Award-winning author Alejandra Campoverdi turned the 2025-26 Common Reading Lecture into a conversation, taking questions from Elon students about her life of “extreme contradictions" detailed in her memoir "First-Gen."
Sitting on stage alongside Elon students, faculty and staff, Alejandra Campoverdi promised the crowd in Alumni Gym that she was going to “keep it real with you,” coincidentally the first line in her award-winning memoir “First Gen,” which was selected as Elon University’s 2025-26 Common Reading, the beginning of the Elon Core Curriculum, a set of courses and experiences shared by every undergraduate student at Elon.
All new students are provided a free digital copy of the book before coming to Elon and are invited to attend the author’s keynote address, but for Campoverdi’s event, part of the Elon University Speaker Series, she wanted to do something different.
“I purposely am not behind a podium,” said Campoverdi. “I’m not an expert on being first gen, you all are experts as much as I am an expert on being a first and only. You’re an expert on whatever thresholds you’re crossing. So, I’m not here to lecture anyone on this experience, I’m here to have a conversation with you all.”
And a conversation was had for more than an hour as several students asked questions of Campoverdi about her experiences as a first-generation college student, her work as an aide in the Obama administration and the process of writing her book.
Between the bullet points
The memoir details Campoverdi’s life as a “child of welfare,” born to an immigrant single mother in Los Angeles, who went on to be White House aide, Harvard graduate and a candidate for U.S. Congress. In 2024, Campoverdi also founded the First Gen Fund, a non-profit that provides unrestricted hardship grants to first-generation students.
“When I would be invited to schools and someone would read my bio, and it would be all the bullet points and it sounded so shiny and glossy and linear, and it made so much sense what I did, and then I did that, I knew that wasn’t the full story,” she said. “I knew that the spaces between those bullet points were actually the real story, and that looked very different.”
Omar Illesca Reyes ’27, a Labcorp-Alamance Scholar in the Odyssey Program and Elon Academy mentor, sat on stage with Campoverdi, alongside Selma Maric ‘27, who introduced Campoverdi; Kenneth Brown, assistant director of First-Generation Student Support Services; and Paula Patch, senior lecturer in English and associate director for First-Year Initiatives in the Elon Core Curriculum. Illesca Reyes asked Campoverdi about feelings of “imposter syndrome” as a first-generation student and in her later roles.
“All of us at some point are going to find ourselves in a space where people might not relate to where we come from and what we’ve experienced,” said Campoverdi. “And you noticing that and not feeling good about that, doesn’t all go into a bucket of feeling like an imposter. She added, “Let yourself clock it and not make that mean something bad about you, because it doesn’t.”
Illesca Reyes reflected that getting to speak with Campoverdi was personal and emotional.
“The struggles are real for a first-generation student, and it’s nice that a light is being shone on them,” said Illesca Reyes, who is studying engineering. “I felt like I was being heard throughout the book, and I felt myself in her shoes multiple times.”
‘Be it all unapologetically’
In her memoir, Campoverdi reflects on the “contradictory extremes” of her life, from being a gang member’s girlfriend to working in the White House, arguing that all of those extremes can exist together.
“Some of us are complicated,” Campoverdi said in response to a student question about finding belonging in multiple spaces. “Own all of these things together at the same time. I sit on stages all the time, and people ask me, ‘What would you say to 16-year-old Alejandra who was dating that guy? What would you tell her now from where you are?’ And I said ‘She’s right here. I’m the same me.’ So stop trying to find the answer. There’s no answer. Just be it all unapologetically.”
Her memoir also works to “shatter the one-dimensional glossy narrative” about what it takes to achieve the American Dream. She notes it was harder to get from her childhood to college than from college to the White House.
“I’ve experienced the American dream,” she said, as a student asked her response to the concept. “I believe education is the driver of the American dream for many of us. It isn’t the only way, but it is for most of us.”
Campoverdi spent the day at Elon, including hosting a storytelling workshop for students and faculty, in collaboration with the Center for Access and Success. Her openness for conversation resonated with students like Daniella Alonzo Lopez ’28, a scholar in the Odyssey Program, who received the Leon and Lorraine Watson scholarship.
“Sometimes along the journey, you think you’re navigating all of this by yourself, but there’s truly a community of people,” said Alonzo Lopez ’28, a marketing and business analytics double major. “I’m always looking for mentors and people to encourage me and inspire me to continue. So I’m glad to be here and hear her. Getting to meet her was almost like an older sister.”
Redefine success
As Campoverdi heard from students focusing on her success as a first-generation student, she encouraged them to also think about how success can be more than just what’s on paper.
“You can be the first generation to go to college or the first generation to have a professional job or break a cycle, the first generation to move across the country or the first generation to X,Y, Z,” said Campoverdi. “But being the first generation to break the cycle of living in survival mode is just as important. Being the first generation to not live in fight or flight is just as important. Being the first generation to allow yourself balance and rest, that’s important, too.”
“I’ve experienced the American dream. I believe education is the driver of the American dream for many of us. It isn’t the only way, but it is for most of us.”
Alejandra Campoverdi, award-winning author of “First Gen”
She ended the event by reminding students about how far they’ve come in their lives and encouraged them to continue being vulnerable as it can serve as a “connective tissue.”
“When I look out in this room, I see a lot of people who have a lot in common, and I think that’s more important than ever. So keep telling your stories, keep turning towards that vulnerability. It doesn’t make you weak, it makes you strong and it will ultimately make you a better professional,” Campoverdi said.
