Welcome to St. Louis, Missouri — formerly known as the convergence of two rivers, most recently known as the convergence of two races. We were home to the Ferguson riots — a demonstration of racial tension in our country reaching its boiling point — and are home to historic downtown Ferguson — an unfortunately lesser known district where the Odyssey: UMSL Team grabs a good lunch. So much of St. Louis follows this dichotomy between what is topical and what is true, and somewhere in the midst of it all, nestled off Highway 70, a stone’s throw from where stones were thrown, is the University of Missouri—St. Louis.

Odyssey: UMSL’s home

St. Louis boasts several downtown universities with bustling campuses and glowing legacies. Washington University and St. Louis University are both located here, as well as Lindenwood University and Webster University. While we may not have a medical school on our campus or a café where the 1904 Olympics housed the Queen’s gold, UMSL distinguishes itself from all other universities by exemplifying what I believe to be the best part of St. Louis — the determination and activism of its residents.

UMSL is a commuter campus, let’s get that straight. Since its founding in 1963, UMSL has been a hub for working families and young students to get a quality education close to home. Although in recent years UMSL has grown its on-campus housing options and constructed a new recreation center for students, it retains this identity to this day. UMSL has never been a place of privilege. The families who are establishing legacies at UMSL do so because they received a good education and a chance to succeed here. They put down roots with UMSL’s business connections and stellar faculty and staff. They want their children to have these same opportunities. No one ever attended UMSL because they wanted to bring up their alma mater in a conversation at the yacht club, although with its striking research facilities and nursing and optometry programs, a gorgeous theater, and the St. Louis Mercantile Library, they certainly could. I adore this about UMSL.

Demographics of Ferguson: Diversity of Our Community in North St. Louis

UMSL’s 17,000 students come from around the metropolitan area and across the globe. Graduates reside in all 50 states and 64 countries. When it was established in 1963, UMSL was designed to serve communities with little access to a higher education, including women, first generation college students, veterans, and minorities. This is true today. In the Fall 2015 semester, UMSL boasted students from over 75 different countries. UMSL has continued to receive the Higher Education Excellence in Diversity Honors (HEED) for three years, the longest consecutive streak in the state of Missouri.

Why does this matter?

The diversity of life experience on our campus gives our Odyssey Team strength. Our team members are exchange students acclimating to the American lifestyle, political scientists and gender study students canvasing and demonstrating with local organizations, biochemists conducting research, anthropologists and foreign language students acclimating to other cultures, and so much more. Our team members have part-time and full-time jobs, in addition to being full-time students. We all count our pennies at the end of the day, before we color in Abe Lincoln’s beard and rumble “four score and seven years from now, when I’ve finally repaid my student loans...”

In the past, St. Louis has received a lot of flack for the neighborhood segregation that remains today and the failing school districts in underprivileged areas. We were the scene of nationally-televised police brutality and destruction. What the world does not see is the daily St. Louis. The good—Food Not Bombs St. Louis, Heat Up St. Louis, Kurt Warner’s Winter Warm-Up, Otis Woodard’s Peace Park. The bad—drive-by shootings involving children, unemployment, vacant and crumbling homes along Martin Luther King Blvd and East St. Louis.

St. Louis and its inhabitants are more than just a headline. We are a diverse and active community. If anyone is going to tell you what is happening in St. Louis, let it be the members of Odyssey: UMSL — the people who have been here, in the heart of it all, experiencing every level of it.

Aerial View of Our Home