7 minute read
President’s DEI Task Force
Year One of the President’s DEI Task Force Follows a Road Map for Change
In January of 2021, the President’s Task Force on DEI was assembled to further FNU’s mission to become an antiracist University. The Task Force is Chaired by Dr. Geraldine Young and is charged with identifying, implementing, and evaluating initiatives that will address DEI and antiracism within our community. The goal of the Task Force is to enhance FNU’s Culture of Caring to make equity, respect, and belonging a reality. The Task Force works collaboratively with the community at large and includes members from the administration, faculty, staff, and students.
Advertisement
The Task Force is specifically charged with creating a comprehensive action plan and facilitating the implementation of each item on the action plan. To accomplish its many action items, the Task Force implemented a roadmap structure which was used to establish a set of subcommittees. The Task Force identified and recruited chairs and cochairs for each of the subcommittees. Faculty, staff, and students were then recruited to join those subcommittees. Once the committee rosters were full, the subcommittees each began meeting on a regular basis and set about creating a work plan and structure.
“The President’s DEI Task Force is intensely focused on evaluating Frontier’s current policies and practices, and identifying areas in need of improvement,” said FNU President Dr. Susan Stone. “Through data analysis and input from members of all factions of the FNU community, the Task Force and its subcommittees are making informed decisions to make immediate changes that will drive us toward our goal to become an antiracist University. In order for Frontier to fulfill its mission, this is a goal that we absolutely must and will achieve.” As demonstrated below, each of the subcommittees has hit the ground running, defining goals and objectives that guide their current and future decisions and actions. The subcommittees take direction from the President’s DEI Task Force and report regularly to the Task Force on the progress toward the stated goals and objectives, many of which are already complete or in progress.
Purpose: In partnership with the President Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Taskforce, the Faculty, Staff, and Preceptors Development and Retention subcommittee will:
1. Collaborate with the necessary stakeholders to plan and facilitate diverse training opportunities to foster diversity, equity, and inclusion at
FNU. The training opportunities are to ensure that all FNU community members are informed and are poised to engage in equitable, safe, and brave dialogues related to DEI.
2. Provide a framework to guide faculty and preceptors on sound teaching principles on how to adopt an Anti-
Racist pedagogy in their courses.
Subcommittee on Curriculum and Learning
Goal: Define, evaluate and refine the components and barriers to an inclusive, diversity responsive curriculum, based on stakeholder responses.
Objectives:
• Created a framework to guide the focus group discussions
• Students, staff, and faculty focus groups hosted in the Spring 2021 term.
• Evaluation of the identified themes from the focus group.
• Evaluate the curricula for the identified themes.
• Develop a plan to implement curriculum revisions.
Who: Faculty, staff, students.
• Two sessions for each group [faculty (2), staff (2), students(2)]
• Two different times for each group and hosted on two different days.
Subcommittee on Climate and Belonging
Goal: Disseminate diversity, equity, inclusion, and antiracism support throughout the University.
Objectives:
• Determine the need for the most significant diverse Special Interest
Groups (SIGs).
• Create forum(s) held on anti-racism, diversity, equity, and inclusionrelated topics.
• Provide diverse support groups and/or access to other educational programs through collaborative partnerships (local, state, and national organizations or SIGs).
• Design and/or adopt climate surveys to assess for a safe culture of caring and belonging.
Goal: Develop a comprehensive student retention program
Objectives:
• Establish a student self-assessment tool to identify personal barriers that potentially impact learning that can guide a success coordinator/coach to develop intervention strategies to mitigate the self-identified barriers.
• Develop a robust mentoring program oriented around lifestyle attributes that impact student resilience to increase positive student help-seeking behavior.
• Mechanism to intentionally root the foundations of the culture of caring and FNU’s commitment to integrating
DEI into the clinical experience. For example: communicating expectations with preceptors, strengthening assignments regarding systemic racism in the clinical setting, professional reporting of incidents of racism, bias, and power imbalance.
• Financial aid resources that assist all students to identify scholarship opportunities that reflect their individual financial needs
Goals:
• Review existing policies/statements and identify new policies/statements using a diversity, equity, and inclusion lens where needed to advance DEI at FNU. • Develop an evaluation process to assess
FNU’s progress toward improving diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Objectives:
• Review the university mission and vision statement.
• Work with appropriate committees and units to identify and create new institutional policies where needed to advance DEI at FNU.
• Identify changes needed in current policies/handbooks.
• Review the existing DEI Dashboard metrics and formalize a process for communicating the DEI scorecard data with the FNU community on a regular basis.
• Create a DEI evaluation plan for the task force to assess progress toward improving diversity, equity, and inclusion for students, faculty, and staff
• Create and implement a standard set of diversity, equity, and inclusion questions for routine student and employee surveys
Goals:
• Identify and develop financial and organizational resources to support the work of the Task Force.
