Iowa Campus Contract recognized Central College alumna Carrie Romo with a 2018 Mixing it Up Community Leadership award at the annual Engaged Campus Awards and Summit.

The award honors students, faculty, staff, organizations and alumni for their work in community-campus partnerships, and community service and service-learning programs. ICC received nearly 50 nominations from 12 Iowa colleges and universities. Central’s director for community-based learning Cheri Doane nominated Romo for mentoring first-year students and facilitating discussions about diversity at Central as well as for serving as a peer leader with the Office of Intercultural Student Life when she was a student. Romo also volunteered weekly at an elementary school where she taught Spanish to elementary students.

She is now a middle-school Spanish teacher with Des Moines Public Schools and program coordinator for Dream to Teach, an initiative to increase representation of educators of color in the Des Moines Public Schools.