Young Trustee finalists announced

The finalists for Young Trustee are seniors Uzoma Ayogu, Anya Ranganathan, Tanner Lockhead and Steven Soto, wrote sophomore Will Hardee, vice president of services for Duke Student Government and chair of the Young Trustee nominating committee, in an email Sunday.

Ayogu is majoring in mechanical engineering and co-founded The Releaf Group, which connects students and professionals in the United States and United Kingdom with agri-business ventures in Nigeria. He is also the Class of 2017 president for Engineering Student Government and previously served as president of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity.

Ranganathan is the president of the Duke Panhellenic Association and member of Chi Omega sorority. She worked as a business development intern for the City of Durham and an undergraduate writing tutor. She is also an incoming analyst for the Macquarie Group and the co-founder of Ungraded Produce, a company that works to reduce food waste.

Lockhead serves as Duke Student Government’s vice president for Durham and regional affairs and is also a Benjamin N. Duke Scholar. He is majoring in public policy and political science, with a minor in economics. As a DSG vice president, he has a seat on the Board of Trustees on the Institutional Advancement committee, which handles strategic planning.

Soto is president of Blue Devils United, the University’s LGBTQ+ student group. He is a public policy major, a former senator in DSG, a participant of the Hart Leadership Program, a member of Dukes and Duchesses and a Hispanic Scholarship Fund Scholar. He also helped develop programming for the new Washington Duke Scholars program for first-generation students.

Students will be able to vote on the Young Trustee from February 14 to 15. The winner will serve a three-year term on the board, and during two of the years, the Young Trustee will be a voting member. Then-senior Jamal Edwards, a Robertson scholar and former president of the Black Student Alliance, was elected to the position last year.