Jalen Wright

by David Kallison

In the Wright household, making a “happy plate” wasn’t just parent’s orders but a competition between brothers. “I grew up in a very competitive household, whether it be sports or education, me and my brother would always fight to see who got the better grades or [a competition] in making sure you finish your plate,” says Jalen Wright, a graduating business management major. “I was always held to a certain standard.”

The middle of the pandemic was a tough time to start college, but Wright took it head-on with his balanced sense of fierce competitiveness and some shyness.

“At that time,” Wright says, “I was a little bit scared. I cried a little bit once they dropped me off, for maybe 30 minutes. Then it was like, okay, they're not coming back; [I need to] make the most of it. I mean, it was hard to find friends, I would say, or just people to interact with.”

With freshman year behind him, Wright made an interesting choice: to stay in the dorms another year. It paid off. He became something like a de facto resident assistant for the freshman coming into the dorm.

“If [the freshman] needed anything,” he says, “they knew that I wasn't out of the loop, so I could help them out when they needed me to.

One course in particular inspired Jalen’s journey.

“I had Dr. [Josh] Daspit [for] intro to entrepreneurship,” Wright says. “The assignments that we did in there, we would like learn a little bit about entrepreneurship and then every other week, he would have a speaker, an entrepreneur come and talk. So I really gravitated to that.”

This gave him the confidence to join the Collegiate Entrepreneurs’ Organization (CEO), a national nonprofit that has over 250 university chapters. CEO’s mission according to its website is to “inform, support and inspire college students to be entrepreneurial and seek opportunity through enterprise creation.”

Wright took his mission to heart getting to know fellow entrepreneurs and immersing himself in his studies. He continued to work with CEO and became president his senior year.

“I feel like with anything in life, if you connect with people on a personal level, that made it much easier to have friends, members, anything,” Wright says. “Throughout my time being the president, I just wanted to make sure that [people] understood where I came from as a person and that they could always reach out.”

Wright’s ambitions are as varied as his interests. He envisions two paths for himself now that he has a bachelor’s degree in his back pocket. One path is doing HR for a large company while the other is to work for a sports organization, like his beloved Houston Texans. While this fork might intimidate some, Wright is unfazed. In a class with Dr. Matari Gunter, he learned that "all leaders don't lead the same” and that each leader has their own path.

On a three-week study abroad program in Portugal, the European Innovation Academy, Wright says he saw more similarities than differences.

“[The guy] I was closest to those three weeks was from Qatar,” Wright says. “And we still stay in touch,” Wright said. Wright is Black, which he often sees as an advantage. He says he is able “to understand and appreciate [people] and be curious for other people's perspectives rather than just mine.” Still, he wishes for more representation at Texas State and beyond.

“I don't see as many people that look like me in business,” Wright says.

Still, it only pushes him harder to be, as Gandhi said, the change he wants to see. Wright’s future is bright and he knows it. “I was feeling myself” after he got unprecedented perfect scores on a class project. But whatever his future may have in store, it won’t be hampered for sartorial reasons.

“You have to be [dressed] business professional. And I have a lot of suits at home.” ✯