From HLC to history maker: Alisha Mitchell talks about her SGA rise

On Monday, Alisha Mitchell '26 gaveled in the first session of the year as Student Government Association President. The meeting saw six new members get sworn in, but more than that, it was the first led by Mitchell, whose tenure with SGA started this month three years ago when she was elected freshman class president. In every year since then, Mitchell has been the class president, a title awarded to the candidate who earns the greatest number of votes in a class.

Among other distinctions, she chaired the Heritage Life Committee, which oversees many of SGA's trademark student events, as a sophomore, and she spoke at this year's convocation ceremony in her capacity as SGA president. In that capacity, she is the first female Black SGA president that Mercer has had, and she spoke with The Cluster before the first meeting about her path to the presidency and what she sees in SGA's future.

Talk a little bit about when you ran for the first time as a freshman. What went into that decision to run for office so early in your college career?

When I got into SGA, I was a political science major and I knew that I wanted to do SGA. Even though it is not only for political science majors or people that are going into law, I knew that that would be a great reflection to see if I can handle law and policy and collaboration on a big scale. And I had done SGA since I was little. That's just something that is always a part of my life. Leadership, student leadership and being a liaison between professors and students has always been a part of something that I was asked to do, requested to do or just things that I liked doing.

So freshman year, I knew I wanted to run for SGA. I went to BearFair and that is where I met Rylan Allen ‘23, who was the 2022 president. He was just amazing. I was like, “Okay, so they're not terrible people,” which I expected to experience, like, at a big SEC school, where the SGA felt like a cult. They did not feel like a cult, so I was like, “Check number one.” I knew already that the people that were a part of SGA were really nice, they were human.

So then I was like, “Okay, I'm gonna try it. I'm gonna try to do it.” So then I ran. You know how we have the Mercer “class of” accounts? I went to every single person and I sent my flyer to them. That is how I campaigned because I was not spending money for this. That is just one thing I will not do, so I sent every single person my flyer. I sent it to every group chat that I was a part of. Every GroupMe that I joined, I said, “Hey, Queen, I'm running!”

The TikTok that everybody talked about for the rest of the year was the TikTok that I made with the China Anne McClain theme song from “A.N.T. Farm.” It was all the girls in my hallway, I love them so much and appreciate them so much. We all lived on Boone's second floor, and every single girl got in the video. We did a whole little dance party at the top of the bean bag area in Boone. So that is how a lot of my votes, I think, got pulled from there, because everyone was like, “That was so funny.”

Everybody has been making flyers and acting like SGA has to be this serious thing, and, well, one thing about it, two things for sure: I am going to take my job seriously but I do not think I am more important just because I am running for SGA. I think that really set me over the edge, and then I got on.

You mentioned early on that the political science major steered you towards SGA. Have you found that, now that you have been here for three years, that the information that you have learned from Ben Hoyt and Will Jordan has translated to your work with SGA?

I think the classes that we take at Mercer teach you how to not be a, what is the word? Tyrannical ruler. It is more personal virtue and stuff like that. By hearing it in the books, I knew it allowed me to hear out loud the person and the leader I did not want to be. When you hear Machiavelli and “The Prince,” you understand you do not want to be the person that uses people for their own good. I knew that I did not want to do that, so it taught me people see every step that you make and what you do gets written down in someone's history. 

The way you treat people in government goes down in someone else's mind and how they perceive you. So it did allow me to know that every decision, every word, every statement I make does matter and it does count. Do I matter as much as that? No, because one thing Dean Pearson always tells us is to take the job seriously, but not yourself. 

I think that showed up in learning the mistakes of people in past government like Socrates and Plato. They took themselves too seriously, and then there was the fall of Rome. So, I think it showed up in that way, like virtue and justice, but other than that, I do not know if it taught me how to do Robert’s Rules perfectly.

Tell me about your election, which came in the same school year as the country’s presidential election.

I think there was a problem of people saying, like, “You know what this relation is giving? It feels like another Kamala versus Trump.” And I was like “Hey, let’s not say that.” But it was. If we are being honest, it was the same thing where it was a Black female running for presidency and a white male candidate running for presidency, so it did reflect the same thing. So, there was a little bit of pressure like, “I think we've had Alisha before, we need something different,” and it was the same rhetoric. And I was like, “Oh, well that is really interesting.”

I think the rhetoric definitely reflected the state of what our nation was saying and I think it made me think, “I've been doing this since my first year, so there's no way that y'all are doubting my ability.” And I do not know if people were doubting my ability or they simply wanted something new. And I think that is when me and Callie Lowery ‘26 talked and we said if the student body wants something new, then they can have whatever they want, but the people decide who they want in charge of SGA.

