‘The Most Good for the Most People’

After returning from a semester in Washington, D.C. last year as part of the Jean Picker Semester-in-Washington program, Student Government Association (SGA) President Sirohi Kumar ’26 had planned to focus solely on academics, taking a break from what she described as “a really long and intense year of being highly involved in extracurriculars.”

That plan didn’t last long, as evidenced by her current office: The small space, tucked into the SGA Resource Room on the ground floor of the Campus Center, is packed with boxes of everything from menstrual products for the newly minted Free Menstrual Products initiative to cans of seltzer, cutlery, plates, and napkins for the recent Seven Sisters Conference held on campus. Everything has a role to play in a recent SGA project or event, and being right in the middle of it all is exactly where Kumar wants to be.

“By the end of my junior year, I found myself more and more excited about ideas that SGA could be doing [in the future], and I was just like, ‘Okay, I have to do this,’” she says, gesturing at her surroundings. 

Kumar’s involvement in campus activism began early at Smith. She had always been interested in leadership and joined SGA as a senator in the second semester of her first year on campus. By the end of that semester, she had met fellow senator and self-described “partner in crime,” Samantha Sondik ’26 (now her SGA Vice President), and the two began attending listening sessions on an SGA-led initiative focused on implementing increased curricula around race at Smith.

“She and I started talking about how this is what we really want to get involved in, in [continuing the conversation around] some sort of curriculum on race,” Kumar recalls. That desire prompted Kumar to run for SGA’s Curriculum Committee Chair, and over the next year, she and Sondik dedicated their time and effort toward the implementation of curricula on race as a new graduation requirement.

“We acknowledge that [change] is unlikely to happen in these next four years,” Kumar says, “but we’re excited that hopefully progress can be picked up from the groundwork where we left off.”

Embracing that particular mindset—celebrating wins, progress, and achievements, no matter how they end up materializing—is something Kumar credits to her time at Smith. “That’s another thing that I’ve had to learn, that when you do impressive things, it’s important to not just say yes and move on,” she says. “You’ve got to recognize that you’ve put a lot of hard work into something, speak about it honestly, and be proud of it.”

Kumar’s got a lot to recognize and be proud of: not only has she led the SGA in successfully completing several projects (increasing student participation on the community standards and academic integrity boards; hosting guest speakers from departments and offices across campus; building the relationship between Smithies and members of the local Northampton community through panels with local government officials; and implementing the aforementioned Free Menstrual Products initiative), but she also utilized connections she made working for U.S. Senator Angus King in her home state of Maine during her semester in Washington, D.C.

“It was an incredible, incredible experience,” she says. “I loved the job, I loved the work, I loved the people. And that’s what I’m hoping to do. After I graduate, I want to go back to Maine and work the midterms, then go back to D.C. and work on the Hill.”

Kumar has spent much of her time at Smith making the campus experience better for her peers. “I was given a really unique opportunity to come to Smith, acquire incredible skills, and meet incredible people, and I think I’m doing everyone, including myself, a disservice if I don’t leverage that into making the most good for the most people,” she says, but one of her most memorable instances of doing just that came when, at first glance, it seemed as though she wasn’t the one who could actually help.

When one of the students Kumar had mentored through the Girls Who Code club she ran mentioned her intent to apply to Smith, she asked Kumar to write her a recommendation letter to include in her application.

“And I was like, ‘I really shouldn’t be the one writing you a recommendation letter,” Kumar says with a laugh. “But she told me, ‘I want you to write it because Smith is such a community-based place.’”

Kumar did end up writing the letter, but when the student, who intended to be a geophysics major, came to campus to visit, Kumar wasn’t sure how else she could help. “I know nothing about geophysics,” she says. “I texted all of my friends asking if anyone knew any geophysics majors who could show her around.”

It was a signature Smithie approach, Kumar says. “She was here for three hours, with so many of my friends coming to show her around, talk about their experiences, and help her. And I just felt like that was so quintessentially Smith, to send out a text the morning of saying, ‘My friend is coming to campus, here are all her interests. Can anyone come talk to her about these things?’ and to have people show up in droves because they care enough about Smith to make time for someone else they’ve never met in the middle of their busy weeks.”

So, did the student get in?

“Oh, she got in,” Kumar confirms with a smile. “She’s coming [in the fall], and I’m so happy she’s going to be here too.”