Salt Lake Community College’s student body president Aaron Starks recently returned home after a two day trip to the nation’s capital.
Starks visited Washington, D.C., on Feb. 19 to participate in a panel discussion at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
The event, sanctioned by the National Campus Leadership Council’s National Steering Committee, featured Starks alongside student body officers from many top universities including Purdue and Harvard.
Starks says he didn’t feel diminished as a representative of a community college among leaders from what are commonly considered elite schools.
“There’s not a difference, we’re all students. We all have a future to look forward to,” says Starks.
“Some of us have gone to Harvard, some of us at Perdue and some of us at Salt Lake Community College,” says Starks. “We’re all in the same track just at different steps and different locations, but that track leads to the same destination.”
The panel discussion was facilitated by former White House senior policy advisor Zakiya Smith and showcased a cast of elected figures from both the education and private sectors, including a representative from Microsoft and the CEO of Veritech.
The group spoke in front of higher education students and members of the private sector about ways to bridge the gap between the two worlds.
