As an aspiring counselor, Aalissia Thomas plans to spend the rest of her life helping others navigate challenges—a dream she will be one step closer to achieving when she accepts her diploma this May. However, Thomas says she never would have accomplished this milestone if the Office of Diversity and Inclusion (ODI) had not supported her through difficulties of her own.
A third-year psychology major in the Young Scholars Program, Thomas grew up in Youngstown, Ohio, where she was heavily involved in community service through programs like My Brother’s Keeper and YMCA Youth in Government. In fact, Thomas decided on becoming a counselor in middle school, when she mentored younger students at a leadership camp.
“I love listening to people. I love hearing people’s stories. Helping people deal with the hardest things in their lives is so captivating,” Thomas said. “It makes me happy to try to find new ways to allow people to express themselves and be themselves in a space that’s safe.”
Thanks to encouragement from Tiffany Payiavlas, YSP’s Youngstown Program Manager, Thomas arrived at Ohio State in 2021 eager to pursue her passion for psychology, but she quickly ran into roadblocks, struggling both academically and socially.
“I was very surprised at how hard it was. As a high-achieving student, you come in with these expectations for yourself, and Ohio State definitely humbled me,” Thomas commented. The challenges snowballed further when Thomas returned home during the spring semester of her first year due to personal circumstances.
In that moment, Thomas learned what she says was the most important lesson of her college career: how to ask for help.
“It was just about getting out of my own way and understanding that asking for help doesn’t make me any less of a scholar,” Thomas explained. “If anything, it makes me more of a scholar because a scholar, by definition, is someone who’s smart, and it would not be very smart of me to not ask for help and utilize all the resources available.”
With the help of ODI staff, Thomas worked hard to turn things around. As she nears graduation, she has a myriad of accomplishments to celebrate, including serving as a House Manager for the Alumni Scholarship Program, working as an Undergraduate TA for the psychology department, and joining Scarlet Force, Ohio State’s first HBCU-style majorette squad.
Thomas has also worked to give back to ODI, where she has been an Advancement Student Ambassador, YSP Academic Success Partner, and YSP Ambassador.
“I couldn’t have done it without the support of ODI and the Young Scholars Program especially,” Thomas noted. “Whether it’s been career services, where I sat for three hours working on my personal statement; the Young Scholars Program, which has really been this hallmark to my college career; or working with the Advancement Ambassadors Program and trying to keep people engaged in our community—the team at ODI just pushes you because they see so much in you.”
While Thomas’s undergraduate career is ending, her time sporting Scarlet and Gray is not. She plans to attend Ohio State as a graduate student in the clinical mental health counseling program on the counseling education track, and she looks forward to remaining in the place that helped shape her.
“Ohio State really challenged me to be the best kind of learner. Getting the experience to think critically, be a critical consumer of knowledge, and understand that there are so many layers to the human experience—I will never take that for granted,” Thomas said. “I’m staying a Buckeye.”