Diversity In The President's Leadership Classroom

Diversity is something every leader should have exposure to. People come from a vast variety of places. Many people have had experiences that are different than most and everyone has originality. That is why I appreciate all the effort Steve Haseley puts into having guest speakers for The President’s Leadership Class in order for us to know about different ways we can experience diversity on our campus alone. Each individual speaker brings their originality to class and they are all so entertaining. Last week in class, we had three guest speakers in one day. I really enjoyed the entire class period. I also learned about many new things that I probably wouldn’t have heard of otherwise. For example, we had a speaker by the name of Areezo Zare.
She was from Iran. She gave us a lot of fun and simple facts about Iran like how all females nine years old and up have to wear a hijab on their head any time they are in public. Alcohol is also forbidden in Iran; They have to attain it how many Americans in the U.S. attain marijuana. Zare told us about interesting customs in Iran that differ from customs in the United States, but she stressed heavily at the end of her spiel that Iranians are much like Americans, they just have better food. Food seemed to be a very popular topic when on the subject of diversity. In fact, one of our guest speakers really only talked about food. That was Nicole Xu, she played many videos of Chinese food and the culture behind the food and having tea. Nicole Xu seemed really sweet but her slide shows and videos didn’t really catch my interest. Amongst the three speakers that we had in class, Swampneel Nanakinsor Deshpande – yes that’s his name, was my favorite. Swampneel was full of character. He is originally from India and he is a graduate student here at Oklahoma State University. His story that he shared with the class really inspired me because he not only came to the U.S. for his after-graduate degree but he sought out many leadership opportunities as soon as he was here. That takes a lot of courage to do in general, it takes even more courage when you’re in a foreign place and trying to be a leader as well. I wish I could say that all of Swampneel’s story was empowering, but unfortunately I cannot. I love Oklahoma State University but sometimes there are some negative occurrences that happen on campus. During Swampneel’s first homecoming experience here, he was targeted by a racist student and called a terrorist. Swampneel eventually calmed the man down, but this has inspired Swampneel to reach out to other students and inform them about diversity. I am very thankful for all three of the guest speakers. They taught us all interesting facts about India, China, and Iran. Swampneel even gave us information about Oklahoma State University’s Cultural Night that is happening this spring. I fully intend to go to the festival. The last two class periods that we have devoted to guest speakers, the class has been challenged to take a step to embrace diversity. I think that attending cultural night is an attainable first step.