This SFL Local Coordinator Has Launched a Student-led Think Tank: Meet Marcus Maldonado
Marcus is a senior at Tulane University who is studying for his bachelor’s degree in political economy.
He is the founder of the Wave Center for Policy and Enterprise, a student-led think tank devoted to unifying public policy, private enterprise, and community leaders around innovative solutions to today’s issues.
He is also a development associate at Louisiana’s free-market think tank, the Pelican Institute for Public Policy, and he will be joining the organization full-time upon graduation.
Marcus is an alumnus of America’s Future Foundation’s Writing Fellowship, and in his spare time he enjoys reading, listening to podcasts, and enjoying all of the great food found in New Orleans.
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The Students For Liberty Local Coordinator Program is the premier program for actively advancing the ideas of free markets and individual liberty on college campuses and local communities.
SFL Local Coordinators, both undergraduate and graduate students, are the face of liberty on their college campuses. They are the muscle of the movement, educating, developing, and empowering students in their communities to become liberty advocates.
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TRANSCRIPT:
It's too dangerous for a normal person to arrange flowers and sell them to another person without the government getting involved. So we are the state in the country that licenses florists.
My name is Marcus Maldonado, I am 21 years old and I live in New Orleans, Louisiana and attend Tulane University. Liberty means the ability for every person in our country and around the world to pursue what’s meaningful to them, allowing them to take control of their lives, pursue occupations, passions, interests, hobbies whatever it is, whatever makes their life better or makes their communities better.
Well my state is actually one of the only states in the country to license florists.
I work with a lot of organizations in my state through my activism with Students For Liberty, Americans for Prosperity, and the Pelican Institute for Public Policy.
We work with them to meet with legislators, talk with them about licensing issues, and why it’s such a big problem. And also just to connect with the community and tell them stories of people who have had painful experiences with the licensing issues.
In particular, there is a lady from Louisiana a few years back who had her license taken away, she was no longer allowed to be a florist and she couldn't find any other means to pay for her home, and the Institute for Justice actually took up her case and tried to sue, but before the suit ended she passed away because she had no means of getting income to pay for electricity, pay for gas.
I joined SFL because it’s the number one organization in the world for empowering students to actually make an impact in their communities.
I don't think that I have ever met a community like SFL, full of students from around the world, who are not only passionate about the ideas of liberty, they are also passionate about getting better themselves and bettering other people around them and making an impact in their communities.
So SFL more than any other organization I’ve really worked with has impacted me. It’s helped me grow as a professional.
My favorite memory would have to be my first LibertyCon. I flew to DC not really knowing much about Students For Liberty, having only been involved for about a semester.
You just see a thousand yelling, screaming and excited students from around the world fighting for liberty, and to hear the stories about what some of our coordinators in other countries go through really not only helped me gain a little bit of grounding in what I fight for, it also helped me realize that we have so many blessings in this country that we should be proud of.
So meeting all the people from around the world has been the most impactful part of it.
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STUDENTS FOR LIBERTY:
Students For Liberty is a rapidly growing network of pro-liberty students from all over the world. Our mission is to educate, develop, and empower the next generation of leaders of liberty. Learn more at https://www.studentsforliberty.org/
