黑料福利社

Seventeen-year-old Jazlin Betancourt graduated as a junior from West Valley High School on Friday.

As a freshman, the West Valley resident started high school with a year鈥檚 worth of high school credits and ambition.

Betancourt鈥檚 ambition not only pushed her to graduate ahead of schedule, but it also drove her to participate in several extracurricular activities such as DECA, ASB and performing as a percussionist聽in the聽school band (joining her junior year having never played before). Betancourt was also a member on the Legislative Youth Advisory Council and the Diversity Equity Inclusion council for Washington state DECA. She did all that while also working as a hostess and hostess trainer at Texas Roadhouse.

Before heading to Indiana later this year to attend Grace College, Betancourt joked that this school year, she had a junior semester and a senior semester after deciding in December she wanted to graduate early.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Why Grace College?

Both my older sisters went there, and they recently graduated, and it has a really good business school and I want to go into accounting, and I really like it. It's located in Winona Lake, Indiana; it's really pretty.

I also joined rugby with my college, so I'll be doing that as well. No, I've never done it. Rugby鈥檚 something new, but I think it'll be fun.

How did you choose accounting as a degree pursuit?

So, the summer after my freshman year, I went to a summer camp at the University of Washington, which was an accounting-based summer camp called the Accounting Career Awareness Program. They've mentored me and encouraged me toward an accounting career.

I鈥檓 also in DECA and in that club and working with the business club these last three years has also helped push me towards that career path.

I know it's kind of a boring career but with accounting, you鈥檒l always have a job and there's so many ways to move up and financial stability. All of that's really important to me.

You鈥檙e into trying new things; tell me more about that.

I think it's fun to try new things. I've done so many random things, like I did welding, yoga, random classes that have been fun. I joined band this year, which was new.

I find so much joy in new things, and I've also decided to, like, stop doing things that I don't actually find joy in. I just find a lot of fulfillment.

I get to connect with a lot of people through academics and extracurriculars. I think one of the biggest, important things for me is advocating and serving others. That鈥檚 something that I really love doing since middle school. Most of my extracurriculars are based on service.

In middle school we had a speaker, and he spoke about how we need to be the bigger people and to always stand up for others. He gave the leadership students a bracelet, and I still wear mine every day; it says, 鈥淎 life serving others is a life for living鈥� and that鈥檚 been my motto.

Ultimately, if someone's willing to teach me or the opportunity is there, I鈥檓 gonna take it.

What are you doing before you leave for Indiana?

This summer I'm leaving in July on a foreign exchange to Spain for about five weeks through the Washington World Fellows Program. It鈥檚 an international ambassadors program and there's 15 of us throughout the state that were chosen. And then crazy timeline, the day I get back I will not leave Sea-Tac because I鈥檒l fly to college. My parents are gonna bring my suitcases to me.

Any advice for students?

I would say to graduates, go off and do big and good things for the world and to leave it better than how we found it. And for the students still in school, know that there's so much ahead and that this is just really the beginning. Don鈥檛 be scared to try new things, because those are the most fun.