Morgan Ransom
Cultural Initiatives Program Coordinator
In 2022, Morgan (they/she) earned their bachelor's degree in Global International Studies with minors in Mandarin Chinese and Business Administration from Loyola University Chicago, and later that year, returned as a full-time staff member within the Division of Student Development. Their passion for social change, academic access, and community building drive her work inside and outside of the institution. During their time as an undergraduate student at Loyola, Morgan’s worked as a resident assistant and QUEST mentor before finishing off their senior year at the John Feliece Rome Center where they interned at the Jesuit Refugee Services headquarters just outside of Vatican City. Now as a full-time staff member within CSIB, Morgan uses their experience as a student to inform and guide their work, with the goal of opening doors and creating opportunities and events for students that will prepare them for their life after their academic journey.
Outside of their work, Morgan is a current graduate student within the philosophy department, studying social philosophy and apply philosophical frameworks to sociological issues. Currently, their interests center on Foucault and Nietzsche, utilizing their work to analyze the relationships between systems of power and access to pleasure.
What brought you to this work and why do you do this work?
As a Loyola Alumna who frequented these spaces in my undergraduate career, CSIB and the mission it follows are a formative part of my academic journey. Being a LUCES mentee and a QUEST mentor helped me professionally, personally, and academically; I owe so much to my mentors and the teams I worked alongside. I returned as a staff member to foster and uplift that mission and the students we serve. Identity-based programming, mentorship, and spaces are foundational to cultivating a sense of belonging, and I aim to nurture those things through my work as a coordinator and programmer. As a first generation BlaQueer academic, I’ve become extremely intimate with the innerworkings of the academy, and the endless ladders needed to be climbed to achieve. My hope is as a staff member and current philosophy graduate student, is to help navigate students towards their goals, understand the rocky terrain they travel on towards their degree, and orient their compass towards their widest, brightest horizons.
What’s something you want students to feel when they enter your space?
I want students to feel empowered and confident when they enter our spaces, completely sure that the ground they walk on and the doors that open for them are meant for them to pass through. My hope is that students enter our spaces owning their identities, their emotions, their hopes and dreams, and feel confident and comfortable in expressing them fully. My great grandma often said that “you’ve gotta walk in the room like God sent you”, and I completely believe that students should take that energy not just into the CSIB resource room or our various programs, but throughout their life as they ‘go forth and set the world on fire’.
Outside of work, what’s something that brings you joy, grounding, or restoration?
To ground myself, I often go to the gym to recenter and recharge myself physically. You’ll probably see me in Halas from time to time (probably listening a podcast or industrial pop). Coming from a long line of academics, scholars, and teachers, reading and writing have always been huge parts of my life. I love writing in my free time and finding a thick novel to sink my teeth into. I love giving out recommendations for books, specifically horror ones. I also enjoy going to locally owned theaters, catching whatever’s buzzing on Letter box or social media and keeping up to date on the cinematic world. I’ve really gravitated to horror over the past few years, and really enjoy dissecting the symbolic and social commentary hidden within the creepy spooky layers of whatever film I’m watching. I also assist in organizing crafting events around the city, centered on skill-sharing and ancestral practices that highlight the crafts long passed down through various BIPOC traditions. Currently, I work in collaging and mosaic tiling, teaching participants about how to use what they already have to create something new.