Longtime friends seek to unite students
WENHAM — While attending fifth grade in Lake Geneva, Wis., Jesse Adams and Arthur Emma were called to the principal’s office for selling fireworks in the school cafeteria. Years later when they left home to attend college in the Boston area, Adams at Gordon College and Emma at Boston University, the two decided to invest in something with a bigger bang: leadership.
Adams, 22, a business major, and Emma, 22, a business and philosophy major, spent the last year as student body presidents at their schools, and both are graduating this weekend.
They balanced demanding schedules, a social life beyond Facebook, and working toward future careers to launch an effort aimed at empowering the area’s college students.
The two founded the Boston Council of Undergraduate Student Presidents, which includes representatives of Berklee, Brandeis, Emerson, Endicott, Harvard, Tufts, and Wellesley.
Despite differences at Gordon and BU — Gordon is a Christian liberal arts college on the North Shore with 1,600 students, BU an urban university with 16,000 undergraduates — Adams and Emma helped each other’s campaigns. Then they wanted to collaborate on a larger scale by inviting other student body presidents to join their group.
Neither planned to run for office when they entered college. Adams wanted a break from student government after high school, and Emma was focused on 4:45 a.m. mornings as part of BU’s Division 1 rowing team.
In 2009, while Adams was studying at the University of Edinburgh, they discussed school leadership and brainstormed campaigns for last spring.
Both were elected. Adams saw an opportunity to expand alumni networking in career services. “Jesse has great characteristics as a leader within his peer group, as well as influencing those within a variety of generations,’’ said Adrianne Cook, director of Gordon’s Alumni and Parent Relations.
For Emma, his campaign was motivated by his love for BU and the learning opportunity it offered. “People don’t understand how much of a microcosm student government is to the real world,’’ he said. “Every political issue you deal with on a national level you deal with at schools.’’
What’s next? Adams will head to Washington, D.C., in hopes of working with a nonprofit that connects young professionals. Emma will work in the area for Teach For America, which works to eliminate education inequalities in urban schools.
