Alex Ackerman

Although Eugene Lang College has a reputation (to those who have heard of it) for being a comparatively small liberal arts school by New York City standards, it probably could not have seemed any less so to Alex Ackerman when she first began her freshman year of college here.

Although Alex, a friendly and refreshingly relaxed sophomore, chose Lang precisely for its small size and liberal values, it was still a far cry from the tiny Quaker school she attended for twelve years throughout elementary school, middle school and high school in her hometown of Virginia Beach.

“My high school had 40 people,” explained Alex, who was dressed simply in a hoodie and jeans, with her blonde shoulder-length hair pulled back neatly in a ponytail. “I wanted somewhere with small classes but still live in a big city.”

But contrary to what she had expected from Lang, Alex, who describes herself as independent and frequently spends time on her own, found it more difficult to make friends and situate herself in the school community than she had in her hometown in Virginia. “My senior class was nine people, so we were all really close.”

Fortunately, or perhaps as a remedy to this problem, it was just around this time that Alex discovered longboarding, a sport she describes as a combination of surfing and skateboarding. “My girlfriend got me into it, and now it was precisely her penchantwe own 11 boards together.”

In her free time on the weekends when she is not studying, playing videogames, or spending time in Long Island with her girlfriend’s family with whom she is close, Alex enjoys longboarding around Central Park, and occasionally out on the roads in Central Islip, Long Island.

Currently she is trying to join a longboarding group called “The Concrete Kings” that meets weekly on Sundays. “Longboarders are really cool,” explained Alex. “They’re very accepting. I guess that’s why I like it.”

For anyone who has spent time with Alex, and is undoubtably familiar with her laid-back demeanor and way of speaking, it would probably come as a shock that she was ever anything but easy-going. But Alex argues otherwise. “I was kind of a deranged child, but I think I’ve mellowed out a little.”

In contrast to her decidedly calm bearing now, it was precisely her penchant for being a wild child as a teenager in Virginia Beach, and emulating the outrageous stunts she saw on Jackass that first attracted to filmmaking — an industry she now hopes to work in after college. “When I was little I used video cameras all the time,” said Alex. “I made videos all mostly of me doing stupid things like flipping off tables.”