LETTER FROM OUR VICE PRESIDENT, ROSE PASCARELL
Nurturing Learning, Engagement, and Community
Friends of the Mason Community,
The start of a new academic year at George Mason brings with it a sense of excitement and new beginnings. We returned to a bustling campus life with signature events and activities such as Welcome2Mason the Get Connected Fair, Career Fair, and Family Weekend. We formally welcomed our new students at Convocation in the Eagle Bank Arena, where Doc Nix and the Green Machine instilled a sense of Patriot Pride with the George Mason University Fight Song. Students, staff, and faculty alike have sought out good luck by rubbing George Mason’s bronze toe on the statues displayed at the Fairfax and Mason Korea campuses.
What’s also usual for the start of an academic year is the inevitability of the unexpected. An ever-shifting national and global landscape influences student life in ways we can’t always predict. External factors present students with unique challenges, but also with great opportunities for learning, engagement, and community.
This year, the Dialogue Across Differences (DxD) initiative offers a framework for engaging with students in productive discourse, helping them to find common ground, and gain appreciation for our shared humanity. This work includes a greater knowledge and understanding of freedom of expression in an environment of safety, civility and respect. We are committed to increasing the skills students want and need to navigate with resilience, compassion and innovation to make their own mark on the world.
This issue of Succeed highlights the Mason commitment to increasing student learning, engagement, and community:
- The long-standing Mason Votes initiative has empowered students to be informed and engaged citizens during election season and beyond.
- Inspiring a culture of kindness across the George Mason community through Mason Chooses Kindness.
- Our commitment to inclusive, innovative student engagement through GAMEmason and the expansion of the Esports program.
- A look at how a new Restorative Justice program is helping students to constructively right their wrongs.
- Reflecting on spiritual development to improve student mental health and well-being.
- An introduction to the upcoming Student Activities and Engagement Building, a multi-use facility centered on engaging student organizations, recreation activities, and the Green Machine.
- The evolution of University Life at the Mason Korea campus over the last 10 years.
- A look at the contributions of student leaders and a spotlight on our University Life staff.
- Creative ways alumni and community partners have continued to impact student success.
We continue to transform our University Life division to be more agile and responsive, and we invite you to engage with us as we double down on our commitment to student success in all forms.
I hope you’ll find the stories in this issue as inspiring as I do. Together, we are building a better future where Every Student Succeeds.
With Gratitude,
Rose
Fall 2024 Articles
Click the boxes below to read each featured article from SUCCEED magazine, Fall 2024 Edition.
Empowering student voices
Sedulous Gives Back
Inspire Kindness on campus
Gowns for Grads program empowering students
GAMEmason sparks tech sponsorship
Make it as right as possible
Supporting students’ well-being
New Fairfax Campus Space
Celebrating 10 years of University Life
Doubling impact with increasing enrollment
View our featured student profiles
Zayd Hamid
Manassas Park, VA 2024 Public Administration graduate Master of Public Policy student at Mason’s Schar School
The reach and impact of Mason graduates is not lost on Zayd Hamid, whose undergraduate days lasted only three years while featuring accomplishments that were recognized at the university, state and national levels.
Hamid, who was selected to give the 2024 student commencement address, was the first recipient of Student Advocate of the Year from the National Institute for Lobbying and Ethics, he represented Mason students while speaking to congressional staff at a panel on education affordability led by the Association for Public and Land-grant Universities among other leaders of the Student Aid Alliance.
Along the way, and also while working on election campaigns, he recalls routinely bumping into Mason alumni, who were leading discussions on public policy, education funding and other important issues, a path that he envisions as part of his future as a lobbyist.
“I found the more I dove into the political arena in Northern Virginia and (Washington) D.C., the more I saw Mason graduates shaping the vision for our region and our country,” Hamid said. “They are opening doors to help people like me get there, and I want to be a part of the next step (for future Mason graduates).
“A Mason education prepares people to make an impact, and it’s a powerful brand with people working to solve grand problems that no other university can match. Mason is unique in the breadth and depth of what it offers and how it stays with you for your career.”
Hamid was part of Mason’s student government and Mason Lobbies, which takes students to the state capitol to lobby state legislators on matters that affect Mason students. Those experiences helped crystallize and confirm his political aspirations.
As a first-generation student who paid his own way through Mason’s Honors College, Hamid cherishes the connections he’s made with Mason faculty as well. He says his professors have gone out of their way to prepare and mentor him.
“They are world-renowned and willing to help at every turn,” Hamid said. “It’s inspiring to see how much they care and what they are willing to do to help students.”
Se Na Julsdorf
Busan, South Korea 2024 Mason Korea graduate Conflict Analysis and Resolution with a concentration in Political and Social Action
Sena Julsdorf has experienced the uncertainty, the fear and the anxiety of being a Mason Korea student staring down her year of studies at the Fairfax campus.
Her advice: Embrace it and grow from it.
“It was hard, but I had the mindset to take advantage of every second, every opportunity and every resource that is on campus,” Julsdorf said. “The classes involve more discussion (than is typical in Korean classrooms), and you learn different perspectives by listening to your professors and your peers.
“Mason is a really special place and the people there help take you to places you didn’t even know you could reach.”
Julsdorf, meanwhile, was intent on carving out her own mark in Fairfax and at the Incheon campus. Stateside, she was a Carter School Ambassador, served as a leadership consultant in UL’s Leadership Education and Development office and joined a Korean Calligraphy Club.
