Since the opening of the Multicultural Office for Student Access to Inclusiveness and Community (MOSAIC) in 2003, many students from various social, cultural and ethnic backgrounds have stopped by to utilize resources that the office has to offer. As a result of this extensive use by students, MOSAIC will be expanding to twice its current size.
MOSAIC has been working to find more space to accommodate the growth of multicultural students on campus. Through multiple petitions and meetings with Chancellor Venkat Reddy over this past summer, they were finally approved to move forward with creating a larger space.
For over 17 years, MOSAIC has strived to advocate for underrepresented social and cultural groups of students. Assistant Director of MOSAIC Anthony Cordova has been a part of the organization since the beginning and continues to help students thrive. “Whoever wants to have some support and would like somebody to advocate for them, that I usually tag on to,” Cordova said.
Cordova shared that, for many years, there has not been enough room to accommodate so many members. “There’s never been enough,” he said.
With campus and student enrollment continuing to expand, it was only a matter of time before an organization like MOSAIC began their expansion too.
When MOSAIC began in 2003 — originally known as the Office of Student Multicultural Affairs (SMA) — the expansion of the organization itself was unpredictable. In 2008, the LGBT Resource Center came together with SMA to eventually become MOSAIC.
Since then, other clubs and organizations have begun to work with MOSAIC, such as the Black Student Union, Asian-Pacific Islander Student Union, African Student Association and more. As a result, they have had to schedule times on a whiteboard to share the same space between the many different clubs and organizations.
At this point, the newly expanded space is being designed to fulfill the need for smaller groups, and eventually larger groups, to meet at the same time, public health orders permitting.

Photo by Lauren Rock.