Emma Cox has a passion for racial and social justice.
As a first-year student, she read the 2013 Dane County Race to Equity Report, which opened her eyes to Dane County’s status as the home of some of the worst racial disparities in the nation. This inspired her to return to her high school, Monona Grove, to raise awareness and promote civic engagement. She coordinated with the League of Women Voters to host several voter registration days for staff and older students. She also presented in social studies classes on ways to practice civic engagement apart from voting.
Emma’s commitment has also been evident in her choice of classes. While pursuing her degree in community and nonprofit leadership, she threw herself into her Community and Social Change course. For a discussion of the social and political issues in textiles and fashion, she accepted an invitation to share her knowledge of the local political clothing company Insert Apparel. Teaching assistant Emily Popp says that Emma took on extra work to create a presentation and “spoke openly in front of her peers about racial issues, including examining her own place in society.”
Emma has worked with the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice, a nonprofit serving marginalized communities, on a project designed to gain insight into homelessness. She helped collect data for government and nonprofit agencies, surveying the Madison downtown streets at night for individuals perceived to be experiencing homelessness. After obtaining informed consent, she and fellow volunteers asked a series of questions, including time spent without housing, mental health status, and experience with shelters. They also provided food, bus passes, and toiletries. “Homelessness is not an issue we can wait on,” Emma says. “Our collective investment in seeking humanizing solutions must begin now.”
Emma has also worked at the Multicultural Student Center as part of the social justice education team, which raises awareness of the ways that social identities, privilege, and power affect social status. She served as a teaching assistant for Issues of Social Injustice, a course taught by the center’s director and assistant dean, Gabriel Javier. She helped design questions for class reflections, worked with small groups to design presentations, and graded student assignments.
“Emma is an incredibly dependable, thoughtful, and humble person,” Javier says. “She is a conscientious, outstanding student, complemented by her acute sense of self-awareness and willingness to integrate critical feedback into her daily life.”