Mia Payne

A rising senior at Talent Unlimited High School, Mia has been a part of YVote since Summer 2020. Since then, she has participated in the criminal and environmental justice action groups. As a young black girl from the Bronx, she felt that these issues were most prominent in her community and works towards creating solutions through civic engagement. She chose to educate herself on the process of voting and found that fulfilling once’s civic duty isn’t voluntary but necessary towards equitable systemic changes. Through her work on YVote, Mia aims to provide accessible civic education to all communities, particularly targeting demographics with low voter turnouts and have been historically oppressed. “Civics is so complex, it’s more than civil disobedience, politicians, or even voting, it’s about nurturing the minds that will be innovative and effective towards creating change for their communities.”