Mims Harris: Diversity makes music for life

By Libby James
Correspondent

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"I grew up privileged," said Mims (Miriam) Harris, the oldest of four girls raised on a sheep ranch near Twin Falls, Idaho. "But for a long time I didn't realize how privileged."

As a middle-class, white, heterosexual, she never went hungry, didn't experience prejudice, and had access to a college education financed by her family.

An increasing appreciation of her good fortune led Harris into a life devoted to making things better for those less fortunate around her. During nearly four decades in Fort Collins, Harris has acted on behalf of minority college students and townspeople, low-income parents in search of affordable child care, gays and lesbians, people with disabilities and organizations such as Hospice and Respite Care.

Her awareness of the need for discussion and action was deepened by her positions at Colorado State University and later as a founding partner in a company that provides diversity training.

In 1964, Harris became assistant dean of women at CSU, but it wasn't until 1970 that she found her niche as assistant director of campus activities, the arena where she would spend the next 30 years addressing arts, entertainment and cross-cultural issues. Her responsibilities included advising student government, overseeing outdoor adventure programs and working with various student organizations, sororities and fraternities.

She was instrumental in establishing the International Poster Exhibition at CSU and nurtured the Fine Arts Series on campus. In those days, the Lincoln Center did not exist, and the CSU Fine Arts Series and Fort Collins Symphony were the major providers of entertainment for campus and community. "I had the best job on campus," she said.

In the 1980s, in response to a student body undergoing radical change, Harris became deeply involved in diversity teaching and training. While her commitment to the arts remains strong, she said that cross-cultural issues have been closest to her heart for a long time. For 20 years, she and colleague Barb Kistler worked together to create inclusive, safe and just environments for everyone on campus, regardless of their minority status because of race, gender, sexual orientation, disability or religion. Harris gives credit to Jud Harper, interim CSU president at the time, for his support of their work.

In 1990, Harris began a five-year term as chair of a multi-cultural education team at CSU that conducted training sessions for student organizations, academic departments, deans and faculty members. Its goal was to encourage people to listen respectfully to another's story, withholding judgment, to further better work, play, teaching and advising activities with each other.

The team's task was seldom easy, but there was progress. And the experience Harris gained set in motion a personal journey that led her to revamp previous conceptions and confront new realities.

When she left CSU in 2000, Harris joined with two others to form Harris, McCrillis, Hudgens and Associates to offer diversity teaching and training. The partnership has worked with Poudre Valley Hospital System, Larimer County, the city of Fort Collins, Poudre School District and colleges and universities in Northern Colorado and Denver.

The goal is always to promote safe and inclusive work environments where people listen to multiple points of view and appreciate cultural differences. Disagreement is welcome in a context of respect for each other and in the hope of finding a better way to live in this world.

When the book club Harris belonged to read Barbara Ehrenreich's "Nickel and Dimed: On Not Getting by in America," the members worked to create awareness of the need for affordable child care in the community. Through the organization they formed, Nickels and Dimes for Child Care Assistance, they met with area book clubs and asked them to contribute to the child care center of their choice or to the United Way. They promoted new funding priorities at the federal, state and local levels, worked on political campaigns and encouraged involvement of the Bohemian Foundation in their work. Harris is pleased that Womengive, a new organization in the area, will integrate Nickels and Dimes for Child Care Assistance and thereby avoid duplication of efforts.

As chair of the Northern Colorado Multicultural Corp., Harris works with a range of private and government groups to raise cross-cultural awareness and acknowledge the richness of diversity in the community. It has sponsored a diversity conference, a Martin Luther King celebration and a merchant awareness award for addressing diversity in goods and services.

Retirement isn't part of Harris's vocabulary, but since leaving full-time work at CSU, she has found time to indulge her love of music. A drop-out piano major at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Ore., Harris was born with perfect pitch and took piano lessons as a child. But as a college freshman she couldn't deal with the required number of practice hours. She changed her major, a decision she calls "an annual event," finally graduating in religious studies. By the time she came to CSU in 1964 she had earned a graduate degree at Indiana University in student affairs and higher education.

"From the time I was 5, I fought with my mom over practicing the piano," Harris said. "I just wanted to play my own pieces, but she insisted that I practice the classical music I was supposed to be learning. Mom won the battle, and now I'm glad she did."

The grand piano from her parents' home sits in an extension of her living room. She plays often and delights in spending 10 days each summer with her good friend and fellow piano player, Christy French, in Bennington, Vt., at Sonatina Piano Camp.

"It took us three years on a waiting list to get in, but it was worth it," Harris said. "Twenty-two people - all levels - beginners to performing artists - together in a house with 25 pianos!" The experience includes four hours a day of practice, master and theory classes, mini-lectures, and even a class in new ways to use the pedal.

In Fort Collins, Harris and French work together on the Abby Signature Concert Series in honor of French's late daughter and to benefit Hospice of Larimer County and Respite Care. On June 24, a piano soiree at Jay's in Fort Collins will present six pianists, each playing for a half hour. Harris will be one of them. Last year the four-part series raised $29,000.

For a couple of months every summer Harris escapes to her family cabin in the Idaho woods. There's a 1917 upright piano there, and quiet and a lake. Family comes to join her, and often her sister insists on cooking while Harris makes music.

Long years of working with students, faculty, corporations and political organizations has instilled in Harris a quiet wisdom that powers her commitment to nurture new ways for all kinds of people to work and live together in harmony.

"I love Fort Collins, and I want to give back to this community by promoting the opportunity for everybody, not just some of us, to live here in comfort," she said.

Recently, Harris has become sensitive to differing attitudes toward work among the four generations that now people the workplace.

"We need to acknowledge the differences, form teams and build on the strengths of each generation," she said. "We cannot live and work in isolation. We must collaborate, cooperate and partner, if we are to effect change."

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