Admissions Office Increases Diversity of the Incoming Class by Four Percent
The Marist College mission states that the school is dedicated to helping students develop the skills necessary to be citizens of the global community. The Admissions Office at Marist is helping to make sure that this mission statement is met. The new entering class of 2018 has increased diversity at Marist from 14 percent to 18 percent. To achieve this four percent increase, the office sends out recruiters around the country and the world to promote Marist to multicultural students. About 1,100 students make up the class of 2018, representing 29 states in the U.S. and 27 different countries. As the number of applicants continues to increase each year, admissions is making a conscious effort to put Marist on the map globally.
Julio A. Torres, Jr., senior assistant director/coordinator for Multicultural Enrollment, says diversity is part of Marist’s strategic plan. The school uses its resources and focuses its efforts on increasing their results. Admissions works to make sure that every aspect of their office reflects every aspect of the institution’s mission.
“A lot of the credit has to go to the entire Marist community, because admissions can bring them but if the community is not ready to work in conjunction with every office, they may not stay,” Torres said. He cited first year programs, student affairs, and academic advisement as a few of the other offices on campus that help make students feel welcome upon arrival at Marist. They aim to get the most qualified, diverse class to enroll and make them feel comfortable on campus.
Admissions also has partnerships with the Marist Upward Bound Program and the Marist Liberty Partnership to help bring in more diverse students. The office is making a conscious effort to visit schools with diverse backgrounds because that is the direction that the world is headed. There are projections that very soon, first generation students are going to make up the majority of college campuses.
“In my opinion it’s one of those things that diversity is life, so if you are not in a diverse environment, you don’t grow,” Torres said. His idea of diversity includes factors such as gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic background, even geographic location. Torres recalled a friend that he had from St. Thomas when he was a student at Marist. His friend had never seen snow before so he was in awe during the first snowfall of winter. Likewise, Torres found differences between himself and another friend who was from the country. Being a big-city kid, Torres had a different perspective of the world than she did. Torres believes that all of the things that make us different from one another contribute to the diversity of the campus.
“I think the Marist community as a whole is also part of [the] increase because students will go back to their hometowns, their high schools, their countries and tell people ‘Listen, I had a great experience at Marist, this is where I feel comfortable’, and other people start to get that feeling and then they show up at Marist, and it just perpetuates itself.”
Jaclyn Fitzgerald, assistant director of admission, was present at a conference hosted by Marist in summer 2013 called the Overseas Association for College Admissions Counseling. There were about 1,000 attendees, all school counselors that recruit around the world. It was great exposure for Marist to have representatives from over 80 countries on campus. In addition to the conference, Marist recently launched a virtual tour of the college on its website. This promotion of the campus has vastly contributed to the increase in diverse students at Marist. Fitzgerald also sites shadow days and bus groups that bring inner city kids to campus as reasons why Marist has become more diverse.
“We’re really trying to boost that too to make our campus as diverse as possible for the students,” she said.
When international students arrive at Marist at the beginning of the year, it is usually their first time on the campus. This semester, President Dennis Murray hosted a dinner for all international students down by the river outside of the Marist Boathouse. About 175 international students were in attendance. Everyone went around and said where they were from and why they chose Marist. It gave the students an opportunity to meet one another and become accustomed to life at Marist. This year’s group of international students come from a plethora of multicultural backgrounds.
“In the total Marist undergraduate population they represent 50 different countries which is pretty cool,” Fitzgerald said.
Joe Giacalone, director of international admission and recruitment, credits the opening of the Florence campus of Marist for opening the doors to expanding the college’s global presence. As the popularity of studying abroad increased, the Admissions Office started to recruit more on the ground internationally. Giacalone referred to the mission statement as reason for why it is important to make our campus as diverse as possible.
