LFASC recognizes diversity with awards ceremony

Chatter grew louder as the back porch at Oliver Winery filled with guests for the Latino Faculty and Staff Council Latino Awards and Reception Friday evening.

The reception was organized to celebrate the end of another school year and to recognize individuals who have worked to promote diversity and awareness, LFASC council member Israel Fernando-Herrera said.

This is the third year the council has awarded these accolades, but the reception has taken place for several years.

“We think that Latino faculty, students, groups and events are needed and they need recognition at a university level because sometimes the work is not well-known,” Fernando-Herrera said. “We want to highlight the accomplishments the students have done.”

One reason the accomplishments of Latino students and faculty sometimes goes unrecognized is because IU is such a large university, LFASC member Luis Hernandez said.

“When you are a minority in numbers, it’s very easy to get lost through the cracks,” Hernandez said. “When you don’t have strength in numbers among 40,000 students to be recognized, especially when working on efforts that support a minority group, well, the numbers just don’t add up and it doesn’t often happen.”

Lillian Casillas, La Casa Latino Cultural Center director and LFASC council member, suggested another idea as to why these accomplishment go unnoticed.

“Often, people don’t get recognized because people assume that because you’re Latino it’s just a part of your job,” Casillas said. “This is important work and it needs to be valued and recognized.”

The council gives out five different awards — an undergraduate, graduate, staff, faculty and event or group award to those who have participated in service and mentoring, promoted diversity initiatives and developed awareness in the areas of culture, arts, health, economy, language or education, according to the event’s press release.

This year, Fred Diego won the undergraduate award for his work with undocumented students and mentoring.

Eric Morales won the graduate award for his welcoming attitude toward new Latino students.

The staff award went to Micaela Richter for her work as the Latino Studies administrative assistant.

John Nieto-Phillips won the faculty award for growing the Latino Studies program and the Latino Film Festival as well as several other programs.

Finally, the Latin American Music Center received the group recognition award for establishing itself more prominently within the Jacobs School of Music.

“When you look at the reasons why the recipients have been selected, it’s for a wide range of reasons,” Casillas said. “It’s from programming to advocacy, behind-the-scenes work to being in the forefront. It shows everybody can do something, they just gotta find that one thing that ignites their passion.”

To help present the awards, Provost Lauren Robel and Vice President for Diversity, Equity and Multicultural Affairs James Wimbush gave small speeches about the importance of the Latino community at IU and congratulated them on their growth and achievement.

“With Provost Robel and Vice President Wimbush coming, it shows we have more people that support the Latino community on campus,” Fernando-Herrera said. “We want to engage in all the communities on campus and make them realize how the Latino community is working and accomplishing many things.”

Aside from recognizing awards, the night’s goal was to bring the community
together from all disciplines and celebrate everyone’s accomplishments throughout the year, Hernandez said.

“Regardless of your race, your background or whatever, everybody here is passionate about what they’re doing and the work they do is amazing,” Hernandez said. “It’s awesome to celebrate everyone’s accomplishments at the end of the year and recognize the people who stood out. I think that’s just great.”

Hernandez has an optimistic view of where the future is going, he said.

He said he believes the campus will eventually accurately represent the population of Latino students and faculty and more space will be given for Latino contributions in academia.

“I would like this event to grow to the extent that everybody feels welcome and everybody feels a part of whatever each faculty member is doing,” Hernandez said.
“It would be awesome if this reception was overflowed with people who’ve all worked hard and made a contribution for us to recognize and celebrate.”