Javier Zamora is pictured in conversation with MSU President Cruzado.

Javier Zamora speaks with President Cruzado during the President's Crossing Boundaries Series.

Strong and visible leadership for diversity, equity, and inclusion often reflects the university’s continual progress towards our goals. Leadership at MSU takes many forms: faculty mentoring students, staff creating programs to meet community needs, and students using their voices for important causes. When designing and planning the new Student Wellness Center, leaders prioritized access and inclusion to positively impact users for decades to come. Powerful speakers— including Stephanie Land, Javier Zamora, and Anthony Ray Hinton of the President’s Crossing Boundaries Series—visited campus to share their stories of perseverance, connection, family, and hope.

Crossing Boundaries

Javier Zamora kicked off Hispanic Heritage Month by sharing his migration story as part of the President’s Crossing Boundaries Series featuring speakers who have crossed seemingly impassible boundaries, teaching lessons of human resilience and persistence through hardship and injustice.

National oSTEM Advising Award

Computer Science professor John Paxton was named Advisor of the Year by oSTEM, a national LGBTQ+ STEM organization, for his mentorship.

La Academia Familia Latina

La Academia Familia Latina, a free 5-session program in Spanish offered by MSU’s Latino Pathways Initiative, gives the local Latino community information about academic and career opportunities. 

Celebrating Black History Month

St. Clair Detrick-Jules gave a public lecture about beauty and self-love in the context of her newest book, My Beautiful Black Hair. Other events honoring Black History Month included African Cultural Night, a seminar on Slavery and the Invention of Race, and a lecture on data and Black life in the 20th century.

 

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departments united under the new Student Wellness Center to provide adaptive participation opportunities, ensure physical accessibility, and foster whole person wellbeing.


95.2%

of Diversity & Inclusion Development workshop participants either agree or strongly agree that they can apply what they learned in these workshops to their roles at MSU.


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First Friday Lunches were hosted by the Queer Faculty and Staff Association to connect members and build community with groups such as oSTEM, the MSU Library, and the City of Bozeman.

 

Maleeya is pictured, sitting on a stool and smiling.

Maleeya Knows His Gun (She/Her)

A proud Crow and Northern Cheyenne tribal member, Maleeya’s passion for helping her community earned her the title of Miss Indian MSU in 2022. She helped plan events for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Peoples Awareness Day and coordinated No More Stolen Sisters basketball games. For this work, she received the 2024 President’s Award for Gender Equity.