“If we are preparing our students for the 21st century, if that’s what we’re tasked to do, it’s silly to think we’re not going to be dealing with people from multicultural backgrounds and from different cultures and countries,” he said. By accepting more international students into Marist, American students are able to interact with people from many different countries, thus enhancing their global perspective. The dynamics of classroom discussions are also further enhanced by involving people with different cultural backgrounds.
Increasing diversity on the Marist College campus is not just enriching for the other students.
“I appreciate the importance of diversity on campus and I can say that traveling to different parts of the world and seeing students from all walks of life, how they interact in their schools and how I get to interact with them and their schools and then here has just enriched my experience both professionally and personally,” Giacalone said.
Marist “Her Campus”
Her Campus is an online magazine for college aged women that was originally launched in 2009 by students at Harvard University. Feature stories are written in six categories: style, love, health, career, world and life. Targeted specifically toward the female undergraduate demographic, Her Campus grew immensely in popularity. So much so that individual schools began developing their own chapters of the website. Marist College launched its own chapter in spring of 2014.
Founded by two Marist College seniors, Nicole Knoebel and Marissa Russo, the Marist chapter of Her Campus has been a wonderful success. Its Facebook page has 322 likes and 182 people follow its Twitter page. One of the most popular features of the Marist chapter is its Campus Cutie page. Marist guys are interviewed by a Her Campus writer and have their photo featured on the website. Marist girls who visit the website have a chance to learn more about guys that they have seen around campus. Another popular section is style, in which different Marist girls are featured for being well dressed. Along with their photo, they also get interviewed by a Her Campus writer about their fashion preferences. It gives other girls ideas of what is currently in style.
Christina Pastushenko, a Marist junior, is a dedicated reader of Her Campus.
“I enjoy visiting the website because it’s fun that Marist has a publication specifically focused on girls’ interests, for girls,” she said.
Knoebel began as a National Contributing Writer for Her Campus. She became very motivated to start a chapter at Marist because she enjoyed writing for the national online magazine. Her co-president Russo felt the same way and the two girls made it happen.
“I knew that we have awesome writers on campus and I thought it could be really popular,” Knoebel said.
The application process to start a chapter of Her Campus is simple but it can take awhile to get started up. The girls filled out an application and took an editing test to prove that they could handle running a website and writing articles. A phone interview followed and after about a month, the Marist chapter was officially launched in April.
As founders of the website, Knoebel and Russo run the chapter in a way that is similar to the Marist Circle. Writers claim their stories from a spreadsheet with all of the ideas and send them in to Knoebel and Russo who edit them and decide when they will be posted on the website. They also find the GIFs and photos that accompany every article as well as promote the Marist chapter on its social media pages. As co-presidents, Knoebel and Russo do a ton of work. However, they do not hesitate to give a lot of the credit to their dedicated writers.
“I think it’s awesome that we have Marist girls writing about other Marist girls. We’ve had so many amazing people featured that are so involved on campus and doing such incredible work and I love that we’re able to give those women the attention and praise they deserve,” Knoebel said.
Cristina Lupo, a sophomore at Marist College, is one of the Marist’s chapters contributing writers. As a member of Literary Arts Society and a writer for the Admissions blog FoxTales, Lupo describes writing for Her Campus as fundamentally different.
“HerCampus is different because in LAS you share your creativity, with FoxTales you have a specific audience of prospective students, but with HerCampus, you’re starting a conversation with other Marist girls. It’s really a place where, as a writer, you’re also the audience,” Lupo said. Her Campus is a website that girls can use to relate to other girls and there is a sense of community among the readers and writers. Writing for Her Campus has been a positive and rewarding experience for Lupo thus far, who became involved this semester.
“When you think about it, having that kind of effect, it’s kind of powerful,” Lupo said.
Knoebel and Russo are always open to new writers who want to get involved, female or male. Knoebel thinks it would be really innovative for the website to have male contributors in the future because of their different perspective.
“Seeing what they would write about when their audience is mostly female would be really interesting,” she said.
