It’s safe to say that since her time at the CU Denver Business School, Ariana Nikmanesh has been busy. Since the beginning of her college career two years ago, Nikmanesh has been active both on and off campus, having served as a research assistant at the business school, a marketing assistant, a College Council business representative for Student Government, and a marketing intern for a major Denver-based firm—all while holding down a job and tackling a full academic course load.

Now a junior majoring in marketing and minoring in political science, Nikmanesh has undertaken yet another role, serving as a representative on behalf of the university for the National Millennial Community (NMC), a group dedicated to breaking down misconceptions about Millennials by engaging businesses, governmental entities, media outlets and the like in conversations about the largest generation in history. As part of the NMC, Nikmanesh has traveled across the country, collaborating with executives from Verizon, Google, Wells Fargo, Nielsen, AT&T, PBS, NBC Universal, and others to develop marketing strategies that effectively reach out to Millennials.

Two of the most pervasive perceptions of Millennials that Nikmanesh has fought to eliminate during her time with the NMC are laziness and entitlement, which she says couldn’t be further from the truth, “As a Millennial who worked three jobs, took six classes and pulled a 4.0 GPA last semester, I find that I work extremely hard for everything I desire. And my story is not an abnormal one either–my peers, who are also Millennials, often work more than one job in order to support themselves through college, attend school full-time, strive for academic excellence, and engage in a variety of activities to better themselves and their communities.”

Nikmanesh’s passion for combating stereotypes and advocating for others goes hand in hand with her primary academic interest, multicultural marketing, “Multicultural marketing is the area of my major that I enjoy studying the most. I find beauty in the diverse perspectives that compose the world around us, and feel that by marketing to diverse groups of people rather than solely to the majority, we can better connect with and understand the world as a whole.”