Pablo Mendoza was always working inside the Multicultural Center.

He was there leading diversity seminars. He was there advising diversity organizations. He was there advancing diversity initiatives.

He has been doing diversity work at MU for 15 years, but after July 12, Mendoza will leave to work at Indiana University of Pennsylvania in Indiana, Penn.

“I finished my doctoral dissertation last July, and I was looking for a new career challenge,” Mendoza said.

Mendoza will be assisting the president of IUP with diversity, specifically in the spheres of academic affairs, student affairs and human resources. He said he will be helping student affairs with developing a women’s center, an LGBT resource center and a multicultural center. Currently, the university only has a black culture center.

“I will be charged with finding funding to support those operations and, hopefully, someday build those operations,” he said.

Mendoza said he has accomplished all that he could at MU. His key accomplishments include the Diversity Peer Educators program and diversity training he does at the Multicultural Center and the various conferences he brought to campus.

Such conferences include the Big 12 Black Student Government Conference in 2002, Big 12 American Indian Conference in 2003 and both the Regional Hispanic American Leadership Organization Conference and the Midwest Asian American Student Union Conference each three times.

“Each of those really provided our student groups a chance to see how other places do things and showed that we are a place of leadership within the region,” Mendoza said.

Other improvements were beyond Mendoza’s scope, he said. He referenced the programs at the University of Illinois and Oregon State University, both of which have multicultural centers with multimillion-dollar funding and larger numbers of staff.

“It would be a nice top priority, but looking at the political climate as it is – meaning the state, not the institution – it would be difficult for anyone to pursue that because we’re in a state that wants to shrink funding to higher education,” Mendoza said. “It would be hard to do these other growth initiatives without further support from the state.”

Mendoza’s accomplishments at MU have not gone unnoticed, however. Missouri Students Association President Nick Droege said Mendoza was a “catalyst” in expanding diversity at MU.

“Pablo’s biggest contribution to the Multicultural Center was his unwavering dedication to the center and the way he opened the doors for everyone to attend events,” he said.

Droege said Mendoza’s actions in promoting diversity were representative of the One Mizzou motto.

“Pablo’s contributions emulated One Mizzou before we even coined the term,” Droege said.

Mendoza’s dedication to promoting diversity on campus has had a unique impact on the numerous students he worked with.

For Young Kwon, external vice president of the Asian American Association, Mendoza was a stern and strict figure on campus – one she was not ready to approach at first. It was not until this summer that Kwon began working with him at the Multicultural Center that she realized he had a goofy side.

Mendoza put Kwon into situations that would develop her leadership skills, she said.

“He truly cares about students,” Kwon said. “He always welcomes students into the Multicultural Center. He not only contributed a lot to the AAA but to raising awareness of diversity issues on campus.”

Droege discussed how Mendoza helped foster discussion on a Four Front retreat.

“He took all our phones so we could really get to know each other and have real discussions,” he said. “His unique way of promoting discussion shows what a unique kind of person he was and how dedicated he is to his work.”

Mendoza has a funny side as well.

“He always would come out of his office and get everyone’s attention as if it was an important notice just to show us ‘Gangnam Style’ by (PSY),” Alexander Sanchez, president of the Hispanic American Leadership Organization said.

As Sanchez put it, Mendoza’s friendly personality combined with his dedication to diversity made him “awesome for the university for the past 15 years.”