At the end of each year, Stanford Politics highlights 10 undergraduates of impact, the Politicos. In the past, these Politicos have hailed from campus media organizations, activist groups, student government and more. This year, we interviewed a shortlist of over 30 students (selected from an even greater number of nominations by the student body) before our editorial board decided on the ones featured below.
As a non-partisan publication, Stanford Politics does not endorse any particular agenda held by any of the Politicos.
1. Lily Zheng
Senior, Psychology
While selecting this year’s top 10 Politicos was extremely difficult, deciding who would get the top spot was not. Lily Zheng made the listing two years ago when she, as a sophomore, brought attention to issues of social justice and radical activism, queer and trans identity, sex positivity and sexual violence, and other such topics through her provocative-yet-compelling Stanford Daily column, as well as her role leading Kardinal Kink. However, in the past year, Lily describes her activism as having shifted from only making noise to making institutional change. In an interview with Stanford Politics, she laments that much of the work of her fellow activists so often “makes a bang and then fizzles out,” referencing, as an example, the Stanford 68 bridge protest on Martin Luther King Jr. Day 2015. She says her own burnout helped her realize that activist efforts on campus can’t be completely student-run and driven. Whereas previously, Lily seemed to serve as a “bridge” between student activists and the greater Stanford community, this year she sought to become a “bridge” between student activists and the university administration, and, in many ways, she succeeded. The efforts she’s made, which she describes as “translation work,” have mostly involved engaging and communicating with administrators, faculty and staff. After reading a campus climate report Lily wrote in December 2016 for the incoming university provost, Persis Drell reached out to Lily, and they have since developed a working relationship that seemingly culminated in a day-long workshop event that brought together students, alumni, staff and administrators to shed light on university organization and governance, as well as to promote collaboration. Also this year, in keeping with her focus on leaving a mark, as a student staff member for the Weiland Health Initiative, a joint project to support the health of all Stanford students of all gender and sexual identities, Lily took the initiative to create four informational brochures (“Coming Out,” “Best Practices for Trans-Inclusivity for Staff and Faculty,” “Intimate Partner Violence & Sexual Assault” and “The 2017 Unofficial Guide to Trans Resources at Stanford”) that have become mandatory reading for all 8,000+ staff and faculty members as part of their bi-annual training. In the last month alone, Lily has been recognized as a 2017 Woman of Impact by Stanford Women in Business and has received a Stanford Award of Excellence, an Outstanding Achievement Award and the James W. Lyons Award for Service.
2. Hope G. Yi
Junior, Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity
Though Hope G. Yi knew their story would be in the inbox of every student at Stanford because the ASSU president and vice president would push it out through a mass email, they also convinced the Stanford Daily to publish it as an op-ed, despite the piece being over three times the word limit for op-eds. Also published in Psychology Today, the Jan. 25 op-ed details Hope’s harrowing personal experience with how Stanford handles student mental health crises. It was that experience that motivated Hope, upon returning to Stanford after a two-year hiatus, to become a tireless advocate for mental health reform. Through formal positions, such as at the Bridge Peer Counseling Center, on the ASSU executive cabinet, as a facilitator for the Peer Support Group for Survivors, on the Mental Health and Wellness Coalition, on the Mental Health and Well-Being Advisory Board and on the CAPS Student Advisory Committee, as well as through informal roles such as at Terra, where they are a non-mandated-reporter, Hope has worked with administrators, staff and fellow students to reform the way mental health is perceived and dealt with on campus. Hope has also been a champion, in particular, for queer people of color and other multiply marginalized identities. Some ways through which their imprint will soon be visible include the launch of a revamped Stanford Wellness website as well as the Bridge’s use of a new curriculum for crisis and sexual assault protocol, which Hope is working on. Their continued efforts have certainly gained the attention of decision-makers, including Provost Persis Drell, who recently met with Hope and other student leaders to discuss the intersections of sexual assault and mental health.
