Zoe Messier was born on January 25th, 2000 in Boston, Massachusetts. She grew up in the South End, and recently graduated from Boston Latin School as part of the Class of 2018. This summer, Zoe has been working in the Executive Office of Administration and Finance under Undersecretary Rachel Madden. In the fall, she plans to attend Suffolk University, where she’ll be majoring in political science.
Zoe’s interest in government can be traced all the way back to her toddlerhood, when her dad began their tradition of bringing her with him when he went to vote in every local, state, and federal election. For each position, he would point to the candidate they were going to vote for, give a brief synopsis of why they liked him or her, and let Zoe fill in the oval. Sometimes, when they didn’t like any of the options, Zoe would get to launch her own last minute write in campaign for various jobs around the city. And although she never won, how many people can say that they ran for city council at the ripe old age of four?
As she got older, Zoe began to follow national and international news, reading Time, Newsweek, and the Boston Globe and actually paying attention when her parents tuned into NPR during long trips in the car. She got the chance to meet then Mayor Menino at the opening of a neighborhood park, and interviewed State Senator Sonia Chang Diaz for her elementary school newspaper, the Hurley Hawk Chronicle. In 2008, she followed the presidential campaign of then Senator Barack Obama with great interest, and later found inspiration in both his inaugural address and the humor, decency, and dignity he embodied while in office.
In high school, Zoe pursued many additional opportunities to explore her passion for government. She crammed her schedule with history courses, as well as classes like AP Gov and Economics, both of which she loved, and watched shows like Scandal, Parks and Rec, and The West Wing in her free time. She did canvassing work for a mayoral campaign, knocking on doors, handing out flyers, and talking to registered voters in her neighborhood. Finally, in the fall of her senior year, Zoe joined the BLS debate team, where she had the opportunity to research and write cases on a wide variety of policies and modern political conflicts alongside peers who shared her interests.
As a public servant, Zoe hopes to use her own lived experiences to advocate on behalf of youth and young adults experiencing challenges similar to those she’s faced, as well as for members of marginalized communities who may feel uncared for or unsupported by the people elected to represent them. In the immediate future, she plans to get involved with voter registration and turnout efforts on college campuses and to volunteer for campaigns at various levels of government.