When I first started in my major in Global Resource Systems here at Iowa State, I was tasked with fulfilling language credits for my major, and it provided me a unique opportunity.

See, when I was in high school, I had taken American Sign Language and fully committed myself to become as conversational in the language as I could. While Spanish was offered, I was afraid to join a class in a city where 63% of the population is Latinx, and I would be the only Latinx student in the classes.

I am neither black nor white.

I’m biracial.

I’m Haitian American.

The content of this post is written by an individual student and is not necessarily the position of Iowa State University, the Office of the Vice President for Student Affairs, the Dean of Students Office, or the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs. We do, however, fully support our students of color speaking their minds and raising their voices.

____

I’m often asked why I protest. Let me explain it to you.

The last place I expected myself to end up is in the crater of an active volcano, having my skin burned with sulfur dioxide emissions, a backpack heavy with scientific instruments on my back, and the biggest smile ever on my face. Never, ever, up until last summer, did I think I was capable of doing something so scary and so monumental. Hiking up that volcano every day to collect soil gas samples in order to help predict the next eruption was one of the greatest experiences of my life. The greatest part of it all, though, was the moment I stood at the summit of Mt.