• Recognize the work of individuals or groups who have made outstanding contributions toward the achievement of Task Force objectives.
Objectives:
1. Identify alternative funding for DEI initiatives. (S&L)
a. DEI focused grants
b. DEI donor opportunities
2. Develop a proposal for an ombudsman-type of service for faculty/staff/students (L)
3. Develop staff mentoring program(s)
4. Evaluate web/portal/documents for
ADA compliance
5. Develop a plan for Equity Awards
Goal 1: Increase the number of faculty and staff of color and other underrepresented and rural groups by December 2022 focusing on the following:
a. American Indian or Alaska Native
b. Asian
c. Hispanic or Latino
d. Native Hawaiian or other
Pacific Islander
e. Black or African American
Objectives:
1. Select committee members that will consist of two faculty members, two staff members, and two students.
2. Committee members will identify graduate nurse practitioner programs to proactively recruit faculty and market FNU focusing on underrepresented groups.
3. Committee members will identify 3-5 job fairs to proactively recruit staff and market FNU focusing on underrepresented groups.
4. Create a faculty and staff hiring committee to develop an evaluation/ screening process to identify underrepresented and rural applicants. (i.e. Applicant Screening and Interview training)
5. Create a strategic plan to move recruiting for faculty and staff to Human Resources. Potential outcomes will be establishing a hiring committee to review self-identified underrepresented and rural applicants and/or hiring an HR recruiter to review self-identified underrepresented and rural applicants and proactively search for underrepresented applicants.
6. Increase print and digital advertising targeting to promote a diverse culture of FNU employees to post on FNU career pages by December 2021.
Goal 2: Increase the number of students of color and from other underrepresented and rural marginalized groups.
Objectives:
1. Provide new scholarship opportunities targeting students of color for both prospective and current underrepresented and rural students (include in marketing efforts)
2. Focus recruitment at conferences, events, and undergrad universities (especially HBCUs) targeting nursing programs and health career fairs (at least 2 new events selected and plan developed)
3. Increase print and digital advertising targeting diverse students (at least 2 new ad campaigns placed)
4. Include diverse imagery of underrepresented and rural groups used across all university communications
5. Updated frontier.edu external website to reflect over-arching DEI efforts
DEI Task Force Members
Chair: Geraldine Young Paula Alexander-Delpech Dionisia Anderson Angela Bailey Stephanie Boyd LaToshia Daniel Elliott Fields Abby Hollander Brittney Kinison Marilyn Lyons Rachel Mack Linda McDaniel Charlotte Morris Audrey Perry Joan Slager Susan Stone Chris Turley
Subcommittee Members
Faculty, Staff, and Preceptor Development and Retention Subcommittee
Chair: Paula Delpech Co-Chair: Stephanie Boyd Tia Andrighetti Erika Campos Audra Cave Kathy Gardner Dwynn Golden Andrea Hiles Jennifer Howard Jeneen Lomax Erin Tenney Heidi Loomis Laura Manns-James Samana Upadhyaya Curriculum and Learning Subcommittee
Chair: Rachel Mack Co-Chair: Audrey Perry Tanya Belcheff Shailah Bevan Mary Ellen Biggerstaff Amanda Carstens Nikita Garrett Loy Watson Kate Woeber
Climate and Belonging Subcommittee
Chair: Geraldine Young Co-chairs: Chris Turley and Elliot Fields Millicent Edgar Elliott Fields Tamra Geryk Kristin Gianelis April Haneline Mary Jones Robyn Roche-Paull Chris Turley
Retention of Underrepresented Students Subcommittee
Chair: Linda McDaniel Co-chair: Abby McCarthy Bunmi Akinmowo Parris-Marie Cannon Autumn Grace Abdoulie Jallow Policies, Statements, Reports, Reviews, Planning, and Evaluation Subcommittee
Chair: Marilyn Lyons Co-Chair: Charlotte Morris Siana Brown Andrew DeZarn Jan Engstrom Bridgett Lyall Niessa Meier Janice Ponstein Sydney Oliver Kayla White
Infrastructure, System Strengthening, and Capacity Building Subcommittee
Chair: Joan Slager Co-Chair: Angie Bailey Katheryn Arterberry Lisa Chappell Cynthia Edwards-Tuttle Michael Steinmetz April Tabor Madeleine Wentzel
Recruitment across the Entire University Subcommittee
Chair: Brittney Kinison Co-Chair: LaToshia Daniel Vicky Burslem Jelena Djuricic Keife Earley Sydney Oliver Jennifer Rockwern Doreen Thomas-Payne
