Emmanuel Dawson is the first to graduate from FAMU with a degree in Supply Chain Management
In 2016, as a high school senior, Emmanuel Blake Dawson of Louisville, Kentucky, garnered national headlines when his academic prowess earned him more than $1 million in scholarship offers.
He had full rides to three universities and five-digit financial aid packages from eight other schools. His $1,002,836 in scholarship offerings earned him the title, “The Million-Dollar Scholar.”
As a FAMU student, Dawson was elected to serve on a regional fraternity post and led the first place Moguls in the Making Team. On Friday, he graduates summa cum laude, the first student to complete a Bachelor of Science in Supply Chain Management from the School of Business and Industry (SBI).
Dawson has accepted Deloitte Consulting’s offer to work as a strategy and operation business analyst in San Francisco, California. Before that, he plans to fly to South Africa – his 43rd country – with his mom and dad.
“Coming to FAMU over 600 miles away from home,” said the Louisville native, “was the best decision I could have made in my life.”
But things didn’t always look that way.
“The first month I was on campus, I suffered from an enlarged heart, anemia, and pleurisy. This led to me missing over three weeks of school,” Dawson said.
Thanks to the support of his campus Business Living and Learn Community, he was able to finish with a 3.81 GPA that semester and kickstart his college career.
“I’ll never forget being in the hospital bed back in Louisville. My professor called me from her personal cellphone and asked to speak to my mom. She told my mom, if there was anything she could do to help or support me she would. That love, to extend across states, assured me early on that we are truly the ‘College of Love and Charity,’” Dawson said.
As he progressed through school, Dawson took comfort in the knowledge he was being prepared to reach his full potential.
“Through interactive professional development opportunities like forums and close-ups I was able to find my voice, and refine my presentation to always showcase the best version of myself,” he said. “FAMU provided me a platform to create, plan, and execute my dreams.”
In spring 2019, Dawson led the FAMU team that won the inaugural Thurgood Marshall College Fund & Sean Anderson Foundation Moguls in the Making Competition. As part of the contest, students from 10 historically Black colleges and universities (HBCU) were selected to present in front of the executive board of Ally Financial and rapper Big Sean entrepreneurship ideas to revitalize the city of Detroit.
“Blake is the consummate scholar and gentleman. It is so awesome to see all that he has accomplished during his short three and a half years at FAMU,” said SBI Dean Shawnta Friday-Stroud, Ph.D. “Blake will definitely be missed, but I look forward to all of the great things he will do in the future.”
This summer, Dawson was elected the 64th Southern Region Assistant Vice President of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. In that capacity, he manages the fraternal affairs of 15,000 brothers across seven states and the Bahamas.
“Being able to sit on the Board of Directors of my fraternity has taught me invaluable lessons that I will build on for years to come,” said Dawson, for whom learning inside and outside the classroom is equally important.
“FAMU has a unique way of humbling you and teaching you that there is always more to learn – from people and experiences,” he said. “I have been able to lay my own career path in the same halls as have innumerable other alumni and have forge partnerships with classmates that will last a lifetime.”
