UB undergraduate on fast track to law school

Understanding why Emery Taylor merits attention in the current roll call of UB students to watch works best when returning to the days she ran an underdog contest for high school class president. It’s only two years ago, recent history, which underscores another true talking point of her emergence on the UB scene.

The 18-year-old has been on the fast track ever since, soon to become the youngest student ever to attend UB’s School of Law. So a short step back is helpful.

If the truth be known, Taylor’s story began to take shape when the heated, presidential election unfolded with drama and conflict in the halls of her high school, located in the Finger Lakes region of New York State.

Taylor says she was shy but emerged from the COVID-19 pandemic determined to make up for what she missed. She became a high school athlete in sports she never would have tried before. Then she joined several clubs she never would have considered.

She developed an affinity for a fast pace, combining her difficult 10th and 11th grade years into a head start for what was to come. She stored up college-credit courses to move ahead in school. So Taylor was 16 when she ran for president of her senior class, challenging a very popular and vocal opponent who had been president of the class for several straight years.

Nevertheless, she decided to take a risk and run for president in an unfamiliar class, knowing the contest could get nasty. The incumbent was too popular, vocal and established, most people thought, to lose to a girl a year younger and who teachers called “Smiley.”

“I would get nervous and just smile,” she says now.

She campaigned with a slogan “The Girl with the Smile will take you the extra mile” and “The cool kids voted for me.”

That was less than two years ago. She won, she says with great pride. She went from 10th grade to president of the senior class. Her opposition called her names, spread false rumors, ridiculed her gender, tore down her signs. She still has screenshots showing the insults, student names of the two camps and an announcement of her win.

Taylor brought that grit and determination to UB, where she is a legal studies major in the College of Arts and Sciences' Social Sciences Interdisciplinary Program. The program offers seven majors — such as cognitive science and international studies — that provide undergraduates with hands-on learning experiences that cross traditional disciplinary boundaries to deliver unique skill sets they need to succeed in their careers.

For Taylor, it led her to UB’s 3+3 Accelerated BA/JD combined degree program, offered by the School of Law and College of Arts and Sciences. She will enter the 3+3 program — in which students complete their Bachelor of Arts and Juris Doctor in six years of full-time study, saving students one year’s worth of time and tuition — this fall while finishing her undergraduate requirements.

“Emery’s admission into the 3+3 program at such a young age is an extraordinary achievement,” notes Benjamin Rogers, associate director of admissions and director of the 3+3 programs in the law school. “It is incredibly rare for someone to reach this stage of their legal education so early. She is the youngest person ever admitted to UB Law in our documented history, which speaks to her dedication and drive. I have no doubt she will make the most of this opportunity.”

In addition to legal studies majors, the 3+3 program enrolls undergraduates from a variety of academic backgrounds that span sociology and political science to history and criminology, among other majors.

You could call Taylor UB’s student wunderkind, a horns-up prodigy. She does it with the flair of a productive True Blue Ambassador, a UB influencer who displays indelible style points championing UB in up-close-and-personal mini videos and uses Baird Point shots to seed her UB social media accounts.

She is also a Daniel Acker Scholar, part of learning community of academically talented and diverse students who have a strong commitment to social justice, leadership and community service.

Taylor does all of this while maintaining an impeccable 4.0 UB transcript. She seems to never stop moving forward.

“I don’t feel like I’m rushing,” says Taylor. “Honestly, I started this accelerated path when I was 14 years old and learned to love the fast pace. I don’t like to waste time, and I love the feeling of getting things done. I also worry about debt. Growing up, I watched my parents struggle with debt from student loans, and I hope to avoid some of that.”

There is one more element to this story.

Taylor was diagnosed with postural orthostatic hypotension in 2022, but she has had symptoms since she was 13. “Basically, this means that my blood pressure drops when I stand, causing dizziness and pre-syncope symptoms,” she says.

Sometimes she passes out, like she did last fall in a Clemens Hall stairway. Recently a neurologist she saw for migraines said the problem is more likely postural orthostatic tachycardia (POTS), “which means my heart races when I stand.”

Both conditions show similar symptoms and treatments (salt pills, electrolytes, getting up slowly).

Last semester featured more trials and challenges. But Taylor insists she’s not a “poor me” story. Her health cannot overshadow all her hard work.

“I recognize that I’m younger than most people who apply to law school, so I put a lot of pressure on myself to maintain a 4.0,” she says. “I also took on an extra class this semester. On top of this, I worked a part-time job for extra money.”

If this sounds grim and arduous, you haven’t met Taylor. Like most outstanding UB students, she is a work in progress. Her personal statement for law school was about how the color pink has come to symbolize her strength and prowess as a woman. She journals, evident in her first journalism class, where she wrote a paean to her parents’ enduring romance.

At the center of this synergy of good fortune and dark-lottery difficulties is that enduring smile and ability to change the electricity of the room. She doesn’t think of herself as especially smart. But she finds a way to get things done.

An aspiring public servant, Taylor hasn’t worked out what happens after law school. “Driven and motivated” is how she describes herself. But with a real wild card of giving into her taste for risks, “to make progress.”

She recognizes how her future is a path to opportunities and experiences.

“I am really open to anything. When I say anything, I mean anything,” she says. “There are so many different spectrums of things I mean when I say that. I consider myself a spiritual person. And fashion. Music. Values. People in general. I guess I’m very open about everything.”