“Inspiration is all around you,” Xiaomei Cai, associate professor of Communication at George Mason University, tells a group of junior and senior high school students gathered in a Fairfax Campus classroom. She’s speaking from her own experience, having just shared her personal account of what it was like to arrive in the United States for graduate school as a young woman on her own for the first time in a foreign country. Cai shared details of her journey, including how she figured out how to get from the airport to Indiana University (there were no cell phones, she reminds students), watching popular television shows to learn the culture, and going on to become a leading researcher in her field.
Cai was one of seven CHSS faculty who spoke in a lecture series this summer as part of Mason’s Early Identification Program Institute for Excellence, all of whom shared their educational trajectory, experiences, and inspiration with students. Speakers included Steve Barnes, associate professor in the Department of History and Art History, Cynthia Lum, Distinguished University Professor of Criminology, Law and Society and director of George Mason University’s Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy, Rashmi Sadana, associate professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, LaNitra Berger, associate professor in the Department of History and Art History and director of African and African American Studies, James Willis, professor and department chair in the Department of Criminology, Law and Society, and Charlotte Gill, associate professor of Criminology, Law and Society and deputy director of the Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy.
Participating students had the opportunity to ask speakers questions and received one credit for the course CHSS 105: Undergraduate Colloquium.
“I cannot thank our participating faculty enough for helping us make this happen,” said Lisa Breglia, senior associate dean of Undergraduate Academic Affairs in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. “Their engagement makes this program possible and enriches students’ experience as they determine the pathways they want to pursue.”
EIP serves first-generation, college-bound students in grades 7-12 in seven Northern Virginia school systems. Mason establishes a long-term relationship with these students, giving the skills and tools they need to pursue their college dreams, with the help of mentors and advisors. Learn more about the EIP program.
August 11, 2023
