The Shocker Support Locker, Wichita State’s student food pantry, will be renamed after Kiah Duggins, a WSU alum and victim of the Flight 5342 collision earlier this year. The announcement came alongside Kiah receiving the Young Alumni Award at the annual Heritage Gala.
The initiative to name the support locker after Duggins came from the Student Government Association. When Duggins was a student at WSU, she was in SGA and was largely responsible for the creation of the Shocker Food Locker — later named Shocker Support Locker — which aimed to help students with food insecurity have access to groceries for free.
“My heart is heavy and proud at the same time,” Kiah’s mother, Gwen Duggins, said.
The Shocker Support Locker will be named the Kiah Duggins Shocker Support Locker pending Student Senate approval.
Along with the renaming of the support locker, Kiah was posthumously awarded the Young Alumni Award from the WSU Foundation and Alumni Engagement. The award goes to WSU alumni under the age of 35 that the foundation feels demonstrate “leadership in their professional field or whose achievements have been significant in their community,” according to the foundation’s website.
“I know that she would have been very excited to be acknowledged by Wichita State,” Gwen said. “And we’re blessed to be here to be able to accept the award on her behalf.”
Vice President of Alumni Engagement for the foundation, Stacie Williamson, said that the idea for the name change was presented by SGA, then was passed to University President Richard Muma to approve.
“This was something that had to happen to honor Kiah and her heart and passion and soul for food insecurities — for our students that they’re facing,” Williamson said. “I think it’s just a beautiful thing that we get to continue honoring her and something that she started.”
While SGA and the WSU Foundation and Alumni Engagement had asked Kiah’s parents, Maurice and Gwen, prior to announcing the name change, the news came as a surprise to Kiah’s other family members who were in attendance Thursday evening.
“The entire family is here,” Maurice said. “Along with some of our very close friends who were also…”
“… Who were also Shockers,” Gwen continued. “They were all at Wichita State at the same time.”
For the name change to be official, the Student Senate must vote on it at its weekly meeting on Oct. 15.
Outside of SGA, Kiah was involved in the Student Ambassador’s Society at Wichita State.
After graduating from WSU, Kiah went on to study at Harvard Law School, work as a civil rights lawyer for the Civil Rights Corp, intern at the White House under the Obama Administration, and ran a mentorship program underrepresented female high school students called “The Princess Project.”
“All of those types of things (that Kiah did) were less about her and more about her wanting to better the community around her,” said Jessica Newman, an assistant professor at WSU’s Elliott School of Communication who was an admissions representative when Kiah was in the Student Ambassador’s Society.
In February, shortly after the collision, Newman told The Sunflower, “She’s always seemed very grounded, even though she excelled in pageants, even though she went on to be this incredible civil rights attorney, she always seemed grounded, and I feel like she always had her core community at the heart of everything she did.”
In late January, Kiah was on a flight back to her home in Washington D.C. from Wichita after a family visit, and the plane she was on collided with an Army Blackhawk helicopter over the Potomac River. Kiah — along with everyone aboard the plane and helicopter — lost her life on Jan. 29.
“She just cared deeply for people,” Williamson said. “It shows through what’s continuing on through the support locker, and she’s just a blessing to everybody.”
