Joanne Harris-Duff remembers arriving as an undergraduate at Virginia’s Bridgewater College and feeling overwhelmed as a first-generation college student.

“I have four siblings and we’re all first gen students, and we all received our advanced degrees,” said Harris-Duff, whose parents owned a pig farm in Virginia and also both worked full-time jobs to support the family. “That’s something I’m really passionate about. If you’re a first generation student of color, it can be a pretty daunting experience for students.”

Harris-Duff will start work on Wednesday, May 23, as Stetson’s new director of Diversity and Inclusion. Among her goals: Expand programs to increase retention of first-gen students at Stetson.

She arrives from her alma mater, Bridgewater College, a small private liberal arts college in the Shenandoah Valley, where she was the director of the Center for Diversity Education and Advocacy since 2015.

While at Bridgewater, she assisted students in creating five new cultural student organizations, and she created the first early-orientation program aimed at increasing retention of first generation students and students of color. The program has been Bridgewater’s most successful retention program to date and resulted in a 96 percent retention rate of students enrolled in the program for 2016, according to an email from Savannah-Jane Griffin, Stetson’s director of Community Engagement and Inclusive Excellence.

Harris-Duff, now married with two children, said she heard a lot of good things about Stetson through the years from a close friend, Stetson alumna Amy Narvy ’99, Political Science. It was Narvy who encouraged her to apply for the job at Stetson.

“I was so impressed with the work that Stetson was already doing,” Harris-Duff said. “In this culture climate in our country right now, people sometimes can get stifled and be afraid to work toward change – social justice, in particular. But Stetson has been right at the forefront in making sure students on campus and people in the surrounding community understand the university’s commitment to diversity and inclusion.”

Harris-Duff replaces Cecil Chik, the former director of Diversity and Inclusion, who moved to California with her wife.

Before working at Bridgewater College, Harris-Duff was the director of Diversity and Advocacy at Mary Baldwin University in Virginia from 2013-2015. While there, she led two successful LGBTQ initiatives which helped the college be recognized as the most LGBTQ-Friendly College in Virginia by eCollegeFinder. Her program, called the Safe Zone House and the Safe Zone program, were cited when Mary Baldwin University made the exclusive list.

In 2013, she and her spouse, Jessica, were named plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit challenging Virginia’s ban on marriage for same-sex couples. Her publication entitled, “Just Like Other Couples — But Without Rights,” details her family’s journey toward winning the right to marry in Virginia. They are the parents of two children: 9-year-old son, Jabari, and 12-year-old daughter, Jazzmyn.

Harris-Duff has a bachelor’s degree in English from Bridgewater and a master’s degree in Social Sciences from Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia. After she and her four siblings all completed college, Harris-Duff’s mother earned her bachelor’s degree and then, at age 58, her master’s degree. “I am who I am because of her,” Harris-Duff said.

“I am honored to join the Stetson University community,” she added. “The welcome my family and I have received has been wonderful. I’m looking forward to working with a team of people who are not only dedicated to inclusive excellence, but who are also kind, thoughtful and creative. My family and I are looking forward to being Hatters!”