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Ashley Anderson was attending the best public university in the galaxy and competing for a Division I track & field team, but there was something missing.
 
She had always been defined as an athlete, but suddenly that wasn't enough.
 
"I felt like something was missing, but I couldn't put my finger on it," Anderson said. "I was miserable. I didn't know what it was, but I was sad. Something was definitely missing."
 
Turns out Anderson was in need of a cause.
 
Enter the Black Student-Athlete Summit at the University of Texas.
 
"It sounded wonderful, but I didn't know what it was exactly going to be," Anderson said. "I had no idea what to expect."
 
She especially didn't expect that it could be so life-changing.
 
In January of 2017, Anderson, along with Noah Westerfield of the football team, Ashten Smith-Gooden of the volleyball squad and Eugene Hamilton of the track & field team, decided to attend the Black Student-Athlete Summit. With student-athlete development advisor Tarik Glenn and learning specialist Daniel Thomas along as chaperones, Cal's student-athlete quartet listened to panels featuring Ph.D.'s and other leaders in the field while engaging in discussions with black student-athletes from other institutions.
 
When Anderson returned to Berkeley, she was a different person. The student-athletes immediately began presenting their learnings to Cal athletic administration while forming the Black Student-Athlete Committee – one of a few of its kind across the country.
 
"All three of these things fit together to make me whole," Anderson said. "When I was just a student and an athlete, I was miserable. I had to go all the way to Texas to feel like I was part of something."
 
Anderson admitted her initial interest in attending the Black Student-Athlete Summit was almost strictly for networking purposes. But when she and her fellow attendees met with Glenn before the trip to find out more, they were intrigued by the possibilities.
 
Topics at the summit included burnout, activism, disparity between African-American grades and the general student population, and the disconnect between the student-athlete black community and the general black population on campus.
 
"When we came back, some of the staff and coaches wanted to hear about our experience," Anderson said. "Tarik suggested we make ourselves an organization so it would be easier for people to help us. That's how we came up with BSAC (Black Student-Athlete Committee)."
 
After making a series of presentations to Cal athletic department staff, the quartet formed BSAC and immediately started holding bi-weekly meetings at the Tahir Room at the Simpson Center for Student-Athlete High Performance. The committee has been growing since and gets about 20 attendees at every meeting.
 
"We try to pick topics that don't pertain to athletics," Anderson said. "Everything around us always is athletics. You spend all your time with your teammates and coaches, going to practice, going to school. We're trying to get our black student-athletes to find their identity."
 
Anderson was initially named president of BSAC until the committee decided it didn't want to use titles. Allanah Hughes from the track & field team also stepped in to help establish BSAC.
 
"When Ashley speaks, people listen," Cal director of student-athlete development Bobby Thompson said. "There is just something about the way she communicates with people that makes it so real for you. It's easy to connect with her."
 
Although Anderson is not technically the president of BSAC, she leads all meetings and has been largely responsible for determining topics and securing guest speakers.
 
"Ashley is unapologetically herself," Thompson said. "That style and personality is not everybody's favorite, but I think it's what everybody needs. She's authentic, she's real, she's raw – she's going to give you what's on her mind and I think that allows for the most healthy conversations to take place. Ashley isn't afraid of any topic, and I think that has allowed BSAC to thrive."
 
Thompson says what makes Anderson's leadership style unique is while she is generally unfiltered, she is still 100 percent committed to being open-minded to others' ideas.
 
"She has a balance of being unapologetically herself combined with being so welcoming of anybody," he said. "She's not trying to push her ideals and vision on anybody. She would probably take offense if she heard she was being called the leader of the group. That's how humble she is."
 
Glenn was able to see Anderson in action in Austin and isn't surprised to see what she has worked to do in the aftermath of the trip.
 
"I thought she was a very confident young lady who represented Cal very well," Glenn said. "The way you can determine a natural leader is by seeing not only how something impacts an individual, but how they use that same experience to impact others. She did an exceptional job of taking the information she got at the conference and finding practical ways of really sharing that experience with other student-athletes on campus."
 
Another way in which Anderson demonstrated her leadership ability is through her work with The Bearettes, a majorette team whose mission is to demonstrate diversity on campus through performance and discipline. A former cheerleader and passionate dancer, Anderson joined the Bearettes shortly after they were formed and quickly became the group's chief choreographer and captain.
 
"Majorette culture is a huge staple in the black community," Anderson said. "They are huge at HBCUs (Historically Black Colleges and Universities). Girls are famous because they were on HBCU dance teams."
 
Anderson joined the Bearettes as a sophomore and quickly was teaching her squad routines. By midway through her junior year, she had become captain. The Bearettes have performed at football and men's and women's basketball games, as well as events in the local black community.
 
"I'm the type of person that I feel like if I can bring something to the table, I'm going to let you know that or I'm going to take charge if I feel I can in some way help develop things," Anderson said. "Why not create a space for us to express ourselves through dance? We want to represent the school."
 
Anderson has qualified for the NCAA Championships in the triple jump in each of the past two seasons and took third at this year's MPSF Indoor Championships. She is scheduled to graduate in May with a degree in legal studies and ultimately would like to attend law school. She hopes to still have some kind of influence on BSAC and the issues and topics that it examines.
 
"As a leader, I've seen her grow and it's sad to see that she's a senior because I want to see her continue to develop in this role," Thompson said. "But I don't at all doubt that she will continue to thrive in her own way. It's adding to her well-roundedness. It's definitely contributing to her 360-degree development."