Sept. 12, 2022
At the beginning of this National Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) Week, I want to take a moment to reflect on our campus’ history as an HSI, with a focus on what it means to truly serve – rather than merely enroll – CSUCI’s Hispanic and Latinx students.
Becoming an HSI in 2010 was a defining moment for our campus. Our HSI status allowed us to more aggressively advance our mission explicitly with populations historically underrepresented and underserved in higher education, to reaffirm our commitment and improve in our ability to effectively serve all students and families of this diverse region, and to actively pursue a shared agenda for student success and equity with other regional HSIs.
This recognition has ensured our ability to not only receive federal funding through diligent, data-grounded grant-writing efforts from 2010 through 2022 (i.e., $36.6 million to date), but to also continue innovating for student success, developing our institutional capacity to be Latinx student-ready, and increasing our cultural responsiveness to the needs of a more diverse and regional student population.
Notably, nearly $37 million in federal HSI dollars created opportunities to provide newly developed support services during some of the most challenging years in CSUCI’s history, with student success efforts made available to all of our students and extending benefit well beyond our Latinx population.
Being a model HSI means we are committed to being constantly responsive to the needs of our students—but also responsive to the needs of our staff and faculty who educate our students in curricular and co-curricular spaces. This is work we can do together, continuing to enhance the community we have created to ensure the success of all members of our campus community.
As many of you know, in 2019 CSUCI was one of only nine HSIs nationally, and the only HSI in California, to earn the Seal of Excelencia at that time. We earned this recognition because of our work to intentionally serve Hispanic and Latinx students, work that has evolved and strengthened since initially earning the Seal. This is evidenced by our ASSET Scholars Program being recently recognized by ¡Excelencia in Education! as one of the 10 “Programs to Watch” for positively impacting the success of Latinx students and the program’s growing evidence of effectiveness. Congratulations to Dr. Michelle Hasendonckx and the SASEI team for this achievement, and for your and so many campus partners’ work in putting CSUCI on the national HSI map.
We will continue to embed necessary opportunities for Hispanic and Latinx students to demonstrate their achievements and to provide services to support their continued success. We will remind ourselves of how lucky we are to be able to foster a campus community, rich in its diverse cultures and populations – all of which have contributed significantly to the University we have built.
To Latinx and Hispanics of CSUCI and of our region, you are essential to our campus identity and success. We will continue to put in the work and hold ourselves accountable to ensuring that we are continuously earning our HSI designation.
If you would like to learn more about National HSI Week and Hispanic Heritage Month, please visit the following resources:
https://www.hispanicheritagemonth.gov/
https://www.pbs.org/specials/hispanic-heritage-month/
Sincerely,
Richard Yao, Ph.D.
President