She also earned a grant from Mason’s Undergraduate Research Scholars Program to study the perception of multi-culturalism in Korea, a project that is close to her personal development as the daughter of a Korean mother and a Danish father.
Julsdorf extended her LEAD experience when she returned to South Korea with the goal of bringing the campus communities closer. She led workshops and was active in service projects, including planning and coordinating a volunteer effort at an Incheon animal shelter. The UL office and Mason Korea students cared for dogs and seized the opportunity to give back to the community.
“Everything that happens at Mason is opening your eyes to what you can accomplish and how to make a difference,” Julsdorf said. “It’s been extremely exciting to develop my skills with the help of everyone around me.”
Eduardo Vazquez
Alexandria, VA Civil Engineering 2024 Mason graduate
Eduardo Vazquez tells a good joke when he’s talking about his first professional job, even if it takes a second for some to get it.
“It’s nice being on campus when I don’t have any homework,” he deadpans before a prolonged pause and continuing his thought. “It’s a bit of a different experience, for sure, and one that I think is really cool and really unique.”
Vazquez, who was born in Mexico and was a first-generation college student, has a long history with Mason, one that starts in middle school with his involvement in UL’s Early Identification Program, extends to his years at the Fairfax Campus and now continues as a project engineer for “The Bubble,” a solution to Mason’s space crunch for student organizations.
Vazquez was introduced to the HOAR construction firm during a career fair on Mason’s campus. He parlayed that moment into an interview, an internship, and after showing his ability, a job.
It just so happened that his first assignment is a project on Mason’s campus that will increase student engagement by providing more space for students to gather. It’s a need Vazquez can understand from his student days that included being a part of the American Society of Engineers, the Hispanic Student Association and Undocu@Mason, an inclusive environment for undocumented immigrants that engages through education and advocacy.
“My time at Mason was amazing,” Vazquez said. “It was very personal with amazing faculty who helped me all along the way. Mason is such a great school, and I’ve met so many people who are going to be a part of my life forever.
“I had a great experience that I know will continue with me for a lifetime, from my friends and professors to the alumni and beyond. I couldn’t have asked for anything more.”
Rodney Rhodes
Botetourt County, VA 2023 Sport and Recreation Studies graduate Master of Sport Management student in the school of Sports, Recreation and Tourism
While growing up in rural Virginia, Rodney Rhodes’s parents always told him he could win an argument with a rock and that he’d end up talking for a living.
Turns out they were right – at least about his voice turning into a career – as the aspiring sports broadcaster has developed his craft during four years of undergraduate study at Mason and while working to finish his masters in Sports Management in Spring 2025.
“Sports have always been my true passion,” said Rhodes, who completed a 400-hour internship with Mason’s Student Media Sports Broadcasting Team in 2023 and then took the reins as the station’s assistant broadcast director for sports in 2024. “It’s fast-paced, it’s exciting, every day is new, and Mason’s given me so many opportunities to get experience and to learn.”
Rhodes entered Mason because of the Sport Management Program’s reputation for excellence and the university’s setting that took him out of his comfort zone of a small town and into the experience of city living. It was “a no-brainer” to stay for graduate school based on the connections he made and the path he envisioned for success under the tutelage of David Carroll, faculty advisor for Mason’s sports broadcasting team.
“I wouldn’t know anything about sports broadcasting without David, he’s amazing,” Rhodes said. “He’s taken the time to give me direction, showing me that it’s not always just the big things that are important because the little things are so valuable, too.”
That meant learning every role from graphics and camera work to technical directing and doing color commentary for Mason sports teams, including telecasts that stream on ESPN+.
“That’s a big deal, it’s experience that says more than anything on a resume,” he said. “You’ve lived it, and you’ve led it. You don’t get that chance everywhere.”
Graham Harper
Springfield, VA Mechanical Engineering Expected graduation spring 2026
There was a time during Graham Harper’s first year on the Mason campus that he considered leaving the university.
Mason’s Esports program changed his mind and his student trajectory by inserting him into a community where he was comfortable and launching a leadership drive that he hopes will one day land him a career in the aerospace industry, ideally at NASA.
“I’m a competitive person, and I’d always played sports and been in the band, but when I got to Mason, I didn’t have that anymore,” Harper said. “I’d always played Esports as a hobby, and when I joined Mason’s team, I found that there were others who shared my passion and interests in the games and beyond.”
Harper quickly rose to the manager of the Super Smash Bros. Team, and in the fall of 2024, he took over as the president for the entire Esports program, a Registered Student Organization that has about 3,500 unique followers on Discord and 1,000 others on different platforms.
Harper has found Mason’s program to be unique because University Life supports Esports, but the team started as a grassroots venture that grew organically. Other schools, he says, throw money at Esports to build a following.
“Here, it’s everybody working together and building something consistent, and not just chasing the next thing,” he said. “We are a home for students and then we work hard to be the best we can.”
Esports have honed Harper’s leadership skills as he constructs teams that excel in the game but also as a cohesive unit.
“The mental aspects and a player’s ability are important, but you’ve got to get an understanding of peoples’ strengths and weaknesses, their personalities and more. Are they going to help the entire group, or are they not going to lift up their teammates?
“There’s a lot going on, and (the lessons learned are) about way more than a game. What I’ve learned and what my teammates have learned in Esports will follow us for the rest of our lives.”
UNIVERSITY LIFE
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Silver Award for Juneteenth Roundtable
Silver Award for Celebrating FirstGen Week at Mason
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