Spring Commencement 2023: Xavier Prescott, College of Education and Human Development
When Xavier Prescott was a sophomore, two particular events had pivotal effects on his undergraduate career.
First off, he decided he would study sport management with a concentration in marketing.
“Once I changed my major, everything just opened up,” said Prescott, from Washington D.C., and now a graduating senior. “I found what I wanted to do.”
The second, however, was an unhappy awakening: He lost his grandmother in 2019. But his reflections on her passing put his own circumstances into stark perspective, he said, and he realized there was a reason he was where he was, attending school several hours away from home and family.
“It was just like, ‘OK … I have to make the best of this time I have left at Radford University,’” he recalled. “One day, I just woke up. It was a new semester. And I tell you, I just went at it.”
His renewed commitment drew notice.
“At some point, something just clicked. He was engaged, motivated and overall a leader in the classroom,” said Tiesha Martin, assistant professor of health and human performance.
She soon offered Prescott one of just four spots available for Radford’s Sport Management Research Team, through which he participated in and presented original work at the College Sport Research Institute’s (CSRI) conference. He’s represented Radford at that Columbia, South Carolina, event for the past two years.
“That experience has helped give him more direction in terms of potential career paths and has allowed him a chance to network with professionals and learn about the industry,” Martin explained.
He’s been busy on campus as well, as an officer with Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity and as a marketing assistant in esports and athletics, most recently with men’s basketball and women’s lacrosse.
Next, Prescott plans to get his master’s in sport business, then hopefully try his hand at marketing for a college or professional team.
His dream, he said, is to merge his love for game-day excitement with his talents for athletic administration and promotion.
Another ambitious task on his to-do list?
“I’m an Eagles fan, so I would love to work for the Philadelphia Eagles,” Prescott confessed.