By Taylore Gills, Staff Writer

The Atlanta University Center (AUC) First Year Class Councils (FYCC) have taken this virtual Fall ‘20 semester by storm. Though their college experience began in their homes, they continue to carry these student leadership positions exceptionally well.

Each AUC ‘24 class president is very confident in their leadership roles and how their board members work together. Kaylin Strahan, Breah Banks, and Tyler Greene are thoroughly dedicated to their classmates’ success as a whole.

Kayla Strahan is president of Clark Atlanta University’s FYCC. Holding a leadership position as a freshman was very important to her, even in this virtual environment.

“I have the heart to want to help people, and I want to see people do well. So I was like, I think this would be a very nice title to have. Not only a title, but somewhere where people can come to me and know that I’m a resource and I can help with whatever they need help with,” said Strahan.

So far, Strahan and her board have planned a meet & greet and other social Zoom events amongst her class. She appreciates her board members tremendously and looks forward to what they will continue to produce for their class in the future.

Breah Banks, Spelman College’s FYCC president, also believes that her class can only be successful when they work together.

“Our main focus is unity, to be honest. Because quite frankly, that’s all we have right now. We have an initiative where we check-in with each other, bringing our Spelman class together and how can we stay together throughout these times until we can finally meet one another,” said Banks.

Spelman’s FYCC is extremely present on Instagram, conducting story takeovers multiple times a week. In addition to the virtual events they are planning, the Instagram activity allows their classmates to be engaged on a more consistent basis.

Tyler Greene, the FYCC president at Morehouse College, believes not only in the council impacting their classmates, but the class impacting the community.

“I realized that while Morehouse does produce pursuers of black excellence that gain a fundamental understanding of their condition as people and are able to mobilize better, I think that it’s also equally important that we encourage and bring this information to our younger brothers and sisters. So I proposed the Step-In initiative, where we all will hopefully be required to write on the black experience and they will all be collected and then approved by the Africana Studies and English departments. And then put into grade level based portfolio packages that we’ll send to as many public school districts in the country as possible,” said Greene.

Greene and his board strive to lead the generations to come, while simultaneously creating mental health chats, career mentorship programs, and other initiatives to keep their classmates engaged throughout the year.

These three FYCC presidents and their boards have played a great role in the AUC so far, and this is only the beginning for them.