Congratulations to the College of Humanities’ Outstanding Senior for Spring 2026, Marisol Marquez Perez!
A first-generation student, Marquez Perez is graduating with a B.A. in Applied Humanities, Public Health emphasis, and a minor in Classics, with plans to continue to graduate school in public policy.
Matt Mars, Professor and Head of the Department of Public and Applied Humanities, nominated Marquez Perez for the award, writing that he first met her when he was lead faculty for the Dorrance Scholarship Innovation Program, and she and her group developed an AI-driven model for providing first-generation college students with timely support within resource scarce university environments.
“Marisol consistently pushed herself and her teammates to take on the intellectual challenge and rigor of leading innovation and change,” he wrote. “She consistently demonstrated a range of humanities-based skills, such as compassion and empathy, critical thinking, and strategic storytelling, throughout the development and presentation phases of the project. Marisol clearly and convincingly showed that the humanities are be not only relevant, but highly effective devices relative to entrepreneurship and innovation.”
Outside the classroom, Marquez Perez served over the last year as Chief of Staff & Policy Director for the Associated Students of the University of Arizona. Last summer, she interned in the Phoenix office of Sen. Ruben Gallego, providing bilingual assistance and tracking constituent casework files and assisting with issues involving federal agencies. In spring 2025, she was an intern at the Arizona State Senate, staffing the Military Affairs and Border Security Committees.
“In my career I want to build public policy that actually works for people, specifically by expanding healthcare access and protecting immigrant families,” she said. “As an Applied Humanities major with a public health emphasis, I’ve learned that you can’t fix a system if you don’t understand the humans inside it. My studies have pushed me to look past what a policy says on paper and ask ‘Who does this leave behind? And why? This human-centered lens is exactly what I plan to bring to graduate studies in public policy.”
In her convocation address, Marquez Perez told fellow graduates about studying abroad during her sophomore year, walking into Sainte-Chapelle in France for the first time, not realizing at the time how much that experience would shift the way she sees the world.
“What stood out was not just the beauty, but the weight of what was being communicated without a single word. Every window panel told a story. Every deep blue and vibrant red had meaning, even if I did not fully understand the history,” she said. “That moment taught me that understanding isn't always about having every answer. Sometimes it’s about being present enough to notice, to sit with something beautiful or uncomfortable, and to recognize meaning even when you don’t fully understand it yet.
“It is one thing to learn about history, culture, or inequality in a classroom. It is another to stand in a place where those realities exist and recognize that your perspective is only one version of a much bigger story. And that is when it really clicked for me. This is what the humanities are about.”