Alexander Blocker

Hometown: Silver Spring, Md.
High School: James Hubert Blake High School
Intended major: Political science, Economics
Possible career: Diplomacy, human rights law

Strongly committed to the pursuit of peace and human rights, Alex intends to advance these causes through a career in politics, law or international relations. Towards that end, Alex spent last summer interning with the human rights organization Suara Rakyat Malaysia (SUARAM) in Kuala Lumpur. At SUARAM, he worked with the Documentation & Monitoring coordinator on two major projects: writing and editing the organization's 2009 Malaysian Human Rights Report and preparing for an investigative visit by the UN's Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. He has also attended the two principal academic conferences in the University of London's human rights series, "Fraticide and Fraternite: Understanding and Repairing Neighbourly Atrocity." On campus, Alex's activities have included War News Radio, an internationally broadcast news program covering Iraq and Afghanistan; Students for Peace and Justice in Palestine, a club promoting awareness of the humanitarian situation in that region; and Extraordinary Possibilities, an afterschool program teaching civic participation skills to Chester high school students.

Before coming to Swarthmore, Alex's interest in social justice led him to volunteer for five years at Justice for Our Neighbors, an immigration law clinic where he also served as a member of the Executive Board. His experience there inspired him to participate in rallies and advocacy campaigns to seek comprehensive reform of U.S. immigration policy. He also served on the Board of Directors of Maryland's only student-run political action committee, worked as a page for the Maryland legislature, and volunteered with numerous political campaigns at the local, state and federal levels. In addition to leadership positions in other school organizations, including three years as student body president, Alex was Associate Editor-in-Chief of The Blake Beat, which in 2009 was ranked the nation's #1 high school newspaper by the Association of Educational Publishers. In 2008, Alex was one of two final candidates for the Montgomery County Board of Education, a race with an electorate of 75,000 student voters.