For the second consecutive year, CSUSM has been awarded the Higher Education Excellence in Diversity award. The award recognizes colleges and universities nationwide that show a commitment to promoting and broadening diversity and inclusion.

According to Arturo Ocampo, Associate Vice President of the Office of Diversity, this award is given to higher education institutions that show progress in increasing diversity on campus, and show a willingness to continue those advancements.

“My understanding from the folks that granted us the award [is,] it’s not that we’ve gotten there, that we are the epitome of what a diverse campus should be like, but that we’ve made great strides, we’ve progressed a great deal, we’ve accomplished a lot of the things we said we were going to do in our first week plan, so I think what they are recognizing is a really strong effort and a really strong commitment,” said Ocampo.

As a recipient of the HEED award, CSUSM will be featured in INSIGHT Into Diversity, a magazine that focuses on diversity in higher education. The feature will be published in the November 2015 issue.

“I feel the recognition is important. It’s a positive step,” said Kia Washington, Peer Coordinator of the LGBTQA Pride Center.

For CSUSM, diversity has been a long term goal since the beginning. In the University’s mission statement, one of the values is inclusiveness.

“In our mission statement we do say that social justice is important and it’s also in our strategic priorities for the university that inclusion and social justice are important. So we’re a four-year university that actually follows what we say we should be doing and that’s a big part of it,” said Ocampo.

Over recent years, CSUSM has made rapid progress in diversity. Since the 2013-2014 year, new faculty diversity hiring procedures were implemented, faculty of color hires have increased by 16 percent and underrepresented minority faculty hires have increased by 10 percent.

Along with strides in faculty diversity, CSUSM has made extensive progress in student diversity by opening the Latin@ Center and expanding the LGBTQA Pride and Gender Equity Centers.

“It’s kind of like a weight off our shoulders. Like we did it, but yet we still have so much more to do,” said Brenda Diaz, a Peer Coach at the Latin@ Center.

The HEED award signifies progress for the campus and encourages groups to continue championing diversity.