Hi, I'm Willa

​We hear it all the time — 'step into someone else’s shoes' — but rarely do we pause long enough to actually feel the weight they carry. Perspect is a call to do just that: to truly walk with, not just look at, someone else's experience — because only then can real understanding, and real change, begin.

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Hi! I want to share a little bit about me and my journey of starting Perspect. First of all, I'm a rising junior at Academy of the Canyons, and the founder of Perspect. My passion for mental health began early and has only deepened over the years — now, I'm pursuing a future in psychiatry, with plans to major in psychology and double major or minor in neuroscience. At my core, I’m someone who believes that understanding — true, empathetic, perspective-shifting understanding — can change everything.

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Outside of academics, I’m a violinist, a sketchbook-filler, a music-lover, and someone who genuinely enjoys browsing AI diagnosis simulations and listening to psychiatry podcasts in my free time. I have two dogs, a supportive family, and I love spending time with friends.

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My extracurriculars reflect the same drive. I currently serve as the Executive Vice President for the Santa Clarita Valley branch of CHEER. I’m a proud member of UCLA’s Friends of Semel Council, a student rep at MindOutLoud, and I’m working on a project at SCV CHEER to create and distribute mental health kits to underserved youth. Additionally, I volunteer as a teen listener at Teen Line, where I respond to texts from teens in crisis — from relationship struggles to suicide interventions requiring CPS or police involvement. These conversations are intense and heartbreaking, but they’ve shown me how badly young people need support, especially when they’re simply afraid of how their parents will react to them getting help from professional services. It's a truly heartbreaking situation to watch unravel. As well as volunteering at my local hospital, Henry Mayo.

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What's more, I'm currently writing a research paper titled Beyond Checklists: How Psychiatrists Compensate for the DSM’s Lack of Functional and Contextual Criteria. It's a research paper where I'm truly passionate about, since I find no greater joy than in being able to learn more about the process of mental diagnosing.

 

My summers have been filled with enriching programs like Wellesley University's Intro to Psych course, UCLA’s neuroscience course, NSLC’s psych & neuro program, and soon, the London International Youth Science Forum.

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However, one point I want to clarify is that Perspect wasn’t born out of a resume. One point I felt necessary to clarify since of the ever-changing college app atmosphere. It was born out of a question I kept asking myself and true passion: What do I care about deeply enough to build something real — something lasting — that’s not just for college, but for community?

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The answer was clear: perspective.

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It’s a word I’ve carried with me since I was six. I used to sit and wonder what life looked like through someone else’s eyes. As I got older, I realized: so much pain — in families, friendships, schools — could be transformed if we simply took the time to understand each other. Parents feeling rejected by the children they love. Kids feeling unheard and invisible to the people meant to protect them. The emotional gap keeps growing, and it’s filled with silence, fear, and misunderstanding. I thought to myself, this is what I want to do. It's not just empty words, I felt my vision clear upon this thought and felt true passion drive me. 

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As a teen, I’ve felt that gap personally. I’ve had arguments with my parents that weren’t just in a  “typical” teenage sense, it was something unexplainably, inexplicably different. . They were conversations that had genuinely left me changed — more aware, more empathetic. Each time, I walked away with a new perspective. And now, through Teen Line, I’ve seen that same pattern play out in heartbreaking ways: teens too afraid to ask for help because they fear their parents’ reactions more than their pain. Teens choosing silence over safety. Those collective moments where when I knew Perspect needed to exist.

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This nonprofit is the combination of everything I believe in — youth leadership, mental health awareness, emotional connection, and radical empathy. Perspect is my way of saying: it doesn’t have to be this way. There’s a better path forward, and we can build it together.

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"Change doesn’t happen when we speak louder — it happens when we listen deeper. Step into someone else’s shoes. That’s where healing begins."

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If you believe that too, join us! Let’s change the way families understand each other — one story, one voice, one perspective at a time.