*Editor’s Note: This profile originally stated that Hope is “developing” the Bridge’s new curriculum for crisis and sexual assault protocol. This language has been changed to reflect that Hope is continuing to work on the crisis and sexual assault protocol that was first created by several other Bridge staffers.
3. Rachel Samuels
Senior, International Relations
The work those in student government do can often be thankless. If not for this profile, the work Rachel Samuels has done behind-the-scenes in an unelected role would probably go unacknowledged, though certainly not unfelt. Though she was selected for her impact as ASSU executive chief-of-staff this past year, Rachel’s personal influence has built up over the last four years as she accumulated institutional knowledge as an intern for the ASSU Senate Advocacy Committee turned ASSU undergraduate senator turned chief-of-staff turned campaign manager turned chief-of-staff again, working with the last three ASSU executives in various capacities and, in recent weeks, working with the newly-elected ASSU executives, Justice Tention and Vicki Niu, to assist with their transition. Recent ASSU executives Jackson Beard and Amanda Edelman (who were each also nominated for this year’s top Politicos) describe Rachel to Stanford Politics as the “third exec.” She has had a hand in virtually everything they have worked on this year, using her relationships with student leaders in the ASSU and across campus, as well as with university administrators and staff, to facilitate meetings and ensure that issue advocates have the tools they need to accomplish their goals. While most of her impact is seen in the success of others with whom she works, including several on this list, she has also seen tangible results in personal projects of her own, such as getting an emergency contraception vending machine at Old Union, something she’s been working on since her sophomore year. Her approach to working with university officials, which has been described by peers as “aggressive without being confrontational,” has allowed her to effectively advocate for ASSU goals. Rachel tells Stanford Politics that, at Stanford, she’s done her best to learn from those before her, build on the progress that’s been made and leave those who come after something to work with. “If we keep starting over,” she says, “we’ll never get anywhere.”
*Editor’s Note: This profile originally stated that the emergency contraception machine will be at Tressider Union but has been corrected to Old Union.
4. Sydney Osifeso
Senior, Psychology
Sydney Osifeso stands out as a clear leader in the First Generation and/or Low Income (FLI) community at Stanford, notably serving as co-president of FLIP. This year, Sydney made food insecurity a key priority of the organization and worked with university administrators and ASSU senators to raise funds for and awareness of this issue many might not think about — what students do over break when they can’t go home, the dining halls are closed and eating out in Palo Alto is simply not affordable. Sydney, who also works in the DGen office, helped establish the “What I Wish My Professor Knew” campaign to educate faculty about the particular challenges — academically, socially or otherwise — FLI students face at Stanford, which has culminated this year in a video that will be used in faculty training about FLI inclusion and awareness. Sydney also is the only undergraduate on the search committee for the next Vice Provost for Student Affairs. Notably, Sydney has taken her advocacy for the FLI community nationwide, speaking at conferences across the country on behalf of Stanford’s FLIP and DGen office to help other institutions model their support systems after Stanford’s. With 18 percent of the incoming freshmen identifying as first-generation and an unpublished number from low-income backgrounds, the work Sydney and the about 30 other students (including frosh interns) involved with FLIP do undoubtedly impacts the lives of current and future students across campus.
5. Shanta Katipamula
Sophomore, Environmental Systems Engineering
A year ago, Shanta Katipamula, a newly-elected ASSU undergraduate senator, threw her hat in the ring for senate chair, challenging a re-elected member of the previous senate. In what the Stanford Review described as a “coup,” Shanta narrowly defeated her competitor with the vote almost exactly split between her fellow newly-elected freshmen senators and the returning ones. But despite the divisive start, a year later, Shanta’s chairship has been widely lauded by her peers. She’s followed through on promises to increase both student government and university administration transparency and outreach by working with Greg Boardman to implement “open office hours” programs, and she’s worked to develop more cohesiveness between the ASSU undergraduate senate and graduate student council (GSC), such as by standardizing the two groups’ funding practices and by creating a joint committee on sexual violence. Sexual violence has actually been Shanta’s main focus area since even before she was elected to the senate. Probably her biggest achievement is having successfully pushed, in partnership with ASSU executive efforts, Stanford to undertake a three-year pilot of Callisto, a tool for documenting and reporting sexual violence. Further, besides Callisto, Shanta has also advocated for students to have sexual violence prevention trainings during all four years of the undergraduate experience, instead of just during the first. The goal is that this year’s freshmen will have four years of trainings by the time they graduate.
