Think about your college career so far. Have you interned with the state Senate, created a political-education organization and successfully combated a tax-cut bill?

Junior Camille Hosman has.

During her freshman year, Hosman helped found Tigers Against Partisan Politics, recently renamed Tigers Advancing Political Participation, with now-junior Trey Sprick.

“What Trey saw is that there wasn’t an opportunity for students to learn and to engage with each other about political issues in a setting that was safe for people of a variety of perspectives and was truly a learning environment,” Hosman said. “What we realized at that time was that there wasn’t a space for this to happen.”

After helping found TAPP, Hosman, a political science major, said she realized what talking about politics could do for students.

“I realized there was a direct correlation between funding levels from the state and tuition levels that individuals pay,” Hosman said. “It was totally mind-blowing. I was like, ‘Oh my God, this is so cool. Everyone can get involved in this.’ ”

This past fall, a tax-cut bill came to the Missouri General Assembly that could have raised MU tuition anywhere from 8 to 16 percent. Hosman said she recognized this was an issue that would hurt MU students.

“That was really hard, and it took a long time, but we brought students together,” Hosman said. “We sent about 500 letters down to the state Capitol, and we brought legislators here to campus. That was really exciting for students, to be able to ask them questions like, ‘What does this mean for me?’ ”

Hosman said MU is her home and she wants to keep it affordable and have opportunities available for everyone.

“There are universities around the country that are losing state support constantly, and students are having to make up for that, and they’re having to pay higher rates of tuition and less faculty, and I don’t want that to happen here,” Hosman said.

Once she realized she could personally help MU students, Hosman said she wanted to keep moving.

“What keeps me going is realizing that as an individual I could help other students, other teenagers from Missouri, just like I was, get a university level education at an awesome university,” Hosman said. “It was really exciting once I was like, ‘This is actually possible. I can do this.’ And I did it.”

Hosman interned with the state Senate and plans to intern in Washington, D.C., with the U.S. Senate in the summer. She has also worked for the Missouri Office of Child Advocate. This is where she discovered what she was really interested in — child welfare issues.

“I love what I do with MSA,” Hosman said. “I love the legislative strategy piece but the issue where my heart lies is that of foster and adoptive care and child abuse and neglect. Combining those skills is what I hope to do. I hope to advocate on behalf of the children.”