Refugee finds his calling in uniform and a University that believed in him

To say the Army changed Emanuel Walker’s life doesn’t begin to cover it.

Four years ago, the Metropolitan State University of Denver student’s family was going through turmoil and financial struggles, and he was looking for a way to help out. He was excelling in his studies but was searching for purpose and direction and had begun to doubt that college was right for him.

Then, he met a U.S. Army recruiter.

His brother had found purpose as an Air Force medic, and Walker thought putting on a uniform might do the same for him. The result, he said, was that “I took a step back from school” and enlisted.

Months later, he was taking steps on South Korean soil.

Now, as Walker prepares to graduate from MSU Denver with a degree in Computer Information Systems, he’s clear about his future and the contribution he wants to make.

“I’m working toward a greater purpose, toward a better society and national security,” he said. Upon graduation, he’ll be commissioned as an officer in the Army’s highly selective cyberwarfare branch and he’ll go to air-assault training. He’ll even get to rappel out of a helicopter.

In between, Walker tested his way into Army intelligence, became the first private in his unit to be accepted into an elite officer-training program, was featured in an Army commercial, completed air-assault school, and, using what he’d learned in MSU Denver CIS classes, literally saved the day for his entire unit when he discovered a system flaw that would have derailed a planned exercise. Along the way, he got in shape, dropped a few pounds and added a sub-six-minute mile to his ever-growing list of achievements.

The latter resulted from the determination that has propelled Walker most of his life. Initially, Army basic training knocked him out. “All that running! I threw up; it was so hard,” he said. “I told myself: never again.”

It’s a life, and a future, he could not have imagined as a little boy in Liberia. When civil war escalated in that west African country, 4-year-old Walker and his mother fled to nearby Côte d’Ivoire, while his father escaped to Ghana. Walker and his mother came to the United States legally as refugees; his father remains in a Ghanian refugee camp.

Walker acknowledges that what has happened in his life in the past few years is “completely unheard of.”

“I am really blessed.”

The Army seemed to find Walker’s presence a blessing. Some 16 months into his training, an officer told him, “You seem to be highly driven, and I think you should go for officer status.” Walker took that advice and applied to the Army’s Green to Gold program, which allows enlisted soldiers to earn a bachelor’s or master’s degree and attain officer’s rank.

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With letters of recommendation from members of Colorado’s congressional delegation and a few from MSU Denver instructors, Walker became the first person from his unit accepted into the program.

With acceptance to the program came the opportunity to finish his degree anywhere in Colorado, with room and board paid for. “I thought, ‘Wow, somebody really wants me to go to school,’” he said.

Once again, with multiple universities to choose from, he picked MSU Denver.

He offered a clue as to why he came back in a 2021 RED story: On the Auraria Campus, he said then, “I knew I was in the right place. I thought, ‘Wow, this is a family that cares about me and is invested in my success. This is amazing.’”

Now, as graduation approaches, he still feels that way. He’s grateful, he said, for instructors’ mentorship and his advisor, Wendy Walker, who “worked around a 15-hour time difference” to help him gather records for his Green to Gold application. “MSU Denver has consistently gone above and beyond to support me — not just academically, but personally. I’m eternally grateful,” he said.

As he collects his diploma and walks off the graduation stage, Walker will officially become a U.S. Army officer. Soon after that, he will head to Fort Eisenhower in Georgia, home of the military’s Cyber Center of Excellence, for additional training that will build on the knowledge he’s gained at MSU Denver. From there, he hopes the Army and his expertise will be his ticket to adventures overseas.

Not that Walker needed the Army to make him an impressive guy.

During his first stint at MSU Denver, he stood out enough to be honored by then-Mayor Michael Hancock with a 2021 My Brother’s Keeper Emerging Leader award for his work developing systems to increase retention and graduation rates among Black students. He also found time to serve as an advisor on the state Department of Higher Education’s Colorado Equity Champions Coalition.

Through it all, Walker has remained remarkably humble. “I work hard, and I show up,” he said.

Still, he’s not too modest to indulge in a little sibling rivalry. When he graduates and becomes an officer, Walker will outrank his brother, the medic. That brother may have inspired him, but that doesn’t mean he’ll get a pass around Walker.

“Next time he sees me, he’ll have to salute,” he joked.

Learn about Veteran and Military Student Services at MSU Denver.