There are a number of interesting layers to Mousael Louis. The senior at Dorsey High School is of Haitian decent. She speaks English, French, and Haitian Creole fluently, and understands Spanish. She has a 4.2 grade point average while taking the maximum amount of advanced placement classes, and she is looking to win the track and field City Section championship in the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes, as well as help the 4×100-meter and 4×400-meter teams win titles.
Louis’ schedule is packed, which is why she decided not to compete on the volleyball team this past season, even though she was one of their best players during her sophomore and junior years.
“It was because I felt like I needed to focus on applying to colleges,” Louis said. “I didn’t want volleyball to be an excuse for me to miss deadlines, so I decided not to play.”
Louis applied to USC, UCLA, Pepperdine, LaVerne, UC Irvine, UC Santa Barbara, UC San Diego, Cal State Pomona, Cal State LA, Cal State San Diego, Miles College, and Tuskegee. She will find out next month where she will be accepted.
Staying local is a goal of Louis’, because she wants to major in aerospace engineering, and work for Raytheon or Boeing, both of which have offices in the Los Angeles area. She feels that by staying local, she will be able to network throughout her college career, which will improve her chances of landing a job in her home town.
Louis was not always an athlete, and she kind of stumbled onto the sport of track and field. As a freshman, even though she had not competed in a sport as a child, she believed in her athletic abilities. Standing at only 5’4”, she felt that she could pull off a feat that did not seem possible for somebody of her size.
“I bet my classmates that I could touch the net of the basketball courts,” Louis said. “Coach Tilley asked me if I really thought that I could do it, and I said, ‘I got this.’ So I jumped up and touched the net, and he was surprised. So he thought that it would be good if I came out to the track and tried long jump. When I came on the track I tried running, and I fell in love with sprinting instead of long jump.”
Even though Louis instantly liked track, her first practices did not go too well.
“It was horrible,” Louis said. “I’m being modest. It was horrible. I was not able to complete a 400. It was too difficult for me, but I was good at the 100 meters. I was always able to finish first in that. But throughout the years I was able to do longer distances.”
During Louis’ first two years running track, she won both the 100-meter and 200-meter City Section championships on the Frosh/Soph level. As a junior she moved up to varsity, where she took fourth place in the championship meet in the 100-meter dash. She is calling this season “the year of redemption,” as she wants to avenge her fourth place finish from last year by bringing home the title again.
Natural ability alone has not led Louis to success on the track.
“Even if you have the talent, if you don’t practice, or put it to work, it’s going to be useless,” Louis said. “I’m always listening to my coaches. They’re always telling me things that I need to do to better myself, and I always keep that in mind and work on that when I come to practice.”
Louis is motivated and determined, which has led her to success on the track and in the classroom. Her motivation comes from a special place.
“I feel that I have a lot to prove, not just for myself, but for my mother, since she is a single mother who has been taking care of me and my older brother,” Louis said. “It’s been difficult for her, so I feel that education is the only way to pay her back.”
Louis’ older brother graduated from UC Riverside, majoring in anthropology. Their mother graduated from college in Haiti. Their Haitian culture has led them to be respectful of others.
“My mother has always enforced respecting your elders, and treating everybody with respect and kindness,” Louis said. “And something that’s a part of my culture is, if you’re in a room, even if it’s a room of strangers, you have to go to everybody and greet them, and treat them like family. So even when I’m around strangers here, I always treat them like family. People ask me why I’m like that, and I tell them that it’s just a part of my culture.”
Religion has also influenced Louis’ life, as she is a Jehovah’s Witness.
“It helps me be a more organized and an honest person,” Louis said. “I would never be able to cheat on a test, because I do not think that it’s morally correct.”
Louis’ potential is limitless because of her hard work, and she is an asset to the African American community.
