The University of Redlands received its first Developing Hispanic Serving Institutions Grant this spring and will use the funding to strengthen successful programs like 第一年的旅程 and Summer Bridge while also developing new initiatives.
2美元.9 million Title V federal grant was awarded by the U.S. Department of Education and will be distributed over the next five years. Redlands achieved Hispanic-Serving Institution status in 2021, and the HSI Working Group—comprised of faculty members, 学生, and staff—spent more than a year discussing priorities and best practices and gathering input from the campus community before submitting their grant proposal, “四面八方Direccion: Building Belonging and Latinx Success at the University of Redlands."
“作为一名校友, 管理员, and current doctoral student, I'm truly excited to see how this grant will help us partner with Latinx 学生 to make their Redlands experience the best it can be," said Anuradha Diekmann '19, director of corporate and foundation relations and an HSI Working Group member.
在过去十年中, the composition of the University's student population "has changed dramatically,”医生说。. 史蒂文•摩尔, director of the Sponsored Programs Office, Center for Spatial Studies, and a member of the HSI Working Group. Latinx 学生 now make up more than 40 percent of the student body and becoming a Hispanic-Serving Institution "recognizes that the University increasingly enrolls Latinx 学生 and will help the institution realign itself to better serve the 学生 and the Inland Empire."
The grant will boost the Summer Bridge, 第一年的旅程, Students Together Empowering Peers (一步), 一年级的课程, Transfer Student Success, and Race in Education Analytics Learning (REAL) Lab programs in individual ways. 一步, 提供指导, 资源, and support for all first-generation 学生 during their first semester, will be able to expand its services to transfer and graduate 学生, 夏桥, a program that helps 学生 make the transition into college, will reduce its threshold for eligibility and increase the number of mentors and sessions.
Students have shared that these programs "help them to transition to the college environment, 满足人们, 结交新朋友," said Belinda Sandoval Zazueta, associate vice president of admissions at the College of Arts and Sciences. "It impacts their sense of belonging, which leads to their satisfaction as 学生 and then ultimately to their success." Her HSI Working Group colleague Martín Hoecker-Martínez, associate professor of physics, agreed. "Each of these programs help to form interconnections between 学生 and expand the size of 学生' safety net,他说.
Additionally, the grant will be used to create the Direccion领导力计划, a two-day leadership retreat for Latinx 学生, and fund faculty training and several new staff positions, including Title V Project Director. The HSI Working Group will transition into an advisory board for the grant project "and an entity that will continue seeking opportunities for further developing the institution's serving identity and promoting the important work already taking place,”医生说。. Adriana Alvarado, co-director of the REAL Lab and HSI Working Group member.
All U of R 学生 will benefit from the grant money, as being a Hispanic-Serving Institution does not mean it will "exclusively focus on serving Latinx 学生 to the detriment of other groups,阿尔瓦拉多说. “对于一个, the Latinx community is heterogeneous, and we need to have an intersectional consciousness when we approach our work. 此外, efforts to develop the institution's serving identity will likely align with other anti-racism efforts on campus aimed at promoting a more positive campus climate and better academic and liberatory outcomes for everyone."
