CLARKSTON, Ga. — Isaac King seems to be everywhere these days.
The 21-year-old Georgia State University Perimeter College student is vice president of the Clarkston Computer Science and Engineering Club, where he helps organize alumni panels to provide input for current students interested in majoring in engineering and computer science.
He found a new passion as president of the Mentoring Initiative for New Americans, a program offering mentoring support to refugee and immigrant students seeking college admission.
A few weeks ago, he helped build a cardboard boat with duct tape for the annual college-wide Cardboard Boat Regatta — and, when his entry sank, he cheered on fellow competitors.
He was recently recognized for his work with the Perimeter College Service Excellence Award. The award honors a student who has initiated and or actively engaged in a community service project.
Not bad for a student who wasn’t sure what he wanted to do when he graduated from MLK Jr. High School in 2014.
“I originally wanted to go straight into Georgia Tech, but I didn’t do so well in high school,” King said.
He came to Perimeter College to get a few math classes under his belt, then transfer. Instead, he found he loved the college and stayed.
“When I was going through high school, I didn’t have the support system that I’ve found here,” King said.
At Perimeter, King learned how to manage his time with his studies, enabling him to be active in student activities.
Finding that support system helped him support others. He heard about the Mentoring Initiative for New Americans and helped craft the organization’s slogan “where hands join together to build a better future,” with co-founder Dr. Heval Keli and Perimeter student Alex Santos. He considers the slogan a personal directive for his own goals.
“I thought, ‘why can’t I see what I can do to help?’ ” he said.
He started tutoring refugees, then was elected the organization’s student president and brought other student mentors and tutors in to help. In the past year, he has become an advocate for the program in the community, manning an information table for students at nearby Clarkston High School and discussing the program with officials at Clarkston City Hall.
Always interested in computers, King refined his career plans, thanks to his experiences at Perimeter, where he learned about the dearth of computer technology in developing nations from a friend who experienced it.
“I want to study computer architecture and computer programming and learn how computing hardware is designed,” he said. “I want to create smaller, less pricey systems that can get shipped to Third World countries for people who don’t have access to those resources.”
This summer, King is taking physics at the college. He plans to graduate in May 2019.