Strengths: Student-Centered Professional (LO 2, 4, 5, 6, 10 & Artifacts B, C1,

C2, C3, G)
I remember when I was sitting at Preview Days listening to the panel of students talking
about their transformational experience within Jesuit education. They had talked about their
growth, development, and how they have grown. When I had started the program, I had a hard
time understanding what Jesuit education even meant, and didn't anticipate as much personal
growth as I had within the Student Development Administration Program. I knew that I would
gain skill-sets on a practitioner level and gain knowledge of student development theory, history,
and best practices, but I never anticipated the depth of which I would grow in Learning
Outcome 10, the development and enhancement of my professional and
personal identity (Artifact B).
I feel that overall, my biggest strengths came from coming into solidarity with my salient
identities which leads to my student-centered philosophy. By developing a strong understanding
of my personal and professional foundation, I have been able to see the larger picture of what I
want my role to be within the field of student affairs. I hope that with my strengths relating to
Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion, Student Learning and Development, and my Personal
Foundation can enable me to become a student affairs professional who can continue to bring the
voices of underserved student communities to the table.
Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (LO 2, 4, 5, 6 & Artifacts C3, G). I began
the Student Development Administration program feeling like I had already developed a strong
foundation and passion for work with multicultural affairs. At my alma mater, I had opportunities
to meet fantastic student affairs professionals from other institutions from the United States
discuss the importance of salient identities when discussing equity, diversity, and inclusion.

However, the Student Development Program was able to make me realize the complexities and
depths of intersectional identities. I also had the opportunity to recognize that social justice and
multicultural affairs should be within the foundation of all the work that I do. The experiences
from my coursework, graduate assistantship, and internships developed my holistic
understanding of the social justice and multicultural affairs.
The project that helped me develop in enhancing my understanding of
diversity and justice of a Jesuit Catholic tradition (LO 4) was my MA project on
Community Building and Identity-Based Spaces for Students with Disabilities (Artifact C3).
After looking at the existing literature and research on identity-based spaces and disability
services offices, I began seeing the lack of support for a student community who faced many
barriers from getting into higher education, persisting, graduating, and finding a job. Many of the
students I interviewed expressed frustration in feeling that our institution, although Jesuit and
focused on social justice, was willing to talk about different underserved populations, but
completely ignored their disability identity. This made me realize how our institution was not
supporting students holistically, even though this is part of Jesuit education. In fact, even within
our own program, we learned about Yosso's (2008) Community Cultural Wealth, but we were
maintaining a system of seeing students with disabilities as having a deficit within our own
institutions. This led me to become passionate for holistically supporting my own students within
my graduate assistantship, something I had learned from my Jesuit education (LO 4).
Within my graduate assistantship, I began hearing the concerns raised by international
students on feeling like the institution didn't recognize their needs outside of their international
identity. This helped me recognizing the importance of understanding different student
populations and issues (LO 2). During orientation, we talked to the students about how

there were resources for students of color and queer students but didn't take time to realize that
we were focusing on the American context of justice, rather than a global context. With student
affairs originating from the American or U.S. university system, many of the theories are based
on U.S. students. I believe that this further perpetuates our focus on social justice from our U.S.
perspectives. From this realization, I felt that we needed to take Seattle Universitys mission of
social justice and find ways to showcase services so that we can adapt it to our
international student population (LO 5). From there, I started having meaningful
conversations with the students I was working with and decided to create programming to have
discussions on their identities as international students, students of color, and queer international
students. I feel that my understanding of ethnocentrism became extremely solid with this
assistantship.
Finally, my internship working on the Queer Ally Network at Pacific Lutheran University
also enabled me to understand my role as an ally (Artifact G). This internship was difficult for
me at the beginning, because I was extremely stuck on the fact that I was not part of both the
Queer Community and PLU Community, and felt fearful that I would cause harm to the
stakeholders. However, my internship supervisor was able to have conversations with me about
how coming into solidarity with my identities and my passion for doing work around diversity
and equity. This enabled me to do the work that we are all expected to do as professionals. As the
grad assistant at the ISC, I became the go-to person for all things international student, and if I
want to work within Multicultural affairs, I needed to understand that people would expect me to
be an expert on all underserved communities, although it is impossible to be an expert on any
topic.

