Arab American and Wayne State University Alumna Rasha Demashkieh is running for an eight-year term on the Wayne State Board of Governors in the Nov. 5 election. 

Demashkieh, a Syrian immigrant who graduated from WSU’s College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences in 1979, said the university played a special role in her life and she wants to help it do the same for others.

“Wayne State is very important to me, as it opened the door for me to become a professional in pharmacy,” she said. “I have a strong belief that if you give a person a solid education, the rest will take care of itself.”

Outside of working as a pharmacist, Demashkieh served on the Port Huron School District Board of Education, the Michigan Civil Rights Commission and the ACCESS Board of Directors. She has volunteered with the Port Huron schools, the American Heart Association and fundraising scholarships for Arab American students.

Demashkieh served on the Port Huron School Board for 13 years, starting in 2003.

“I was always pushing for providing more opportunities, opening more doors, learning about what it’s going to take and how we can make our district even better than it was by offering more classes, offering more ways to expand every student’s horizon and addressing every student’s needs,” she said.

Governor Snyder appointed Demashkieh to the Michigan Civil Rights Commission in 2011. She served until 2019.

“The Michigan Civil Rights Commission was created by the Michigan Constitution to carry out constitutional and legal guarantees against discrimination,” according to the state’s website. “The Commission is charged with investigating alleged discrimination against any person because of religion, race, color or national origin, sex, age, marital status, height, weight, arrest record and physical and mental disability.”

During her time on the commission, she served as co-chair, helped create a report about the Flint Water Crisis and held hearings regarding the intersection of education and race.

WSU plays a huge role in how education is delivered to people in the inner city and to surrounding areas. WSU is very important, and it has an amazing level of diversity that creates a wonderful medium for learning because learning happens inside and outside the classroom. – Rasha Demashkieh

“It (the experience with commission) was light shedding,” she said. “It pointed focus on a lot of issues that have to do with education and how it’s delivered in different communities based a lot of times on race and why is education better in certain areas than others?”

She said she appreciated the diversity of WSU and its location in the heart of Wayne County.

“WSU plays a huge role in how education is delivered to people in the inner city and to surrounding areas,” she said. “WSU is very important, and it has an amazing level of diversity that creates a wonderful medium for learning because learning happens inside and outside the classroom. Student interaction with other students is extremely enriching, and it adds to the level of worldliness, understanding and becoming a better citizen all in all.”

She said her general goal is “to open more doors for more students and to provide the best education possible.”

“WSU has an amazing opportunity with the revival of Detroit and all the businesses that are opening in Detroit,” Demashkieh said. “There’s a lot of opportunities for students to get internships or job placements. It’s wonderful. It’s exciting. This is a perfect time for Wayne State to expand.”

She said ongoing conflict between the BOG and students advocating for Palestine played a part in her wanting to run for the board.

“What is lacking is representation,” she said. “We need to have a voice, because otherwise the conversation is only one side of it… Democracy is based on representation. There is a high percentage of students that are from the Middle East or are Muslim, and they don’t have representation… You need someone to understand your perspective, to understand your issues. It is very important to have somebody that can speak to those issues.”

Demashkieh said freedom of speech is especially important on college campuses.

“The time when you are in college is the time when young people learn about new things and discover new new ideas,” she said. “To curtail that and say, ‘no, we’re not going to talk to you’ when students have issues is not the right approach. Some universities have found a way to have a dialogue with students. So why not Wayne State? I think there is a huge opportunity, especially at Wayne State, to have that dialog, come to an understanding of what the students want and for the students to also understand how a university functions.”

Demashkieh said she wants to see better communication between the Board of Governors and students, faculty and staff.

“It’s up to the other side (administration) to understand you have to listen to these students,” she said. “It’s their right to be heard. Freedom of speech is key and it’s in our constitution. You need to listen to them (students), not just stop them from talking… No one is going to get everything they want, but to get to a consensus, you have to start a conversation.”

She said she would be a voice for the Arab American community as well as WSU students in general.

“I want to be a voice for a great, top-notch education and create many opportunities for future generations,” she said.

There will be two positions open on the board of governors for the Nov. 5 election, as Republican Michael Busuito and Democrat Mark Gaffney complete their eight-year terms and run for re-election. Other candidates include Republican Sunny Reddy.

Demashkieh received her formal education in Damascus, Syria. She moved to Detroit with her husband, Walid, in 1975. She received a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy from Wayne State University. She is currently a pharmacist at CVS Health in Port Huron. She and her husband now reside in Port Huron and have three daughters and five grandchildren.