So, I think that was also just another thing that comes with running for presidency, because everyone in the past three years have run unopposed. They did not have to run against anybody. The one year that Callie and I run, we run like against two very ambitious, very head-driven rising sophomores. We were, like, “Whoa, that's so crazy.” So it was really interesting to see how that played out and the rhetoric that happened on YikYak. People started making jokes like, “Alisha and Callie saved my cat from a burning building and then went to class. Vote for them.”

Since I have been at Mercer, a presidential election has never been like that, so that was really interesting to have someone running against us. As students, we have not had that. It has always been like, “Oh, Rylan's going to be the president. Nobody's going to run against Rylan. Dalton Loyd's ‘25 going to be the president, why would you even try to run against him?” And now one Black female who has been on SGA for four years, held positions that no one else held at the age I did, and now it is like, “Does she need to be in the position?” That was really interesting to see, so I am glad that the students picked who they trusted, and I am glad that everyone had the opportunity to participate in democracy.

Did you have any intention as a freshman of becoming SGA president, and if you did, was it with the intention of becoming the first Black woman to lead SGA that Mercer has had?

In freshman year, I just wanted to join SGA because I knew it was a way that I was able to connect across campus. I knew I was in the liberal arts. I do not stay in the STEM quad. I do not even think I have been in the STEM quad unless I am on an admissions tour, so I knew that there was going to be a part of campus that I was never going to experience. I knew that if I did SGA, I would get a snippet of everybody in that part of campus, so that was the main reason why I was running.

I did not think I was going to break the record. Of course, once people realized that I take this seriously and that I was actually invested in SGA, it was like, “Oh, I know your future,” and I was like, no, “I'm just a girl, please don't say that I'm gonna be SGA president.” At that point, I was a young girl. I was freshly 18. I was just doing SGA because I love SGA. I have always done it, and it is a part of me. It is who I am.

I was not like, “I'm gonna get in there and I'm going to make it to the top.” I just wanted to do it because I like SGA. By sophomore year, they told me I was going to get the Heritage and Life Committee position, I was like, “What?” I think that is when I realized that I was being perceived and set up for a succession, at least in HLC, but at that moment, I still did not think that I was going to be SGA president.

In terms of being the first Black woman, when I first thought about it when it was brought up to me by a past senator, I called Rylan, and he was like, “No, you wouldn't be the first because, technically, Sheridan King would have been the first.” I do not know if Sheridan King was SGA president, but I am pretty sure Sheridan King would have been the first.

I hope I am not the first because, to know that Black women never had the opportunity to be in a position of power, it is a mix of emotions. That is really cool that I get to be the first, but for it to happen in 2025 is kind of insane. That is the same notion for every Black person. We have the first Black woman Supreme Court Justice. Yay, question mark? Are we supposed to be cheering that our social systems were set up this way and that people had this notion that Black women were not supposed to be in leadership? Like, who told you that? So, it is definitely a “Yay, question mark?”

What is your main priority as SGA president in your last year on the governing body?

I think one of the biggest questions that we always hear that makes us senators go, “Oh, brother,” is, “What does SGA do?” We all sit there, like, “Did you just stay up till 2 a.m. trying to plan the Wellness Fair?” So I think communicating to students we are the people figuring out ways to help students. If there are controversial things, if there are protests on campus, you guys all come to us first. We need you to understand that we do work, and when you come to us first, that is the reason.

Callie and I have a monthly meeting with President Bill Underwood and we tell him, “This is what is happening on campus.” Then he tells us how he can fix it or how he can help. One of the biggest things was the question about the light across the street from Amici's to campus, and Dalton talked to him about the timing of the light. In the meeting, he picked up the phone for the city people and was like, “So, can we fix that?” and they were, like “Yeah!” and he hung up the phone. It was fixed the next week. He does get stuff done and so that was really scary when he did that with us, we said, “Oh, right, right.”

He doesn't play about his students, and knowing that we get to talk to President Underwood and to tell people that while you might not see him all the time, he does not play about his students. I think that was really something interesting to see a different perspective so communicating that. Also for students to understand that if you are confused about what office to go to, even if it's just about your personal things, come talk to senators. We have to talk to the Student Affairs Office, we have to speak to them. We are always in there. We have to talk to the Chief of Mercer Police, we have to do the safety walk with them. We have direct access to those people. 

Every senator has office hours. Whoever the senator is for your class, they're here to help, and this is a really good group of senators. SGA has always been open, but we are a group of yappers this year so we want to help you and we want to be a part of the things.

Editor's note: This conversation was lightly edited for clarity and length. Mitchell served as a staff writer for The Mercer Cluster for two years before being elected to the presidency.