Sandy Monge - Excellence in Global Education: Special Recognition!

Sandy Monge is an undergraduate student studying Applied Medicine and Rehabilitation. This Salvadorian-American student is the president of the Hispanic Latino Alliance after only being here at Indiana State University for two years. As president, Sandy has accomplished quite a lot on campus to promote Hispanic and Latin culture and heritage, and through this she has made a big name for this organization. In the fall semester, Sandy organized a DACA march in which she had several members and community members speak on their experiences with DACA recipients. Furthermore, earlier in the Spring semester, Sandy and her organization spent days rallying students on campus to call their representatives to change the bill regarding the “Dreamers” and their futures in the United States. Throughout the year, she has held several “Latin Dance Night” events where she and her members teach authentic Latin dances to anyone who comes. This event was not the only one that highlighted culture and heritage. In the spring semester, Sandy organized the Hispanic Latino Global Night rightly named “Back to the Roots”. She hopes that in the future, she will lead the organization to bigger and greater things such as: forming relations with other student organizations at ISU, creating Latino Conferences in collaboration with other schools to promote Latino/Hispanic education and create more events to highlight their culture and heritage. As president, she was asked to attend the Presidents Retreat, which gave her the opportunity to “know what type of leader [she is] and understanding [her] strengths and accepting [her] weaknesses”. To Sandy, being a leader means “listening to everyone’s input before making a final decision [and] making every member of the group feel valued”. Her vision is to one-day work as a neonatal therapist to help premature babies, and also to open her own physical therapy clinic and work with FIFA (International Federation of Association Football) as a physical therapist. Sandy became interested in physical therapy to work with patients one on one and create personal relationships with them, while exercising and doing therapeutic modalities in order to help relieve pain and help them go back to their normal lives without the injury. Although Sandy works hard every day to promote social justice and Latin/Hispanic culture on campus, she still finds time to hang out with her friends around the Terre Haute area to catch up with them and relax.

Past Recepients