Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: Creating a Home for Everyone

At IUP, we work to ensure that every person–regardless of race, ethnicity, identity, socioeconomic background, age, or any other identifier–is cared for and given opportunities to be successful. In every part of our university, the people of IUP are striving to make diversity, equity, and inclusion just as much a part of our tradition as Homecoming and the Oak Grove.

IUP is a microcosm of the world around us. Our vibrant campus boasts people of all races, religions, and sexual identities, and we come from all over the globe to teach, learn, and work side by side. But because the world around us can sometimes be ugly and divisive, it is imperative for us to create a campus community where everybody feels safe and valued.

A united campus will pull us through hard times and push us toward greatness. But to be united, we need to hear all points of view. We cherish our right to free speech, and we want all of us to feel that our voices can be heard.

We welcome discussions from opposing sides of the political spectrum, because it’s through interpersonal communication that we learn about each other and grow as a community.

But that is not a destination we have arrived at. It is a journey we are on.

“IUP has been a place, for more than a hundred years, where people can go and figure out who they are,” says Elise Glenn, IUP’s chief diversity and inclusion officer and Title IX coordinator. “We give people opportunities to grow and change and be exposed to broader ideas and different people. We are trying to raise the bar for the entire campus community about how we talk about diversity, equity, and inclusion.”

This is not lip service. We know that becoming the university community we aspire to be requires action, and we are taking that directive seriously.

We have created programming to help students connect with their peers who have different backgrounds than their own. We have brought speakers to campus to help guide our work with their expertise. We encourage each other to share experiences to open the eyes and minds of people who have never walked in our shoes–or we in theirs.

One of the more surprising events has been the spread of a book across all levels of the university. Glenn and IUP Chief Marketing Officer Chris Noah realized they were reading So You Want to Talk about Race, by Ijeoma Oluo, at the same time last year, and they found it to be so insightful that they started sharing its lessons with their peers.

Soon, President Michael Driscoll was encouraging members of his cabinet to read it, and that turned into a groundswell where faculty members were reading and talking about the book with their students, who in turn began sharing experiences that have shaped their view of those around them.

“We had listening groups and study groups that read the book,” Glenn said. “We met with the author, and a lot of students and faculty came together to hear her insights. We have been learning about what it means to confront racism in our community, and we see how we can act to make IUP the university we want it to be.”

There have also been institutional changes to put DEI efforts front and center. In the past, ugly incidents have brought negative attention to our university, and while we have stressed that these incidents were not indicative of what IUP is all about, we knew we needed to act–and that means being both reactive and proactive.

Glenn and her staff have installed a system in which any person who experiences racism or sexism or any -ism that separates us can report it, knowing action will be taken. Prior to this, incidents were brought to light and usually dealt with privately, leaving those affected feeling unsupported. But now there is a system, and campus groups take on different supporting roles, ranging from comforting the victim, to talking with the aggressor, to holding community dialogues, to keeping the university police in the loop.

“Because this is America, we get to say what we want, in certain contexts,” Glenn says. “But our goal as a university is to be a place where if an incident happens, it’s viewed as an outlying instance. If we have a campus where everyone supports each other and cares about each other, then those incidents will be anomalies.”

To be proactive, we are striving to empower our students to understand the roots of hatred so they can take ownership of their university and join in the journey to equality.

Our work has gained us positive attention. In fact, some of our sister schools in Pennsylvania’s State System of Higher Education have reviewed our protocols and have installed them at their campuses. It is clear IUP is helping lead the charge to create a world where equality is the status and not the goal.

“Young people today see themselves as people with complex identities, which is what we all are,” Glenn says. “We see ourselves as valuable members of the IUP family and the State System. We believe that the better we all see and understand each other, the better off we are.”