The New Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Committee

The Equity, Diversity and Inclusion committee held its inaugural meeting on October 20, 2020. The following faculty, staff and students will help move this important work forward:

Chicago: Faculty Chair of Bioscience, Zenzile Pearson (Staff Student Advisor), Ouinette (Afiba) Wallace (Student)

San Diego: Aimee Holdwick (Faculty Chair Department of Professionalism), Ivy Pratt (Student), Beatrice Smith (Staff, VP Financial Aid)

New York: Seanna Sifflet (Faculty), Steven Kendrick (Staff, Student Advisor), Xinlin Zhang, Zakiya Cush (Students)

This committee will be chaired by Steven Kendrick and Zakiya Cush has agreed to be secretary.

The overarching goals of the committee are:

GOALS

1. Review needs assessment for EDI at the college
2. Recommend strategic initiatives in alignment with the college strategic plan with annual goals to improve practices related to recruitment, retention, and promotion of diverse faculty, staff, and students.
3. Promote knowledge, skill, and institutional practices toward diversity, equity, and inclusion.
4. Review existing and proposed curriculum related to EDI
5. Maintain an active line of communication with the Office of Institutional Research (OIR) in analyzing data regarding institutional diversity.

Current Initiatives and Tasks

Current tasks for this committee will be making a recommendation on the use of “Cracking the Code” as a tool to launch discussions on racism and creating an institutional learning outcome that will impact all programs.

“Cracking the Codes”

This is a film created by World Trust that asks America to talk about the causes and consequences of systemic inequity. Designed for dialogue, the film works to disentangle internal beliefs, attitudes and pre-judgments within, and it builds skills to address the structural drivers of social and economic inequities. Cracking the Codes supports institutions and communities to deepen and shift the framing of racial disparities. The current conversation is not only shallow, but actually harmful. We continue to primarily focus on individuals, when institutional and structural inequities are the bigger problem.

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