The Office of DEI is entrusted with leading the Eastern Mennonite University community
to live more fully into its identity as a faith-informed peace and justice university
and its commitment to cultivating a more robust and inclusive community of learners.
Its primary mission is to advance and support students, faculty, and staff in diversity,
equity, inclusion, and belonging efforts at EMU through institutional transformation.
At the heart of EMU’s mission, as an academic institution rooted in the Anabaptist-Mennonite tradition, is our commitment to an inclusive and equitable campus community – a place where everyone is treated with dignity and respect and where everyone can
fully express their authentic self.
We strive to extend the richness of the EMU experience to students, faculty, and staff
who may have found themselves at the margins in the past.
We aspire to share power, stories, challenges, wisdom, and dreams with authenticity
to forge a campus community where we can share our common humanity and build relationships
with each other.
Our goal is to remove the barriers that underrepresented and marginalized groups have
historically encountered at EMU.
Our commitment requires that together we face the fundamental causes that have led
to discrimination, racial injustice, gender inequities, sexual orientation marginalization,
structural racism, and many other forms of oppression.
Join in our efforts – dei@emu.edu. You belong at EMU!
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Who We Are
Executive Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Jackie Font-Guzmán
About Jackie: Jackie strives to be a change agent and sees her role as constructively disrupting
systems to advance equity and justice for everyone. She received her MHA from St.
Louis University, her JD from Interamericana University in Puerto Rico and her PhD
in Conflict Analysis from Nova Southeastern University.
Associate Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Patience Kamau
About Patience: Patience is a peacebuilder-conservationist who sees her role as a conciliatory one
between humans and our environment’s complex ecosystems. She received both her BA
'02 and MA '17 degrees from EMU, and began her role as associate director of DEI in
August 2021.
Graduate Associate to the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Katie Mulembe
About Katie: Katie is a connector and systems thinker who works to transform organizations into
agents of social and structural change. She earned her BA from the University of Dayton
and will graduate with a MA in Transformational Leadership from EMU’s Center for Justice
and Peacebuilding in May 2022.
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