“We’re so fortunate; we have so many freedoms,” said Cindy Ho, coach of the women’s golf team. “Someone from another country comes over here, and they’re like, ‘Wow.'”

The United States has established its reputation in the world as a constantly evolving blend of different cultures, ethnicities and races. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the population of the United States was 308,700,000 as of 2010. Of that population, about 72.4 percent are white, 12.6 are African American, 4.8 are Asian, American Indians and Alaska Natives make up 0.9 percent, and Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders comprise 0.2 percent.

So how does UNC Wilmington’s student body stack up against the diverse population of the United States?

“It depends on how you want to define (diversity) and measure that,” Ho said. “Compared to another university, we may be lower, but it’s not from lack of trying.”

Ho, a native of British Columbia, is the daughter of Chinese immigrants. Her father came to Canada around 1954 to work on the intercontinental railway, leaving the rest of his family behind. In the mid-1960s, Ho’s mother left Hong Kong to travel to Canada where her brother was working with Ho’s father at the railway company. Ho’s parents met through her mother’s brother and after dating for two years, they married. Ho was born in 1968.

Ho grew up in Victoria, a large city with a substantial Asian population. “I grew up with people of all different nationalities in my high school,” she said. “My neighborhood had a large Chinese population, and so you didn’t really feel out of place, and when you’re growing up, that’s big.”

Ho left Victoria to attend Lamar University in Texas on a golf scholarship, where she says the shift in racial culture was palpable. In Canada, Ho had not felt out of place. At Lamar she found herself in the minority, and at times she witnessed racism that opened her eyes.

“It was more from just people not understanding,” she continued. “I had to realize that people just don’t understand; they’ve never had a relationship or friendship with people who are multicultural.”

Now, Ho says, diversity has become commonplace—something our global media and technology may have aided. “When I was a kid, you watched ‘Leave it to Beaver’ and ‘I Love Lucy,’ ‘The Partridge Family’…every family was the same,” Ho said. “Now, media is inclusive of different races’ cultures, and you’re being exposed to it more.”

According to CollegeBoard.org, there are 11,700 undergraduate students and 1,301 graduate students at UNCW. Here, 83 percent of students are white, 6 percent are Hispanic or Latino, 3 percent are African American, 2 percent are Asians, and the rest is made up of American Indian, Alaska Natives, Hawaiian and multiracial students. In any classroom, the disparity between minority races and the Caucasian student body is easy to see.

One of our biggest programs at UNCW is the business school. Does that play a role in demographics? “To a degree, that would affect it,” Ho said. “When you think of the people in business, and what attracts people to business in that major and the sciences…if we were more in the arts, you may see a totally different population. I think we’re a lot smaller, we’re a smaller city, we’re a smaller school…I think that in a large school you have more opportunity to have diversity.”

However, Ho believes UNCW is making strides. “I know we go out to communities and try to solicit and recruit, and we don’t discriminate,” she added. “I think that’s going to be a challenge of ours.”

Ho acknowledges the unique environment college provides and credits it as a medium in which new generations can be educated on diversity. “Prejudice is a powerful thing,” Ho said. “Bigotry, hate—you’re taught that. College is the one area in time where you have people that are young, they’re educated, they’re more open to learn and more open to things.

“I think that universities have a responsibility to teach and educate and to bring in people from different cultures and races, religions, sexual orientations…this is the one time that you can do that. You have to have an environment that supports that,” Ho said.

Does UNCW have that environment? Despite what our statistics may suggest, yes. “I think this is a great college community that is very inviting, very open,” Ho said. “I have never faced any challenges or obstacles because of my culture or my race while I’ve been here. Everyone has been friendly within the community also, and for 10 years I’ve felt like this is my home.”