AccessU: First Gen on Campus

Jessie Lara Pliego

Jessie Lara Pliego is a first-generation student at the University of Minnesota majoring in marketing, whose new Reggaeton song “AIR KOREA” has recently gained more than 1 million Instagram views. (Follow him at Jessie Co) His quirky fact? He is senior and only 19 years old.

“My junior year of high school, I did this program called PSEO [Postsecondary Enrollment Options],  and I did it full time. So I didn’t really go to my high school. Basically, I went to Normandale my junior year, and I did college classes. Then the following year, I actually got accepted into the University of Minnesota — Twin Cities. So, for my senior year of high school, I actually went to school here on campus, and I was 17. And then after that, I was able to get into Carlson because I had graduated.

I started with marketing. Originally, I just wanted to study something business-related since I was in middle school. I got fascinated with the idea of business because I had an uncle, and he was writing for, like, a business or something. And I’ve always been fascinated by people like Gary Vee and other really prominent marketers.

My dream is to build my own brand, which I am already doing.

I’m an artist, and I’m a musician. So it’s really amazing, like, goodness! It is just perfect timing, because over these past two weeks, we’re almost at a million views just on Instagram alone, and I saw almost 100% growth. So it’s just insane doing content with my music and stuff. It’s really cool to be able to grow that, grow my fanbase.

I also model as well. That’s a whole different conversation. But it’s also groundbreaking being a first-generation college student because nobody in my family has ever gone to college. From my parents and my grandparents, nobody has been a model before and nobody’s been a musician before.

I’m trying to learn Corridos because I’m Mexicano. So, like, I want to learn how to play Corridos. I feel like that would be something really dope and my people have been asking me to do it. So I have to learn now.

I think my biggest highlight of being here at the university was really finding Mi Gente. I’m part of this organization called Mi Gente and, man, that was just like, life changing, because, first of all, I’m the co-marketing director for Mi Gente, which is also cool. Just getting to host all these crazy events consistently and, like, meeting so many Latinos on campus, it’s ridiculous. We used to be only 2% of the population, and now we’re only like 5% of the university. But we’re such a tight community that when we host our event, it feels like we are really uniting everyone. And, I don’t know, I just love that I get to talk to all sorts of Hispanos and Latinos from all over, like, the U.S., Colombians, Puerto Ricans, Dominicanos, other Mexicans … all sorts of people, and I think it’s so dope.”

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Interview by Gabriel Castilho