6. Carson Smith
Sophomore, Political Science
Carson Smith is a pillar both in the Native American community at Stanford and in student government. As a co-leader of the Native American Cultural Center (NACC) social justice team, she has aimed to start conversations and advocate for issues that impact Native communities on campus, nationally and internationally. During the fall, in an effort to give people a productive way to support the NoDAPL campaign, the team worked directly with organizers at Standing Rock to put together a rally here on campus to raise money and awareness. Carson tells Stanford Politics that she didn’t want the rally to be just an expression of frustration, so she made sure it also included an educational panel with Delphine Red Shirt, Buzz Thompson and Tiarra Little. As an ASSU undergraduate senator, Carson has focused her attention on mental health and well-being advocacy, working with a coalition of student groups to directly engage the student body and the administration on CAPS reform, counselors in community centers and other mental health initiatives. Even though her senate term is now over, Carson continues to work with the coalition and well-being curriculum for resident assistants next year. In her capacities as a leader in the campus Native community and as a senator, Carson has been a visible and vocal advocate for renaming buildings named after Junípero Serra, telling Stanford Politics that the reason she actually decided to run for the senate last year was because she knew Leo Bird, who was named a 2015–2016 Politico for his advocacy on the issue of Serra renaming, was not going to run for re-election, and she didn’t want the efforts he began to be swept away. As a senator this year, Carson requested that she be placed on the university committee (of mostly faculty and staff) that is currently finalizing the principles for renaming a building. Now, she hopes that when those principles are established, they will be quickly applied to Serra. Carson says she wants administrators to understand how this issue of inappropriate memorialization is inherently tied to mental health and wellness.
7. Josh Lappen + Alex Ramsey
Senior, Classics + Senior, African & African American Studies
When one typically thinks of Stanford Politicos, the Stanford Band might not be the first thing to come to mind. However, this year, in responding to the band’s suspension, seven members really stood out for their influence in channeling public outrage, cooperating with the administration and, eventually, getting the ban overturned. This past fall, on the Friday night before finals week, members of the band found in their inboxes an email notice of the band’s immediate suspension. It was what appeared to be the culmination of a two-year war between the band and the university administration, and the band seemingly lost. Josh Lappen texted Alex Ramsey right away. Because the band transitions its formal leadership on the calendar year, with just a few weeks left in 2016, it was unclear who was in charge of dealing with this, both tell Stanford Politics. While it was an emotional and chaotic night for many members of the band, Josh and Alex figured that something had to be done, so they took it upon themselves to organize a response. The very next day, several hundred people showed up to their hastily planned rally. This outpouring of support that necessarily included so many non-members of the band, Alex tells Stanford Politics, really made clear to him how big of a deal this was to the broad campus community. At this point, Josh and Alex joined forces with their friends and fellow band members Allegra Cohen and Peter Adelson for what Peter describes to Stanford Politics as the point in their response when they decided to shift from being reactive to proactive.Th is working group of four, operating as a distinct entity from the formal leadership of the banned band, hatched a plan for a letter-writing campaign and public relations operation, including an official statement that reached over 100,000 people on Facebook. Over the winter break, they began to tackle the formal appeal process, working with the band’s incoming 2017 management — Cassidy Forler, Anna Whittell and Julia Howell (who were all already supportive of this effort) — and four became seven. Over the first few weeks of January, all seven of the working group (Josh, Alex, Allegra, Peter, Cassidy, Anna and Julia) met three times with outgoing Provost John Etchemendy, not to mention the additional numerous meetings between individuals in the working group and individual university administrators. Though Cassidy was nominally the leader of the band, she tells Stanford Politics that, throughout these efforts, all seven in the working group were equals. After several iterations of writing and rewriting their formal appeal and executing an effective PR strategy that included denouncing the FoHo’s calls for people to submit FERPA requests as a form of protest, Etchemendy delivered a verdict even better than the band had expected: All preexisting investigations were ended, the suspension was lifted and the bureaucratic hoops the band used to have to jump through when dealing with the administration were replaced with a simple, four-person board that will handle any issues with the band going forward. Just six months after they were totally shut down, the band is back and, arguably, better than ever.
