Multicultural Liason Officers Support Students Across Colleges By Logan Metzger Logan.Metzger@iowastatedaily.com The various colleges at Iowa State have many things similar when it comes to their structure and how they serve students, but one key member of their personnel that often goes unmentioned is the multicultural liaison officer (MLO). According to the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences website, the multicultural liaison officer is an advocate and support network for domestic students who self-identify as African American, American Indian/Alaskan Native, Asian American, Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, Latina/o and/or multiracial. The multicultural liaison officer also provides leadership in the development, implementation and coordination of diversity and inclusion initiatives for students. Some of a multicultural liaison officer’s main duty include working closely with students, staff, faculty, advisors and administrators in their colleges and throughout the university to support recruitment of underrepresented student populations, promote student retention, help students connect with key resources on campus, develop programs and initiatives that promote student success and engage students who are interested in learning more about diversity and inclusion. “The MLOs were created in the late 90s by George Jackson, the director of Multicultural Student Affairs at the time,” said Elizabeth Martinez-Podolsky, the multicultural liaison officer for the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. “He wanted there to be a liaison person in each college that could also be supporting our multicultural student populations. The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences was the first college to receive an MLO.”Martinez-Podolsky said the position was originally titled minority liaison officers before being changed to its current name. She said they are now looking to change thetitle to directors of multicultural student success (DMSS). Currently none of the multicultural liaison officers have changed their titles but are hoping to in the near future.“[The new title] conveys more of the work we do with students and it alleviates some of the energy of explaining what an MLO is,” Martinez-Podolsky said. “We feel that DMSS offers more of an explanation as to what our focus is on. September 2019 The URBAN EXPERIENCE 23
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