GHC Helps Change Lives: Congratulations to Kristi Maldonado

Posted on: Mar, 2, 2020

GHC’s first recipient of the Transforming Lives Award, given by the WA State Community Colleges Trustees for the past 9 years. As a teenager in the 1990s, Kristi came out and was soon locked out of the family home. They moved to WA, met their partner who was attending GHC. Kristi enrolled at the College in 2014, unemployed, receiving financial aid and food stamps, plus they worked with Jen Gillies and received BFET funds and lead a group to create the Diversity & Equity Center as it is now in the HUB. During that first year at GHC, they were nominated by 4 instructors for the Academic Development Award, for dedication and courage. Now they are completing a BA degree focused on Integrated Strategic Communications/Sociology minor from WSU, with plans for a Masters in Communications. With their efforts as drag king persona Ceasar Hart, they explain that, “I have helped the local community to teach tolerance and acceptance of all humans and their equal rights.”