President’s Address

President Address

Greetings!

Welcome to the University of Missouri’s (Mizzou) chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE). My name is Ogheneobarome Emeje and I have the honor of serving as Mizzou NSBE’s chapter president.

I am thrilled to work with many key players such as our chapter executive board, Region V NSBE, Mizzou’s College of Engineering, and many more this year in increasing our efforts to follow NSBE’s mission and national directive of graduating 10,000 black engineers annually by 2025.

In order to reach this goal, we need to make sure we raise awareness of who we are and what we stand for. As a chapter, we have and hold a number of events, workshops, and programs that run in line with our mission as a society along with ensuring we are benefiting our membership. 

To make sure we are excelling academically we teach programs such as the Guaranteed 4.0, host various tutoring sessions, study halls, GPA checkups, and more. To help our members succeed professionally, we often partner with our College of Engineering to hold resume reviews, elevator pitches, and mock interview workshops as well as bring in companies for the opportunities of internships, co-ops, and/or full-time positions. Furthermore, we take our members to the annual Fall Regional Conference and National Convention for the opportunity to learn more about society, go to workshops that align with our mission, and network during conferences along with the career fairs held at conferences. And to ensure we are positively impacting the community, we do weekly tutoring to the youth at St. Luke United Methodist Church, our annual Walk for Education, and other acts of service in between such as volunteering at the local food bank and community clean-up in the Columbia area.   

As chapter president, my personal directives are Listen First, Speak Second. This is my directive because during my time as a leader within NSBE I learned how powerful membership’s voices are. Listening to what they want while giving important information will allow us to retain membership.  

I want to invest in membership, have effective leadership, and by bridging gaps. To invest in membership, I first have to foster a community. I plan to do that with events and bonding. I also want to send out surveys to gauge how membership feels about Mizzou NSBE. Lastly, I want to improve the number of opportunities with companies and help promote scholarships. To have effective leadership I want to start with my current 2022-23 board and then help develop the next generation with the Jr. executive board and communities.

How I would like to bridge the gap for Mizzou NSBE is by collaborating with organizations at Mizzou, and in NSBE Region V.

I also want the chapter to be recognized regionally by joining Region V technical competitions and being involved with the region’s programming

We have a lot of focus points to cover with our mission, and our national, regional, and chapter directives, but I have no doubt in my mind the team we have here will bring all of it to life in the best light possible and keep the NSBE Family going here at Mizzou one member at a time. 

-President, Ogheneobarome Emeje