ROCHESTER — A 16-year-old Rochester girl who spent much of her childhood in Kenya is one of 21 teen advisers for the United Nations Foundation’s “Girl Up” campaign, which aims to support women’s empowerment around the world.

Munira Alimire will begin her role as a teen adviser with a trip to Washington, D.C., for a leadership day in July.

“I don’t think it’s fair for me to be able to walk in the streets with a higher degree of comfort than my counterpart in Kenya, or somewhere else in the world, just because I was born here,” she said. “As an American citizen in Rochester it doesn’t make sense for me not to think about those issues just because I live here.”

Alimire will begin her senior year at Rochester STEM Academy in the fall. She’s also enrolled as a Post Secondary Enrollment Options student at Rochester Community and Technical College and was recently named to a six-month online science and engineering program through the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

She hopes to eventually work with the UN as a doctor or lawyer to address worldwide health issues like AIDS, malaria and female genital mutilation.

“I want girls here to realize that they’re not isolated and that they’re connected to a community of girls around the world,” she said. “I want everyone to feel responsible for every single girl around the world. We should not be able to sit down and say those crimes are not happening right next to us so we can ignore them.”