University of San Diego Magazine: Those at Our Core - Ethical Conduct and Compassionate Service

Ariela Canizal ‘17 (MA) talks about student connection

In Spring 2023, the USD Board of Trustees adopted updated vision and mission statements for the university. This year, USD celebrates 75 years as an anchor institution — 75 years being a part of the community and 75 years working alongside its neighbors near and far to make the world a better place.

The updated vision and mission speak to the community’s deep commitment to service and compassion. USD’s mission states that “we are advancing academic excellence to create a more inclusive, sustainable … and hopeful world.” The vision states that “strengthened by the Catholic intellectual tradition, we confront humanity’s challenges by fostering peace, working for justice and leading with love.” 

Those aren’t just catchy taglines or lofty goals. 

Those words, chosen with the utmost care, are the university’s true north. They inform decisions, directions and strategy. The vision and mission are embodied through six core values — academic excellence, Catholic identity, human dignity, care for our common home, ethical conduct and compassionate service, and inspired and meaningful lives. 

In the story that follows, you’ll learn more about the meaningful and inspiring ways through which one Torero lives out USD’s mission, vision and values.

Ariela Canizal ‘17 (MA) has come full circle. The only child of immigrant parents in Los Angeles, she worked hard to get to college. But Canizal didn’t do it alone. She had important mentors along the way. 

Now, as USD’s director of community and leadership development, she fulfills a similar role for commuter and first-generation college students, helping them forge a new life on campus. 

“At the end of the day, it’s all about connecting the students to the resources that are here for them,” said Canizal, who is also a PhD student in leadership studies at the university. “However, it’s not enough just to make sure they graduate. It’s teaching them how to navigate the world, how to make socially just, civil discourse decisions, and how to be a good human.” 

In her current role, she oversees four initiatives. One entails creating programs to onboard commuter students and ensure they experience the campus the same way residential students do. She also co-chairs a team to support students who, like her, are the first in their family to attend college. 

In addition, Canizal runs a financial wellness initiative so students understand the full range of options for funding their education. On top of all that, she teaches an undergraduate class on leadership. 

Teaching made her reflect on ethics, because while Canizal acknowledges that she loves working with students and they think she’s cool, she is still an authority figure who has to hold them accountable. 

Her job is a natural extension of her previous role as a retention specialist in the university’s Office of Student Support Services. That role focused on advising first-generation students on classes, scholarships and internships, as well as coaching them through challenges, including imposter syndrome. 

“I was there to basically pop that bubble of self-doubt and self-intimidation and let them know they deserved to be here,” she said. “They worked hard to get here, and my job was to show them how to take full advantage of it.” 

Canizal knows what it’s like to be that student. “I’m a Latina, raised in Boyle Heights near downtown L.A. I was always told I was never going to leave.” 

But she did, securing a full scholarship to Marymount Manhattan College in New York. 

She credits her own academic success to helping hands. Not only her parents, who believed in her, but also her high school guidance counselor, as well as compassionate faculty members and student affairs leaders — many of them women and people of color — during her undergraduate and graduate career. 

Now she’s passing it on. 

The students she interacts with are not at the university just to get a degree and land a good job but to make a difference in people’s lives. They want to go back to their communities and say, “Hey, I did it. Let me show you how.” 

With Canizal as a role model, they already have a head start.

– Story by Bonnie Nicholls