Student Diversity Council leader YSU resigns

Joe Iesue said it’s time to focus on other
organizations in which
he’s involved.

By HAROLD GWIN

VINDICATOR EDUCATION WRITER

YOUNGSTOWN — The president of the Student Diversity Council at Youngstown State University for the past 31⁄2 years is stepping down.

Joe Iesue, who took the job as a freshman, said he needs to begin devoting some of his time to other organizations in which he has leadership roles.

“He’s done an excellent job,” said Susan Moorer, coordinator of diversity initiatives in the office of Equal Opportunity and Diversity, and Student Diversity Council adviser. “We will certainly miss Joe.”

Iesue led the rebuilding of the council, which was down to just three members when he took the helm.

Today, there are 278 people involved, he said.

The organization is healthy and has helped increase diversity numbers in terms of students and staff and changed the way the university looks at diversity, Iesue said. When he came in, diversity was regarded only as a racial issue, he said. Today, that approach has been broadened to reflect that everyone on campus is diverse in their own way, Iesue said.

He handed in his resignation during a council meeting Wednesday but said he will remain involved, perhaps serving in an advisory capacity.

It’s time to worry about some other organizations, he said, noting that he is president of Phi Kappa Tau fraternity, Youngstown Men Against Rape and the YSU Civic Society. He is also a presidential mentor for YSU.

Iesue, a senior political science and nonprofit leaderships major from Erie, Pa., plans to graduate in fall 2008, and feels that doesn’t leave him much time to fulfill his duties with those other groups.

“Council has been my home since I’ve been at YSU,” he said.

He said he chose to attend YSU because it was less expensive than other schools he considered yet offered the exact programs he wanted.

He said he tried to step down once before, at the end of his second year in office, but council members wanted him to run for a third year.

He did and then was re-elected again in May for a fourth year.

He won’t serve out that term, instead handing his duties over to vice president Rick Vendetti, who will have the option of serving out the rest of the school year or calling for a special election at the end of the semester to select a new president.

gwin@vindy.com