Thanks to my experiences of my coursework, assistantship, and internship, I finally

understand what my role would be within student affairs. My role would be to not claim
expertise, but to collaborate and make sure that the voice of underserved communities is at the
table. I learned that this is possible by meeting with stakeholders across campus, ranging from
staff, faculty, and to students to make sure that what you are doing can is equitable to as many
campus communities as possible. By taking initiative to collaborate with stakeholders to make
sure they are represented within committees and decisions within my graduate project,
internships, and assistantship, I believe that I have developed and demonstrated Learning
Outcome 6, which emphasizes my role as a leader within the focus of equity,
diversity, and inclusion.
Student Learning and Development (LO 4, & Artifact C1). My
understanding and appreciation of Student Development and Theory was strengthened from both
my practitioner experiences and my international experiences. During my coursework, I was able
to spend time looking over theories and write papers on globalization within student affairs to
promote diversity and equity. My personal philosophy is that higher education has become more
and more globalized and institutions could benefit from connecting with locations abroad to see
what best practices are occurring around the world.
When I was in the SDAD 5700 Comparative Education Course at Uppsala University, I
had the opportunity to write a paper on some of the Swedish University practices around student
leadership (Artifact C1). As part of this program, I began seeing how there were many benefits
within both the Swedish Educational System and the United States Educational System. Upon
further reflection of my experiences living abroad and studying at Uppsala, I began considering
how Cultural Wealth goes beyond the deficits we see in students. I believe that Cultural Wealth

also relates to our misconceptions of best practices. For Learning Outcome 4, I recognized that
although it is important to recognize social justice from the Jesuit tradition, it is just as
important to find value in the social justice and student affairs best practices happening
globally.
From my experiences interning at South Puget Sound Community College in the
International Student Services Office and my graduate assistantship at the International Student
Center at Seattle University, I have found ways to take parts of Student Development theorists,
such as Astin, Schlossberg, and Baxter-Magolda and adapted them to support students from a
non-U.S. background. As part of my long-term professional goal, I hope to find opportunities
where I can collect research from institutions abroad and find ways to connect student learning
and development theories and practices with the U.S. context of education.
Personal Foundation (LO 6, 10, Artifact B, C2). Overall, I am leaving this
program with a stronger understanding of what my personal goals, foundations, and
professional identity are as a future student affairs professional (LO 10).
Initially, I knew that I loved working within the university administration environment, and I
loved being able to work with the multicultural competency training committee. However, now I
recognize that my work isn't limited to my own personal identities. My role as a student affairs
professional comes down to my understanding of my role as an ally and advocate for
underserved student communities.
While taking EDUC 5700: Leadership in Education I with Tim Wilson, I began the
process of critically defining who I wanted to be as a leader within student affairs. Seeing the
national climate of racial tension within higher education institutions, I discovered my
nonnegotiable identities and leadership styles moving forward into the job search process. I was

not going to negotiate my salient identities in order to fit a standard framework of what people
appreciate as a leader. Instead, I am excited to find ways to hold onto my unique identities and
demonstrate that I am a strong leader in my own authentic way, as demonstrated in my
Leadership Philosophy Paper (Artifact C2). As tensions continue on a nationwide scale, I hope
that my racial identities and leadership philosophy can demonstrate my ability to support
underserved students moving forward.
Overall, the last two years in the SDA program has been one of the most challenging
experiences of my life. I realized that during my time as a student, I began reflecting on my own
life and how I fit into the theories I was learning about. My first quarter, when taking Student
Development Theory, I was amazed by the different identity theories, such as Kims (2001)
Asian American Identity Model, that reflected on my experiences. Prior to joining the program, I
never had a textbook that represented my identity. Throughout this process of self-reflection and
finding solidarity within my coursework, I began seeing the negative areas of my experience and
compared myself to my peers.
As I continue working on my personal development to wrap up my experience within the
program and the job search process, I am challenging myself to start seeing the opportunities and
positivity that I can bring to the table. Not only will I plan on empowering students and bringing
their voices to the table. I will also remember to lead by example and find the means to advocate
for myself and remember that I, too, matter. As I developed my mission statement (Artifact B), I
recognized that I needed to apply my own mission to myself before applying it to my students.