Our goals for this year

Hello again!

Last year, we, student workers, and our lovely supervisor, Tracy, decided that our goal for the year would be to improve our customer service. We focused on:

• offering customers proper attention
  
• guiding them when they are lost in the union
  
• contacting offices for them when they are lost
• offering them coffee/candy

This year, our goal is to improve our own professional development. These are some of the ways we are working on this:

• mock-interviewing with a major company
• taking part in a Monopoly game to learn the real consequences of the real world

Thanks to the LWW assessments that we do every year, we are thinking more about how we can both contribute and gain something from our experience working here at the MICA office.

- the mica kids

And we're back!

We went kind of M.I.A. for a while, but we're back -- with a couple new student workers! We had to bid adieu to Jose (who graduated) and Courtney =( -- but along with Jenna and Pareesha, we now have Jacob and Spencer working with us as well! In addition, Lidia is working as our intern and Monet is the marketing liaison between our office and the marketing office across the hall.

Hayley Haywood has also recently joined as the graduate coordinator for Black Student Involvement & Advocacy.

Welcome to the new members of our team!

We are currently working on a variety of things. Remember, you can always stop by for a cup of coffee, a piece of candy, or just to say hi! =)

Sincerely,

the MICA student workers

New Semester, New Student Worker!

Welcome back!

It's a new semester and things are hot here in the Office of Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy! Our calendars are full and new programming is being put together every day. We were sad to bid farewell to Hugo Najera (Coordinator for Latino Student Involvement) and Mary Lesch (Graduate Coordinator for LGBT Student Involvement) as well as two of our awesome student workers and friends, James and Noah, at the end of last semester, but we know they are going on to do great things. Congratulations to James on graduating (good luck with grad school!) and to Noah for getting a sweet internship with GenderPAC! We will miss them dearly, but we got to eat some going away cake and we'll always have the memories. :)

This semester, we welcomed a new student worker, Pareesha Narang! Pareesha is a sophomore journalism major who has already brought a lot of great ideas, dedication, and good attitude to MICA. We're really psyched to have her!

In other news, we've only been back a week, but the semester is in full swing. Black History Month starts tomorrow, and it's going to be awesome. If you haven't already, stop by the MICA Office (1120) in the Adele H. Stamp Student Union- Center for Campus Life, and pick up a free Black History Month calendar, with all the events for the month handily listed, so you don't miss a thing. We're also selling Black History Month long sleeve shirts for only ten dollars, and they're going fast, so make sure to get yours before they're gone! If you have any questions about purchasing a shirt, please contact Stephanie Smith, Graduate Coordinator for Black Student Involvement and Advocacy @ steph1@umd.edu. The official UMD Black History Month website is www.blackhistorymonth.umd.edu.

FYI, the first event of Black History Month is a Showcase at the Nyumburu Cultural Center, in the Multipurpose Room. It starts at 3 pm on Friday the 1st, and will be featuring a guest speaker, entertainment, give-aways, and more! Contact Anne Reese Caarswell at carswell@umd.edu or 301-314-7759 for more information.

Remember, the MICA Office is here for the students...come visit anytime, and let us know how we can improve the campus climate and better empower the students we strive to serve.

Good luck with classes,

The MICA Staff

Hey remember that time Jenna accidentally deleted the blog and had to re-do it?

Welcome to the Office of Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy blog redux! Hopefully Jenna will be able to create a close facsimile of the one that she deleted, not out of malicious intent but rather overconfident stupidity. Welcome to college, Jenna!

Meet the MICA student workers:

James

Jose

Noah

Jenna

If you don't know what the MICA office is all about, here's an idea:

MICA Office Mission

We in the Office of Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy [MICA], a unit within the Adele H. Stamp Student Union and the Division of Student Affairs, stand firmly in our role to empower students through education on issues of race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, religion and their intersections. In support of our campus’ commitment to diversity, multiculturalism, and social justice, we advance a purposeful campus climate that capitalizes on the educational benefits of diversity, through student-centered advising, advocacy, programs, research, and practices. Our collective work results in positive student outcomes observable in their learning, identity development, involvement, and leadership.

MICA Office Philosophy

We support all students at the University of Maryland. Our work is important and provides opportunities and spaces that affirm students and their identities, build inclusive communities among diverse members, and create social change locally, nationally and globally.

We encourage students to participate in both culturally specific and cross-cultural involvement and leadership experiences.

We do not do this work alone and through our values of collaboration, personal commitment, authenticity, and inclusion, we serve our campus in its goals to achieve equity and social justice.

Cool!