Calvin Gets New Dean for Multicultural Affairs

July 9, 2007 == MEDIA ADVISORY

Summary: Dr. Michelle Loyd-Paige, a longtime Calvin professor, is stepping into a new role at the college as dean for multicultural affairs.

Full story, including JPG, see http://www.calvin.edu/news/releases/2006-07/loyd-paige.htm

On a formerly empty wall in her Spoelhof Center office, Michelle Loyd-Paige has hung a large tapestry.

There are nine squares in the piece, the fabric of which came from a thrift store. And while the squares each represent a variety of colors and patterns, what brings them all together is the work Loyd-Paige did last November when she created the tapestry.

On each square she has applied colorful fabric paint in curving lines of gold and silver. Many of the lines bridge the squares, bringing adjacent squares together, while on some squares she has added other accouterments, including some small, but bright gold leaves.

"I like that each square can stand alone," she says, "but I also like how they come together. Together each square is beautiful but when they work together as a whole there's a different kind of beauty there."

It's a fitting metaphor, a visitor points out, for her new work at Calvin, as dean for multicultural affairs, a task which sees her working towards Calvin's stated goal of establishing a campus community committed to multicultural citizenship, anti-racism, reconciliation and restoration.

Loyd-Paige smiles. "I suppose it is," she says nodding.

Her new post, into which she officially stepped on July 1 after serving in 2006-2007 in an interim capacity, is something, she says, she never envisioned for herself.

"I did believe in this position," she says. "I knew how important it was. But I didn't see myself doing it."

But in December 2006, on her annual personal, spiritual retreat, Loyd-Paige did something she does for all major decisions: she made a list of all the reasons she should and shouldn't do the job and then she turned it over to God.

"That's a dangerous thing to do," she says now with a hearty laugh. "So here I am."

Here she is, ready to prod Calvin, to hold it accountable, to cajole, remind, appeal, celebrate and cry.

"I've seen a lot of progress at Calvin when it comes to issues of race and diversity," she says. "From my time here as a student (in the late 1970s) to now there have been a lot of positive changes. I really do believe that this campus is committed to bringing about a more multicultural vision. I also know how difficult it has been to achieve it. And, we're not done. We'll never be done. So I see my job as an important part of what we need to do to keep moving forward."

Contact Michelle Loyd-Paige at 616-526-6239

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Received on Mon Jul 9 10:12:24 2007