Alumnus focuses research on race, ethnicities

Domingo Morel is a lecturer in the department of Political Sciences at Wellesley College, whose research program and teaching portfolio focus on racial and ethnic politics.

Morel is a University of Rhode Island alumnus who went on to receive a Master’s Degree in Political Science from Rhode Island College and later received his PHD from Brown University. During his time at URI, Morel was a member of the Talent Development Program —commonly referred to as TD— and studied Human Development and Family Studies with a minor in what was then called African American Studies but has recently been reworked into Africana Studies.

Before Lecturing at Wellesley, Morel worked in higher education for eleven years, was an Academic Advisor for the Talent Development Program at URI for seven years, and was an Admissions Officer at RIC for four years. As an Academic Advisor for TD, Morel was responsible for recruiting potential students from city school districts all over Rhode Island from low-income communities that otherwise might not have been afforded the opportunity of attending college. Morel spent most of his time recruiting in Providence and Central Falls and says that “TD recognizes students from low income families, most often people of color, and we encourage them to consider going to college and then we provide them with the financial support they need to make it happen.”

In addition to recruitment, Morel, amongst other advisors, had a caseload of students that each needed to be met with weekly for advising, support, and just someone to talk to.

“TD is like a family, every student gets an advisor, but students also see different advisors and advisors see different students both formally and informally to touch base and make sure they’re receiving the support they need either with filling out financial aid, registering for classes, deciding on a major, or personal matters.” Morel said.

As a former member of Talent Development, Morel is still very connected to the community, saying “it’s a part of my life, we call it TD Nation and I’m very much still a part of it.”

Morel refers to his close friends, most of which he met through his time in TD, saying the program is a “mechanism, a vehicle for getting into college. Something most people—my close friends and I included—would not have had access to. It gave us the opportunity to consider college and the advising we needed once we got in to stay in and graduate.”

Morel refers to his life as a “testament” of Talent Development, crediting his academic achievements to the support TD provided him with; he retains a lot of his friendships and connections with the program and even met his wife of eleven years, Lisa Abreu Morel, during his senior year of TD. “We just celebrated our eleventh wedding anniversary and have two beautiful daughters together. That’s the story for most of my friends; they all met their spouses through TD” Lisa works at URI as an Academic Advisor for the College of Business.  

“TD started in 1968 to give 13 students of color the opportunity to go to college and has grown into a program that accepts over 500 students a year. It provides students the chance at an education and is an important program for URI to support because it changes lives,” Morel said. “It changed my life. It changed my wife’s life. It changed our close friends’ lives.”