Every year, the walls get plastered with glossy photos of smiling student council hopefuls. For the past six years, one face has been a constant during all election cycles: Sarah Gebremeskel, ‘25, this year’s executive board president.
Gebremeskel first got involved in Student Congress (StuCo) in eighth grade due to the influence of her brother, Emmanuel Gebremeskel, ‘20, who was executive board president in her seventh-grade year.
“He is definitely somebody that I look up to,” Gebremeskel said.
By following in her brother’s footsteps, Gebremeskel began to discover her passion for leading people and started forging her own path in StuCo by becoming eighth-grade class president the following year. From there, she obtained the class presidency for the next three years and is currently serving as the executive board president.
“I’m really into leadership,” Gebremeskel said. “It’s one of the skills that’s woven into me as a person, and I enjoy carrying it out.”
Being executive board president comes with many responsibilities. This position includes representing the student body and heading the StuCo meetings. Along with this, similar to the class president, the executive board is tasked with organizing student events such as pep rallies, the homecoming parade and so much more.
Gebremeskel also believes that her status as a first-generation Ethiopian American student, which means that her parents were born and raised in Ethiopia and later immigrated to America, where Gebremeskel and her siblings were born, has further enhanced her involvement in StuCo.
“Being first [generation] is a really big part of my identity, and my time here at Walnut especially,” Gebremeskel said. “If you peel back all the layers at the end of the day, that’s why I do everything that I do.”
Gebremeskel’s culture and connection to her Ethiopian heritage have guided her throughout her life. Knowing and being connected to her roots provides her with a sense of purpose and gives her something to strive for in times of uncertainty.
“With Ethiopian culture, there’s a lot of tribalism,” Gebremeskel said. “Every tribe kind of has a mantra and a foundation associated with it, and the one that I’m from has a lot to do with hard work, so I think that my culture has really fueled me in that way.”
As a first-generation student, Gebremeskel is able to not only follow the path of those students who came before her but also use this opportunity to lay the groundwork for first-generation students to do the same after her.
“Whatever I do, I’m representing first-gen kids everywhere,” Gebremeskel said. “I’m representing Ethiopian kids everywhere [too], so that has definitely been a really big [motivation].”
Being placed in high authority positions as a minority can be disconcerting due to systemic barriers that often make them less accessible. Additionally, women of color have not always had the easiest time obtaining positions of high status and influence.
“To be frank, it’s stereotyped,” Gebremeskel said. “Black women are stereotyped all the time, and I think that there’s also a duality here because some people don’t really see me as a Black woman in leadership because they’re like, ‘Oh, she’s Ethiopian,’ so it’s different, it’s separated.”
Women being stereotyped in the workplace is not a new issue and can be found in all areas of professionalism.
“Sometimes it’s hard because you never want to come off as too overbearing, too powerful, too aggressive or too stark, because it’ll get scrutinized, and obviously, as a leader, anything gets scrutinized, [no] matter who you are,” Gebremeskel said.
These stereotypes are not just limited to Black women. Many women everywhere deal with sexism and prejudice in the workplace constantly. Because of these issues, it becomes difficult to speak up without being labeled as “aggressive” or “dramatic.”
“Being in an influential position means something else for people of color, especially Black women because you are representing something that is changing,” Gebremeskel said. “That means that the things that you do and things you say and the actions you take are defining that, so every single Black woman in this world who’s in any influential position, everything they’re doing right now is impacting the definition for years to come of a Black woman in an influential position.”
Through her awareness of her culture and the struggles faced by minority students across the world today, Gebremeskel is able to apply this knowledge when making decisions for the student body in a unique way.
“Now I’m at a place where I’m proud of that [her accomplishments], and I’m proud of every single other Black woman who’s doing anything in this school, and I think that being a person of color helps a lot with relatability, so I’m able to recognize multiple sides of the student body,” Gebremeskel said.
While it can be hard for people of color to come to terms with their identity, students at WHHS are fortunate enough to have a strong support system to lean on and come to for guidance and redirection.
“Whether people see it or not, Walnut is an extremely good place for that, because our [student] body is so diverse that you’ll see kids who are not societally expected to fit into certain roles, and they fit into the role, and they do well in the role,” Gebremeskel said.
As executive board president, Gebremeskel aims to ensure that students’ voices are regardless of gender, race, ethnicity or religion.
“I think that for any younger generations of Black women, it’s really important that you realize there are no limitations to what you can do just because of who you are,” Gebremeskel said. “If anything, your identity should boost that, and it should perpetuate any good things that are coming out of that, so [do] not ever let anything stop you.”