Casandra E. Harperis an Associate Professor of Higher Education in the Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis Department at the University of Missouri. Her research is focused on the diversity of the individual student experience, which has included attention to race, ethnicity, gender, ability, and class across the following key experiences and outcomes: multiracial identity development, racial identification, openness to diversity, the influence of student-faculty and student-parent interactions, perceptions of campus climate, and financial aid as it relates to college access and academic success. Casandra received her BS in Psychology and her MA in Higher Education from the University of Arizona and her MA and PhD in Higher Education and Organizational Change from UCLA.

Judy Marquez Kiyama

is a Professor in the Center for the Study of Higher Education, Department of Educational Policy Studies and Practice, at the University of Arizona. Dr. Kiyama is a community-engaged scholar with nearly 25 years of experience in research, practice, and administration. She works to interrogate systems of power that perpetuate inequities for minoritized communities and is committed to understanding the cultural and collective resources drawn upon to confront and (re)shape such systems. Working alongside Latinx/o/a families and communities is at the core of Dr. Kiyama's research efforts. As a first-generation Mexican American college student, she draws on her own experiences with her family to connect with the sources of support that first-generation families of color offer their students in the transition to college. Her numerous publications focus on inclusion efforts to better support first-generation, low-income, and families of color within postsecondary settings.