When Kenneth Brown Jr. was helping his seven younger siblings and parents move into a bug-infested hotel room four years ago, his mother embraced him with tears in her eyes and said, “Tell me it’s going to be ok.”
When Brown told her he was elected as Elon University’s Class of 2019 president last week, she teared up again — this time for a better reason.
“I was so happy for him,” said his mother, Tabitha Brown. “He is a phenomenal dude and I’m glad he’s my son. He keeps finding a way to overcome tremendous odds.”
Kenneth Brown has overcome hurdles since his birth. As an underweight infant at three pounds, 14 ounces, Brown lived in an incubator for three months until he could properly breathe on his own. He had to wear braces on his legs to support himself while learning to walk as a child. Throughout his life, he and his family have moved between houses and hotels because of their low socioeconomic status.
“Growing up like that was weird because I never wanted to see my parents fail,” Brown said. “They would always put up this front that they were Superman, but occasionally they would let their guard down. So when they did blow up over financial arguments, I had a hard time trying to explain it to my little siblings.”
Brown arrived to Elon ready for a new start. He said he wanted to be involved with multiple campus organizations like Elon Local News, but was unsure whether or not to attempt joining Student Government Association. After multiple conversations with his roommate, Kyle Albertelli, he began to prepare for his campaign as class president.
“When he asked me whether or not he should run, I told him, ‘What do you have to lose?’” Albertelli said. “If you win, that would be great, if you lose, you gave it everything you had.”
Once interest meetings and campaigns began Brown said he realized how daunting and formidable the competition for the presidency was. Doubts and uncertainties began to creep in his mind, especially when he heard the success other candidates were experiencing.
When his confidence was at his lowest point, he wrote, “I’m winning this” on the white board in his room as motivation to keep fighting even when he was feeling down.
“At that point, I knew I really wanted to win,” Brown said. “I wasn’t going to let my self-consciousness get the better of me. I had been through too much in my life already to let that happen.”
By posting to social media at least once every two hours, Brown’s campaign, with the slogan, “I’m fighting for you,” began to reach voters through his Facebook, Twitter and YouTube accounts.
“As first-years coming to a new place, we need someone that will fight for us and give us a voice,” Brown said. “We need someone that’s going to stand up and help us as we make one of the biggest transitions in our lives.”
Freshman Connor Quinn, one of Brown’s supporters, said he voted for him because he felt he was the right person for the job.
“I felt that he was in it for the best reasons and would do what needs to be done,” Quinn said.
After the votes were tallied and Brown was announced winner, he immediately called his mother to tell her the news. She said that leading others is in her son’s blood and that this job will come naturally to him.
“He has set the bar high in our family,” Tabitha Brown said. “Impossible or ‘I can’t do it’ aren’t allowed to be said in our household because he is living proof that anything can be done. I just want people to embrace him because he just wants to touch lives.”
Brown’s term is set for one year before reelections take place again. In the time he has as president, he said hopes to represent his class to the best of his ability.
He doesn’t take his new position lightly.
“I am one of the most unlikely people to be running this class,” he said. “But that’s the way I like it. There are so many paths we can go in life, but we chose the path that led us to Elon. We’re here now, so we need to work together to make Elon better for ourselves, the future classes ahead of us and the community as a whole.”