Being a leader and accomplishing goals is not always easy. It can be time consuming and stressful, as well as rewarding, as NaLette Wooten, a senior in finance at Ohio State, has discovered.
Wooten, president of OSU’s chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, has been motivated throughout her life to take an active role in change.
Growing up in Bedford Heights, Ohio, Wooten went to high school with about 1,200 other students.
Her proudest moment was while she was a high school senior, when standardized testing was a big issue.
“The issue was whether standardized tests were biased against minority students,” Wooten said.
She said her class was a close-knit group, and because she had such a strong belief in them, she made it her goal to see everyone graduated.
“Lots of students were having trouble passing the proficiency tests,” Wooten said. “Through the National Honors Society, I created a tutoring program so they’d get the fundamentals they needed to graduate.”
Wooten got involved in the NAACP through a group called the Cleveland Youth Council — a group comprising of students from different high schools.
“My best friend, who was president of the group at the time, invited me to attend a meeting,” Wooten said. “I went and had a great time. I just kept going from there and became a member.”
After being accepted to attend OSU, she sought out the OSU chapter of the NAACP at their National Convention, and got to know their representatives.
“When I first arrived on campus, I was immediately appointed to education chair,” Wooten said.
Wooten said it was especially nice to be able to interact with other members of the black community, something she was unable to do in her residence hall.
“In the entire hall my freshman year, there were only about five or six other black students,” Wooten said. “That was frustrating.”
After serving as education chair for a quarter, Wooten ran for president when the previous president resigned.
“I really went out of my way to run,” Wooten said. “I made a lot of posters and even a speech. I didn’t think I would win because I was a freshman.”
She won the election and is the president of the OSU chapter of the NAACP. The chapter is currently inactive, and it needs 25 members to regain an active status. The cost for an enrolled student is $15 a year.
In the fall of 2002, Wooten attended the John Glenn Institute’s Washington Academic Internship program, where she interned with Hilary Shelton, the chief lobbyist for the NAACP.
“I researched the changes in Social Security policies that can benefit the lifestyles of minority citizens,” she said. “It completely changed my outlook on parties and politics. I realized that if you feel strongly about something, then you should research that issue, instead of just relying on what a political party says.”
One of the more successful programs she ran stemmed from a speech made by Shelton during her internship.
“I found out that every time a bill is on the floor of the House or the Senate, they send an action alert to everyone in the NAACP,” Wooten said. “So I set up a booth in the Hale Center where there was a display board with all of the different alerts posted on it. We had a laptop with formal letters all typed out, so that people just had to give their names and addresses and a letter was sent out on their behalf.”
Last December, OSU’s NAACP chapter teamed up with the Coalition for Equal Opportunities in Education and took a bus of students to Cincinnati for the hearing of the University of Michigan affirmative action case.
“It was a very successful event,” Wooten said. “It was raining out, but we still marched in the rain.”
Wooten is one of the organizers of the NAACP’s next trip to Washington, D.C., on April 1.
“The admissions policies for the University of Michigan are under attack and we are heading there for the hearing that began in the Supreme Court,” Wooten said.
The vote in that case could go either way, but many, including Wooten, think the vote will be 5-4, with Judge Sandra Day O’Connor making the deciding vote.
“On March 14, Judge O’Connor will be speaking at Weigel Hall,” Wooten said. “We are going to be meet in the basement of the union, and then march over to Weigel and have a rally. The national staff is coming, and we want to bring all of the media out. We want to show how OSU feels.”
Wooten’s peers recognize her dedication and passion for the NAACP and problems in society.
“She consumes her time and energy for improving the civil rights of black students on campus and beyond,” said Elicia Wyman, a sophomore in real estate and finance.
“I know she has spent countless nights stressed out, wondering how she can make an impact,” Wyman said. “When she sees a problem, she doesn’t just sit around and whine about it. She goes out and takes care of it.”
Wooten’s mother, Paulette Wooten, believes her daughter’s passion for making a difference began when she took a ride on the New York subway system at age 5.
“She saw people sleeping in the subway and eating out of trash cans,” Paulette Wooten said. “At such a young age, she saw and recognized the difference between being poor and actually having something. She surely wanted to do something.”
Her mother said whatever Wooten chooses to do in life, she is positive that she will continue to be focused and will always be concerned.
“No matter what I do in the future, I will definitely be trying to help the community as much as possible,” Wooten said. “I’d like to pull all three of my passions together — finance, public policy and civil rights.”
