2015 has been Cabrini College’s most diverse year when it comes to diversity in race.
African Americans now make up 15.2 percent of the students who go to Cabrini.
Hispanics and Latinos make up 5.4 percent of those who go to Cabrini.
If one has been a student at Cabrini College for over one year, they may have noticed this significant change in diversity.
In order to keep the diversity level rising, the college needs to be able to retain these students.
Although some students transfer due to financial reasons, others just do not find any reason to stay at the school.
Cabrini College’s diversity office has arranged many clubs and activities to keep minority students engaged and interested in the school.
“There’s several things that the college does but my department specifically, we have a couple of things that are specific to trying to retain minority students. One of them is PUMP,” Stephanie Reed, directory of student diversity, said.
PUMP is one of Cabrini College’s pre-orientation programs and according to Reed, it is also a mentoring program.
“PUMP stands for Preparing Underrepresented Mentees for Progress,” Reed said.
Cabrini College offers many pre-orientation programs in the summer that allow incoming first-year students to feel welcomed and meet people that they may potentially build a strong relationship with.
PUMP has been a Cabrini tradition for years but the diversity team is introducing new activities to keep minority students engaged in campus life.
“We also have the ALANA CommUNITY Scholars program, which is brand new and a lot of people are not aware of it across campus yet but that is also sort of a retention initiative to help our African American and Latino students have a stronger sense of their academic possibilities, to really build their skills, to help them stay here so that they can succeed,” Reed said.
Whether it is because of gender, race or sexuality, minority students can often feel left out.
“All the clubs that have come out of this office are to help students of color feel a sense of belonging on campus,” Reed said.
It is always important to have people on campus that other students can relate to.
Teachers of color are important because they may be able to help students in ways that other teachers may not feel comfortable with or understand.
Professors of color may be able to help students of color in areas that other teachers may not be able to understand due to cultural differences or different experiences.
Some students may also feel more comfortable talking to someone whom they feel will understand them better.
“They have Latino counselors and we have professors of color on campus so students can go to those people who they might feel comfortable with and maybe ask for help there or share their feeling there and that way we can take that to the top and get the right kind of help or get what they need on campus,” Saleem Brown, associate director of first year experience, said.
Although clubs like BSU [black student union] and ALANA commUNITY scholars are meant to help retain students of color and get them involved, they are still very inclusive and will not push other students away.
“The purpose is to make that person of whatever background they’re from feel comfortable on campus,” Brown said. “They have a outlet and a place to go to talk about their feelings and their comfortability on campus and what we need to do to improve their comfort level.”
It is important for all students to speak out and these organizations and clubs allow minority students to do so as well.
“That’s why these clubs and organizations are put into place so that way students have a voice [because] a closed mouth don’t get fed,” Brown said.
Although the college has admitted many black and Hispanic students, the main goal is not to fill the school with an illusion of diversity.
“The goal for the future is to have a truly diverse campus,” Brown said.
To the entire faculty and staff that are a part of the diversity team, the key word is community.
Cabrini has enrolled many African American students within the past year but the numbers in Hispanic students going to college are rising across the country.
“The population is growing in terms of the number of Hispanic students that are going to go to college within the next ten years. We know that nationally, data shows us that,” Nakia Mack, director of enrollment retention, said.
Mack agrees that student engagement plays a big role when it comes to retention of al races at Cabrini.
“In order for a student to retain they have to be engaged and it’s a holistic review. You can’t just be happy with classes but then socially, you’re not doing anything on campus,” Mack said.
It is important to build a community no matter what race, gender, ethnic group or sexuality is in the community.
“The purpose of them [the clubs and organizations] is for students to find a community that they can identify with,” Mack said.
Cabrini faculty and staff look for every way that they can, to allow students of color to feel comfortable and be engaged with different students and activities on campus.
“It’s holistically, how are we able to engage students on campus so that they feel connected and they feel like they’re part of a community,” Mack said. “It’s really critical for us to look at how students engage on campus both academically and socially.”