Profile Story: Zahara Diego-Moffitt
Determination is an envious quality for a young high school student to have. It is a character trait that Zahara Diego-Moffitt, a 2014 graduate from Poughkeepsie High School possesses. When she was entering sophomore year, Diego-Moffitt was selected to take part in Marist College’s Upward Bound program. Upward Bound is a federally funded program for students who are first generation, come from low income families and are academically at risk. The program helps high school students to increase their academic skills so that they can complete high school and go on to earn a college degree. Diego-Moffitt heard of the Upward Bound program through her mother, who worked as a nurse at Marist.
Upward Bound began as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty in 1964. The program was one of the first college-access programs that was federally funded. This year marks the 50th anniversary of The Office of Economic Opportunity implementing the programs across the United States. One of the first three experimental programs, Upward Bound was a part of “TRIO”, along with two other programs. Today, there are a total of 8 “TRIO” programs that help low income, first generation students earn a college education.
Each candidate is interviewed and required to submit paperwork, documents, transcripts and test scores to see if they have college potential. Gladys Negron-Collier, the director of Upward Bound at Marist conducted Diego-Moffitt’s interview and reviewed her academic performance.
“She was motivated, she stayed on task, she earned good grades and she participated in community service events,” Negron-Collier said.
About 90 percent of students who participate in the program go on to college, which Diego-Moffitt did when she enrolled at DCC, with college credits for two classes already completed. She had another accomplishment besides success with Upward Bound that helped her succeed academically. In 2013, Diego-Moffitt was awarded the Wendy’s High School Heisman. Only four students throughout New York received the honor. The Wendy’s High School Heisman is an award for high achieving students who participate in a wide array of sports and community service activities. Founded in 1994, the Wendy’s High School Heisman Program selects high school seniors from across the country who have a GPA of 3.0 or better and participate in 1 or more of the 27 eligible school sports, which can be found on their website. Being a leader in school or one’s community is also a requirement for consideration. The program encourages seniors to be well-rounded individuals and to pursue a level of higher education after graduating.
“Upward Bound is successful as it is engaged in the community through its presence at the high school and in various academic and community activities. Caring and persistent support from Upward Bound staff working with program youth and families, along with support from Marist College enables area youth to achieve their education goals,” said Steve Sansola, the Associate Dean for Student Affairs at Marist, whom Upward Bound reports to.
In addition to being a hard-working student and a strong presence in the community, Diego-Moffitt was a stellar athlete. As a member of the cheerleading squad, she helped change the way that cheerleading was viewed at Poughkeepsie High School. Speaking of her time on the team, Diego-Moffitt commented that not many people considered cheerleading to be a serious sport.
“We worked so hard to gain the respect of the school,” she said. With the help of one of the Upward Bound counselors who was a former cheerleader at Marist, the team showed Poughkeepsie High School that they were worthy of respect. Diego-Moffitt wrote her essay for the Wendy’s High School Heisman about her experience as a cheerleader along with her high-standing GPA and contributions to the community, she received a certificate from the program.
Diego-Moffitt remembers the anxiety she felt waiting to hear if she had won the prestigious award. It had been several years since a student from Poughkeepsie was last honored. Awhile after Diego-Moffitt applied to Wendy’s, she began to worry that she had her application had been rejected.
“I was curious because I didn’t hear back from them for a really long time and I was like what’s going on, can I know that I didn’t win anything? I eventually went on the website and saw my name was on there and I got the certificate. I won the first section but I didn’t win the national.” She did not continue on to the national level of awards but Diego-Moffitt was the one student out of all the Poughkeepsie applicants who was recognized for being an outstanding senior. Her advice for other students hoping to be accepted into college is quite simple but encouraging.
“Don’t wait until the last minute to do things! Learn everything you can and take any opportunity that’s given to you. Whenever you’re given an opportunity, go for it, if it’s something that can’t hurt you!”
Amber Case 