D.C. Scholars Lead Student Government at Grinnell

Posse D.C. is proud to have two Scholars recently elected to lead the Student Government Association (SGA) at Grinnell College. Summer White is the incoming SGA president and Kahlil Epps is the vice president of student affairs.

Both Summer and Kahlil have previous experience working within the Student Government Association. Summer became involved during her second semester of college and has held positions of senator, assistant treasurer and treasurer. Kahlil also served as a senator and worked on various committees.

Both Scholars were encouraged to pursue these leadership opportunities by other Posse Scholars and alumni, including Posse alumna Opeyemi Awe, who was the Student Government Association president at Grinnell in 2015.

“Opeyemi was really involved and encouraged me,” says Kahlil, who is also the president of Concerned Black Students and a member of the swim and dive team.

“When I saw a lot of Posse students with leadership positions on campus, I wanted to follow that. Posse gave me a good foundation to find something I was interested in and delve into it.”

Summer, who is also on the swim and dive team, credits Posse’s programming with providing the skills needed to excel and implement change on campus.

“In terms of technical training, I learned how to facilitate a meeting, talk about difficult things and work in a diverse team,” Summer says. “I came into college with Posse knowing that the organization and the school believed that I can be an effective leader. Having that support was really inspiring and confirmed that I can go after these things.”