8. Eva Borgwardt
Sophomore, Undeclared
Eva Borgwardt is a champion of open-mindedness, collaboration and communication between different political identities. As a co-chair of Stanford J Street U, she promotes productive discourse on campus about the Israel/Palestine conflict. At this time last year, Eva (along with other J Street U leaders) was a key figure in unanimously passing the undergraduate senate anti-Semitism bill, which included an original definition of anti-Semitism that met the needs of Jewish students while not silencing the free speech of pro-Palestinian advocates. This past fall, Eva led an action as part of a national campaign against the demolition of Susya, a Palestinian village in the West Bank. Part of that campaign included the construction in White Plaza of a sukkah, in which J Street held a teach-in and sleep-in to raise awareness of the impending demolition, which has since been put on hold. Further, Eva was influential in changing the dynamic of how Israeli Independence Day was celebrated on campus this year. Last year, seemingly irreconcilable narratives confronted each other when pro-Israel supporters publicly reveled in White Plaza while pro-Palestine activists held a “die-in.” is year, Eva and J Street U helped move the pro-Israel party to Hillel and focused on facilitating public conversations, instead. In addition to her work on campus, Eva spoke at J Street’s national conference in Washington D.C. There, she advocated that American Jews should stand up for Palestinians the way they stand up for American Muslims, suggesting that the immigrant and refugee narrative with which Jews in America resonate is politically salient not just in Trump’s America, but also across the world. As just a sophomore, Eva has already proven to be a mainstay in both the Jewish and activism communities on campus, and she tells Stanford Politics that she has no plans to stop now.
9. Di’Vennci “DV” Kerón Lucas
Senior, African & African American Studies
Di’Vennci “DV” Lucas has been an influential figure at Stanford ever since getting involved with the Black Lives Matter campaign in 2014. While being involved in direct actions both on and off campus, he came face-to-face with police, while also engaging community and family members in conversation surrounding the police brutality, criminality and systemic bias riddled throughout the justice system. But during his junior year when campus climate seemed to have quieted, DV tells Stanford Politics, he reflected on his activism, the effectiveness of his communication and its complex impact on both himself and his surroundings. Ultimately, he decided that he would depart from thinking of direct action as a primary vehicle towards social change. Instead, for him, direct action would stand as a tool to be used strategically and pragmatically. “I believe now that while direct action has symbolic and therapeutic significance for its participants, without effective communication of salient messages, it can be detrimental not only to those receiving the message, but also to its participants,” he explains. Nevertheless, while DV may not be readily found on the front lines of protests and marches today, as the outgoing chapter president of the Stanford NAACP, an at-large member of the Black Student Union, an undergraduate fellow for the Program in African & African American Studies, and an ethnic theme associate in Ujamaa, he can be found in almost every other corner of Stanford’s black community. As a passionate leader and trusted mentor in these spaces, DV aims to make an impact by providing his comrades in civil rights advocacy with the contacts, connections and knowledge he has acquired through his wide network and range of experiences. He pushes those around him to not only think of making an impact, but also to consider how and when they will engage others. A particular challenge he has posed to both self-identifying and non-identifying activists on campus is to think about the ways they can ensure that every demonstration has a purpose — a tangible goal beyond visibility — while also understanding the real psychological impact demonstrations inevitably have. In the wake of Trump’s election, for example, DV sent an email to the Diaspora email list (the self-described “virtual soul of the Black Community at Stanford”) asking that people focus their reaction on sending emails and making phone calls to elected officials not in opposition to protest, but to enhance the message and purpose of protest. In addition to his political, behind-the-scenes activism, DV has emphasized community service both in his own life and in the efforts of the broader activist community at Stanford. He has pushed the NAACP to center more programming on service in the coming year and, personally, has worked and succeeded in bringing CEO of My Life, an Atlanta-based organization that empowers future entrepreneurs, to Stanford’s campus for a summer pilot in partnership with the d.school.
