Trisha Goldsborough, a sophomore transfer communication and social influence major, has forged her own path to activism and advocacy through two colleges and multiple majors. In preparation for the 2020 election, she has spent the last two months interning for Pennsylvania Public Interest Research Group (PennPIRG), a non-partisan public interest advocacy group, doing voter outreach and managing their social media. At Klein College of Media and Communication and at PennPIRG, Goldsborough feels that she is doing what she can to make her mark and change history.

After spending a year at Stonehill College in Massachusetts, Goldsborough transferred to Klein because she realized she wanted to be close to home and missed her dog, but was drawn to Klein’s wide array of programs and location in Philadelphia. She came in as a film major, but quickly changed her major to communication and social influence. 

“Then after seeing all the majors and options, and I love the city, so I was like, maybe I missed the opportunity to go to the perfect school because I didn’t want to be near home,” she says.

As she arrived on campus as a film major, Goldsborough also immediately became involved with activism on campus. She was invigorated to redouble her activism efforts after the divided 2016 presidential election, and so she looked to join organizations where she could have a direct effect. She started by joining the student organization Ignite at Temple. It was through Ignite that she received an email notifying her about the PennPIRG internship, and noting the direct involvement it would have with voters and the election, she applied and was hired.

“The election, I feel like, is so important this year,” she said. “I mean, this is history, and I wanted to be a part of history, I wanted to be able to tell a third-grader down the line how it was in the 2020 election and that I was helping people vote—not just sitting around.”

Her work at the internship mainly consists of phone banking and text banking, totaling about eight hours of direct voter outreach every week. She also manages their social media, posting to PennPIRG’s Twitter and Instagram feeds daily and reaching out to third-party organizations.

Right now, she says the main goal of voter outreach is to get people to register and make a plan to vote either by mail or in person.

In this particular election, she says it’s an important distinction that she works for a non-partisan organization.

“Communicating non-partisan is very hard. So having to learn how to communicate to all types of people from all types of sides really helps.”

Of course, this sort of communication with people of diverse backgrounds who hold diverse views can be carried over into almost any interpersonal situation, and these skills will likely serve Goldsborough for the rest of her career, if not her life.

"Trisha brings a wealth of experience and knowledge to class. Her work for PennPirg gives her a unique insight into the day to day effort that goes into social change and advocacy,” says CSI Department Assistant Chair Thomas Wright. “Perhaps the best part is that in class Trisha shares that with other students. I think it’s really empowering to see someone their own age actively involved."