Professor Roger Haro of UWL
Hometown Hero February 26th, 2014
One of the things I like best about the Hometown Hero project, aside from getting to honor my constituents, is giving people the opportunity to nominate someone to receive this recognition. And it is always special when the person being nominated is a friend who has done some extraordinary work. That is where today’s Hometown Hero came from. The University of Wisconsin System came to me to let me know about an important accomplishment by one of my friends and colleagues, Professor Roger Haro. You may have seen the article about him in the La Crosse Tribune.
Roger Haro is a professor of biology at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse (my alma mater, go Eagles!). And this year he has been chosen to receive the 2014 UW System Board of Regents Diversity Award.
The Regents Diversity Award is given to three recipients each year to recognize “institutional change agents that foster access and success for historically underrepresented populations” according to the UW System website. The awards, $5000 each, are given to individuals, teams and units from the many colleges and universities within the system. The program began in 2009 and is a part of the Office of Academic Diversity and Development.
Back in 2007, Professor Haro was instrumental in bringing the federally funded McNair Scholars program to UW-L. The McNair program works with students from low-income families who are first-generation undergraduates and helps them prepare for the rigors of graduate school. Currently, Professor Haro is director of the program and it was because of this important work that he was nominated for the award.
In his interview with the La Crosse Tribune, Haro said it was an honor to receive this award but he also noted that his colleagues have played a huge role in working to inspire this next generation of high-level degree seekers. “It’s an amazing program,” he said. “I get to work with a lot of other great faculty and staff. I have the same aspirations for those students.”
Every year, the McNair program helps 28 UW-L students by providing them with faculty mentorship and undergraduate research opportunities, often including $2,800 stipends. At a time when more and more of our students are entering graduate school as the first ones in their families ever to do so, programs like this one are making great strides in helping them succeed.
Professor Haro himself was the first in his family to go off to college. His father was a waiter and his mother was a secretary in inner-city San Francisco. He notes that he probably never would have become a professor if he had not had some very generous help from some graduate students who helped him to realize his aspirations and put his trepidation aside. Now he spends his time helping students who were in the same situation he was all those years ago.
UW-L Chancellor Joe Gow says that Haro is “very passionately dedicated to mentoring traditionally underrepresented and first generation students.” It was that passion that made him an easy choice for the Regents Diversity Award.
This year’s other award winners are Dr. Brett Carlton Woods of the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater and the Pre-college Enrichment Opportunity Program for Learning Excellence (PEOPLE) from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
We need more people like Roger Haro who are willing to help those who find themselves in an unfamiliar academic situation and to ease the transition from undergrad to graduate school or even high school to college. At some point in our lives we all were in that same position of being “new” and we can use the lessons we learned to help others who come after us.
So congratulations to you, Professor Haro. And a big thank you to the UW System for alerting me to this important achievement. Keep up the good work and continue to be a Hometown Hero.
Hometown Hero is a regular feature put together by Rep. Steve Doyle (D-Onalaska). If you have any suggestions of a Hometown Hero, send a short description of why you think this person should be a Hometown Hero and contact information of both you and the nominee to rep.doyle@legis.wisconsin.gov.