As a freelance writer and illustrator not even four years into his career, Asher Elbein has already published multiple times with journalism behemoths including The Atlantic, The New York Times, and Smithsonian. Elbein knew when he came to The University of Alabama that he wanted to be a science journalist—after all, he’d been obsessed with drawing and learning about dinosaurs from childhood. But rather than pursuing a journalism major, he thought an interdisciplinary approach through New College would serve him […]

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Upstart director and storyteller Xavier Neal-Burgin is pushing to tell underrepresented stories in Hollywood. At only 28 years old, Neal-Burgin has already directed twelve short films, which have led him to become an HBO Film Finalist, a Sundance Lab Fellow, a Student Academy Award Semifinalist—and he has 60,000 Twitter followers to boot. Neal-Burgin says he is excited by his success and hopes he’ll see increased visibility for black directors, storytellers, actors, and other creatives. Thus far, he has focused his […]

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Since she was a child, Olivia Bensinger has strived to take care of the planet through advocating and recycling. Now, her goal is to save the planet through the law. Bensinger, a UA and Harvard Law School alumna, is an associate at Hughes, Hubbard and Reed—an international law firm that has been ranked No. 1 on The American Lawyer’s “A-List” and recently won multiple honors at the 2018 Americas IP Awards. “I wanted to get my feet on the ground […]

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Listening to Miss America contestants say that they want to solve world hunger seems so cliché that it verges on trite. But for UA senior Jessica Procter, also known as Miss Alabama, fighting against food insecurity is more than a winning platform—it’s a passion project that, most recently, has been helping campuses across the nation to save and bring thousands of pounds of food to needy families each week. For the project, known as Fifth Quarter, members of Alpha Gamma […]

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As a young alumna spearheading her career, Cameron Shevlin is already the director of Impact Alabama, a division of Impact America, which is supported by the Center for Ethics and Social Responsibility. Impact America is a non-profit group that serves communities in the Southeast by helping families file their tax returns for free, conducting vision screenings for preschool children, providing college mentors for high-school students preparing to take AP classes, and coaching young debate teams. “Each of our initiatives is […]

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