Diversity and Social Justice

Early in my professional career, I had a moment of self-awareness brought on by a reading assigned to all staff members in university housing one summer at the University of South Carolina.  This chapter caused me to reconsider my awareness, knowledge, and skills as it related to “diversity” and was a critical step down my path to considering higher education’s role in creating a socially just world, broadly, and my role in supporting student success for members of traditionally underrepresented population groups, specifically.  More than that, it opened me up to greater amounts of humility through engagement in introspection and new perspectives.

This experience led me to seek out opportunities to serve on the diversity committees at the University of South Carolina in university housing and at Dixie State College.  It has come up in other opportunities I have had, working on a self-study team with the disability services office at Georgia Gwinnett College and international work in South Africa.  These experiences have become foundational as I develop and refine my research agenda and teaching. As I consider implications of my research and practice around programs that support student success, the question keeps coming up “who does this work for?” and “who has access?”  While my research is not about underrepresented student groups on the surface, it is fundamental to my character as a scholar and a practitioner and I am committed to continuing to improve my awareness, knowledge, and skill in this area.

A more detailed overview of my commitment to diversity and social justice is available to download.