Leading by example

Good leaders practice what they preach. In all of my leadership roles over the years, I've stuck to five core principles molded by my mentors, heroes, and personal experiences. Read about it below:

Steady progress beats not progress at all. Change is neither linear nor immediate. Progressive pragmatism garners lasting results for the toughest problems.
Put practicality before ideological dogmas. No person, party, or platform holds all the answers. Prioritize workable solutions over rigid ideology.
Common sense can bridge almost any divide. Compromise, when necessary, is not surrender — it's strategy.
The most enduring service comes from intrinsic motivation — not titles, rewards, or recognition.
Kindness is non-negotiable. No matter the setting, lead with empathy. The Golden Rule still works everywhere, for everyone.

Read about some of my accomplishments

Member, Stonington Board of Education

On August 7, 2025, I was unanimously appointed to the Stonington Board of Education to fill the remainder of a departing member’s term. The next day, I was sworn in at just 21 years old — becoming the first Gen-Z and youngest active public official in town.

As one of seven board members, I help oversee a $45 million budget, set district policies and goals, and hire and evaluate senior administrators, including the Superintendent. The district I serve consists of four schools serving about 2,000 students across Stonington, Pawcatuck, Lord’s Point, Wequetequock, and parts of Mystic and Old Mystic.

After securing the Democratic endorsement, I was elected to serve a full four-year term on November 4th, 2025.

Chairman, Stonington Municipal Ethics Commission

In July 2024, I was appointed to the first-ever Municipal Ethics Commission in the Town of Stonington’s history — selected by the Board of Selectmen for my commitment to the principle that unethical leadership is no leadership at all. Just six days after my appointment, I was unanimously elected Chairman at age 20. As Chairman, I led the Commission through its inaugural term with a focus on integrity, impartiality, and procedural rigor. Along the way, I:

Directed multiple investigations into formal ethics complaints concerning elected officials.
Ensured all proceedings adhered strictly to legal standards and confidentiality requirements.
Presided over all meetings, set agendas, prepared materials, and facilitated deliberations.
Helped bring the Commission's work to a decisive conclusion by September 4, 2024, at which point the body formally dissolved.

This appointment was both a personal honor and a testament to the importance of youth leadership in public ethics.

Save UConn Rally

As President of the Student Body, I co-organized and delivered remarks at the largest UConn student protest in history. A crowd ranging from 700-1,000 student activists gathered at the State Capitol on February 15th, 2023 to protest large cuts in state funding to the University. The protests worked, increasing state aid to the University by somewhere in the ballpark of $60 million when all was said and done. On February 20th, 2024, I returned to Hartford with a delegation of UConn students for a hearing of the Connecticut General Assembly Appropriations Committee. After negotiating with the UConn Governmental Relations team to include at least one representative from each regional campus on the panel for the hearing, my Avery Point team arrived with the largest overall collective of students. This panel has been credited with the return of over $98 million in state funding. Finally, on February 19th, 2025 I testified to the CGA Appropriations Committee. My written remarks can be read here.

University By-Law Amendments

As Chief Advocacy Officer of the student government, I began a momentous effort to increase student representation within the administration. I collaborated with members of the Senate Executive Committee, various staff members, and student leaders from all UConn campuses to review University By-Laws. We determined existing language was undermining undergraduate student advocacy efforts stemming from regional campuses. Active policy had failed to acknowledge regional campus student government structures and describe certain procedures clearly, producing undesirable outcomes (e.g. four out of nine undergraduate seats, representing roughly 5,000 students, in the Senate remained unfilled until I began this effort). After months of negotiations, I presented my proposed policy changes to the University Senate on February 5th, 2024, where they passed with overwhelming consent. On April 10th, 2024, I presented more policy changes to the Board of Trustees Student Life Committee, ultimately leading to the changes being unanimously recommended for adoption by the full Board. A week later, on April 17th, I briefly presented the changes to the full Board of Trustees, who would later approve and adopt them on June 26th, 2024.

Husky Harvest Food Pantry

As Vice-President of the Student Body, I engaged in preliminary dialogue about food insecurity and ways to address it with administrators and student government leaders from each UConn campus. Shortly after becoming President, the Husky Harvest Food Pantry launched to combat the issue. Alongside university leadership, Connecticut Foodshare Executives, and state legislators, I championed the program at its opening ceremony and have continued to promote it to existing and incoming students ever since.

Mystic Aquarium Partnership

In my experience as both an employee of Mystic Aquarium and a student leader at UConn Avery Point, I pursued numerous ventures to tie the institutions more closely together. As Vice-President of the Student Body, I used this network to plan an “End of Year Celebration at Mystic Aquarium” for the Avery Point community. We have since returned for three more years, cementing the event as an annual tradition. In its first year, the event had just short of 400 attendees. The second, third, and fourth years saw a spike in attendance, with 650, 700, and 750 respectively. My budget for the inaugural event totaled $13,000, but our institutional relationship later strengthened, lowering the cost burden by around $6,000 for successive gatherings despite increased attendance and entertainment value. I also utilized my connections to establish another annual networking event, “Penguins & Pizza,” which was co-sponsored by the UConn Center for Career Development. This event would entail a meet and greet with live African penguins right on campus to accompany a slew of career services personnel and Mystic Aquarium staff.

Safe-Sex Product Distribution Project

In my second term as President of the Student Body, I launched a Safe-Sex Product Distribution Project on campus with the goal of ensuring universal access to condoms, dental dams, lubrications, and more. Previously, students could only access these supplies by visiting the Student Health and Wellness (SHaW) office on campus, typically run by just one professional staff member. Student-staff interactions regarding such products can be intimidating, thereby limiting overall access. General awareness of the availability of these products was also abnormally low for a college campus. I developed a volunteer team of five students, who installed and maintained numerous refillable safe-sex product dispensers in gender-inclusive restrooms across three buildings. To improve awareness, we curated infographics to display on social media and around campus. In the project’s inaugural semester (Spring 2024) we delivered over 2,600 assorted safe-sex products to UConn students.

Advocating For Human Rights

In response to the arrests of 24 students at a peaceful encampment protesting UConn’s complicity in the 2024 Israel-Hamas genocide, I co-signed a resolution to hold a special meeting of the University Senate to condemn the actions of the administration. Along with 29 other senators, most of which were concerned faculty, I delivered an address to the Senate in support of the creation of a special committee to review the procedures of police mobilization and investigate the feasibility of divestment from the military industry. I also co-signed a resolution that demanded the President of the University urge the State Attorney to drop all charges the peaceful protestors faced. By the end of the session, all resolutions had passed with an overwhelming majority.

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