Leading with Heart:
A Senior Year Reflection

A young woman with curly brown hair, glasses, and a black shirt sitting in a purple chair, smiling at the camera, holding a smartphone and a small black object in her hands. Behind her, a group of people is sitting at tables, engaged in conversation and working on laptops in a lively indoor setting.
Four young women standing outdoors in winter, wearing matching gray hoodies and black beanies, smiling at the camera with snow and trees in the background.
Two young women standing indoors, smiling at the camera, with photos on the wall behind them and chairs on the side.

Sometimes, I forget how much has changed.

I walk into the Hunter Hillel lounge, and it feels so natural—greeting students, checking in with my team, setting up for another Not Shabbat Shabbat. It’s routine now. But if you had told freshman-year me that I’d be running student leadership meetings and organizing Jewish life on campus, I don’t think I would have believed you.

Hunter is a commuter school, and that comes with its own challenges. You go to class, maybe grab a coffee, and then you’re back on the subway heading home. It’s easy to feel disconnected. But then there was Hillel. And suddenly, I found myself staying just a little bit longer. Then a lot longer. Then I wasn’t just showing up—I was creating the kind of space I wanted other students to walk into.

Group of nine diverse young adults sitting and smiling in a cozy room with large windows, cityscape in the background, decorated with hanging stars and paper chain banners.

That’s what leadership has meant to me. It’s not about titles or running meetings—it’s about making sure that no student walks in feeling like an outsider. That they see someone—maybe me—who says, You belong here. Stay a while.

There are moments that stick with me. Seeing students linger after an event, deep in conversation. Watching a first-year student who came in alone laughing with new friends. Hearing someone say, I didn’t know I needed this community until I found it.

This is my last year at Hunter, and I feel it—this bittersweet awareness that soon, I won’t be the one holding open the door for the next generation of students. But the good thing about building something real is that it lasts. The friendships, the traditions, the feeling of home—it doesn’t leave with me. It stays.

And that’s what matters.

– Stephanie Pincus, Student President, Class of 2025