaro.”
“It was an absolute honor Major. All right. Thank you.”
“Have a good rest of your day.”
Tune it to the Roundup for more interviews with our Rangers of the Week!
