GONZAGA FACULTY AND STAFF NEWSLETTER
SEPTEMBER 2023
VOL. 25 | #1
› Faculty, Staff Honored
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› Technology buzz
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› Meet New Deans
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› Fields of Dreams
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Reyes a Clear Definition of Loyalty and Service Few could speak with Raymond Reyes for more than a few minutes without being drawn into his wit, wisdom, wonder for the world and his passion to make it better. He’s a visionary, a healer, an extraordinarily bright and well-read luminary, highly sought speaker and capable administrator . . . but what he likes best is teaching because “when I’m in front of a class or in a circle of students, I’m learning.” Beginning his 36th year at Gonzaga, he came as a lecturer, and has taught for most of his 35 years. In partnership with Robert “Bob” Bartlett and others, he collaboratively contributed to establishing the Unity Multicultural Education Center and also was a founding member of the Gonzaga Center for the Study of Hate (GCSH), initiated the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, co-chaired the Council on Campus Climate, served on the Spokane Task Force on Race Relations and was appointed Gonzaga’s first chief diversity officer/associate vice president in 1998, among many other roles. “My work at Gonzaga is trying to understand how culture is a way of life that allows one to walk the spiritual path with practical feet,” he often says. He has taught hundreds of training and technical assistance seminars, from Kenya and Colombia to Canada and Zimbabwe, and a half dozen other countries in between, on an array of subjects from spiritual significance of human difference to optimizing organizational performance through intercultural competence
GIVE US YOUR INPUT Today Spirit offers you two versions of your monthly newsletter: Both containing the same stories, pictures and information. One is the pdf version you have received since the onset of COVID, which is laid out in a print format, and the new version is in a webpage format. Please take one minute to respond, giving us your feedback on these two versions. Tell us which one you like best and why? Or why you don’t prefer one over the other. Email us at spirit@gonzaga.edu today. Thanks so much. Your Spirit Team
Serving Gonzaga for 35 years in many capacities, Raymond Reyes now serves as associate vice president for cultural affairs in the president’s office.
and multicultural literacy. He is one of the nation’s experts in teaching Native American culture and intercultural dynamics. From 1994 to 1998, he delivered classes to Olympic athletes at the U.S. Training Center in Colorado Springs on sports psychology and optimal performance for Native American elite runners. But all his trails lead back to Gonzaga, what he calls his “Happy Place; a place of love, where I belong. It’s home, it’s fertile ground, a source of nurturing and nourishment. A place where I’ve grown up. A place where I am always working to move us toward a better common good,” he says. On July 13, Reyes received the Harry H. Sladich Loyalty & Service Award from Gonzaga’s Board of Trustees, the 16th person to be so honored since its inception in 2009. In presenting the award, President Thayne McCulloh thanked Reyes “for blessing Gonzaga University with your guidance, leadership and the vision for what could be, and what should be. You are a leader who embodies the values of our mission and exemplifies them for the good of all.” He’s had a remarkable career, but in hindsight, he could just as easily followed another path. “I’ve always been interested in God. If I knew as a young man what I know now, I would have become a Jesuit priest,” he says. “The Jesuit founder St. Ignatius of Loyola has captured my
“I think I’ve had 14 or 15 different offices during my time here. One day my mom visited and saw that the University had moved my office to the second floor and was happy to see it landed between two priests,” Reyes says with delight. imagination, and his Spiritual Exercises have helped form the person I am today.” Reyes has been a lot of things to a lot of people, as a friend, colleague, confidant and confessor in his many roles served. He fondly equates his work at Gonzaga to group therapy. “Through relationships here I learned who I am,” he says. “In relationships, everything is an abundance of potential waiting to be activated, it’s God’s presence in my heart and a willingness to express love in relationship to others.” He learned to explore his restless curiosity from GU’s students. “I have always been curious about the ‘what ifs,’” he says. He is a practical visionary, whose idealism draws inspiration, but whose feet are on the ground, getting things done. He is always experimenting with ideas for his presentations or teaching. A mad scientist of sorts, always asking “what if.” Continued on pg. 7
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