A native of Los Angeles, Vusi moved with his family to St. Louis, MO, in the wake of the 1965 Watts Rebellion. Upon his return he attended LA High School and subsequently enrolled at UCLA, where he was a prominent student leader. Building off the blueprint laid out by UCLA students during the late 1960’s, Vusi and his peers helped to shift the paradigm concerning the role of students in campus governance regarding University policies related to investments in Southern Africa during the apartheid era, how student programs are funded and addressing systemic economic and social disadvantages in student admissions and retention rates, faculty hires and course offerings.
A long-time educator, community organizer, since 2006, Vusi is as a Student Affairs Officer at the UCLA Community Programs Office, where he advises student-initiated, student-run community service organizations and serves as a member of the UCLA Student Risk Education Committee, which he co-founded to make it safe for student to volunteer.
Through his current campus and community efforts, Vusi established MLK Remembrance Day occurs the 4th Tuesday of April each year since 2015, to commemorate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1965 visit to UCLA; a program that has impacted nearly 10,000 students K-12 and culminates with honoring a deserving recipient of the James C. Williamson Award designed by renowned local artist Nijel Binns, for their efforts to facilitate equity, diversity and inclusion and to promote the university mission. He has also co-founded the Reel Talk Film Series, TEC Leimert, the Crenshaw Corridor Consortium and the Camp X-S.T.R.E.A.M., a new innovative, collaborative summer program designed to excite P-12 campers about STEM career and learning opportunities.
More recently, inspired by the UCLA Centennial Campaign, Vusi helped launch the UCLA Beloved Community Initiative, which hosts the Beloved Community Luncheon on the third Tuesday of April each on Macy’s Bridge at the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza. This past year the luncheon served to hand out the inaugural UCLA Bridge Builders Award (also designed by Nijel Binns) to UCLA alumni the Hon. Diane E. Watson and aerospace pioneer Shelby Jacobs “for their efforts to engage a diverse community of people and to connected our work and or world to a deeper meaning and a higher purpose.” A son, brother, uncle and father who lives by the motto: “It’s not about the taste. It’s about the purpose.”, Vusi is a vegan and avid recycler who loves researching almost any topic and spends much free time writing poetry, playing with his guitar or reading a good book.