An active Girl Scout until she was 18, Aftyn grew up in Knoxville and started her advocacy career early. She attended the Webb School of Knoxville, Tennessee where she was nominated to represent her high school in the Knoxville Mayor’s Youth Council in addition to achieving her Girl Scout Gold Award. Following graduation, Aftyn attended the University of Texas at Austin where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the Liberal Arts Honors and the Psychology Honors programs. In 2014, she enrolled in UT Austin’s Steve Hicks School of Social Work specializing in disability studies and public policy.
In 2016, Aftyn watched the election night returns in Switzerland where she had been working for the United Nations advocating for refugees and forcibly displaced persons. Unlike many of her peers, Aftyn decided to return to Tennessee because she wanted to advocate for people at home. When she returned, the first person she met with was Rep. Gloria Johnson who helped Aftyn, like so many others, get involved with politics.
