CLACS Associate Director Emily Holley passed away in September 2025, after more than 20 years of service to the center and to MSU’s broader Latin American and Caribbean community.
Emily was first employed at CLACS beginning in the 1990s, while she was a graduate student. Over the decades that followed, she served in multiple roles that spanned the whole of the center’s activities. After becoming Associate Director in 2013, Emily drew on the expertise she had gained from these varied experiences to play critical roles in strategic planning and successful grant development and administration. As Associate Director, Emily administered the center’s student-facing programming, including FLAS fellowships for graduate and undergraduate students; graduate student field research funding; and undergraduate fellowships for study abroad, internships, or research.
Emily also directed CLACS’ outreach work. Guided by her deep belief in the transformative power of empathy, Emily developed innovative outreach initiatives that immersed Michigan educators in art, literature, and music from Latin America and mentored them in their development of teaching materials that enable their students to begin to understand the daily lives, aspirations, and challenges experienced by people in different Latin American and Caribbean contexts. Emily’s outreach impact also extended well beyond Michigan, as she developed nation-wide programming through her leadership roles in the national Consortium of Latin American Studies Programs.
People with whom Emily collaborated across campus, within the national Latin American Studies community, and throughout her extensive networks in Latin America admired her intellect, strategic thinking, and leadership. They equally appreciated her integrity, sense of humor, and willingness to do the hard work required to support student and faculty success. The kindness and passion that Emily brought to mentoring students and collaborating with colleagues demonstrated how deeply she cared about each of the individuals whose lives she touched over the years.
We are grateful to have had the opportunity to know and work with Emily, and we take solace in the knowledge that the impact of her support for generations of MSU students and scholars will live on in their accomplishments.