10. Matthew Cohen + Gabe Rosen
Junior, Political Science & Earth Systems + Sophomore, Public Policy
Matthew Cohen has run for and been elected to the ASSU undergraduate senate three years in a row, the last two years running with coalitions of candidates that both included Gabe Rosen. Matthew recently resigned his seat for the current senate term (which began a few weeks ago and runs through next April), making Gabe the only returning senator. Both Matthew and Gabe have established reputations among their student government colleagues as dedicated public servants with a knack for efficiency and efficacy. Matthew tells Stanford Politics that he feels the senate is a body that too often gets caught up trying to tackle really big issues. He says he prefers to focus his attention on the actionable areas that affect students, even if those might not be as sexy. One area in which Matthew has been particularly influential upon returning to campus after spending the fall at Stanford in Washington and interning at the White House is the management of Stanford Student Enterprises (SSE), the business and financial branch of the ASSU. As a member of SSE’s board of directors, Matthew pushed for a resolution to the legal discrepancies over fiduciary responsibility in SSE’s and the ASSU’s governing documents. As a candidate for chair of SSE’s board, Matthew hopes to keep the board apolitical, especially on issues of divestment. Also with keen financial savvy, Gabe worked on the senate appropriations committee this past year and was elected to serve as the chair of that important committee for this new session. Gabe’s personal achievements in the senate this past year include authoring, passing and implementing the “Full House” bill, which provides need-based financial assistance for student group membership, as well as writing and passing several bylaw amendments relevant to senate appropriations rules.
HONORABLE MENTIONS
★ Skye Lovett (Junior, Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity)
It may come as a surprise to many that Terra is only the de facto LGBTQ+ house on campus and is not officially considered a theme house. Skye Lovett, a prominent activist for an array of issues, has been working, along with many others, to change that. This year, Skye — hosting programming on topics ranging from asexuality to family — has nominally served as the residence’s RCC, but effectively as the Queer Theme Associate, a position that will only be formally recognized next year (as the Weiland Health Associate) thanks to partnership with the Weiland Health Initiative.
★ Elizabeth Davis (Senior, Computer Science)
Elizabeth Davis has served as both a role model and mentor to black entrepreneurs at Stanford. Elizabeth co-founded Greo, a video-based social media app being used at Stanford in its beta phase, with the intent of providing a platform for people of color to engage with each other on topics of social justice and politics. Also a resident assistant at Ujamaa and a founding member of Black in CS, Elizabeth encourages and advises her freshmen and others at Stanford to think about how they can use technology to make social impact.
★ Emma Hartung (Senior, African & African American Studies) + Solveij Praxis (Senior, Anthropology)
Despite respectively asking not to be considered for the top-10 ranking and declining to be interviewed, Emma Hartung and Solveij Praxis merit recognition for their influential roles in campus activism, particularly with SALA (Student and Labor Alliance) and SSN (Stanford Sanctuary Now).
The Editorial Board consists of Truman Chen, Micaela Suminski, Brett Parker, Ruairí Arrieta-Kenna, and Maddie McConkey.
This article appears in the May 2017 issue of Stanford Politics Magazine.