"BLM MURALS" BY UAJAMIE1, USED UNDER CC/DESATURATED FROM ORIGINAL
THE PURSUIT OF In January of 2020, Phoenix Matthews, PhD—a clinical psychologist who has been on faculty since 2003—took the helm as the UIC College of Nursing’s first associate dean for equity and inclusion. It was just as the college was confronted with the need to demonstrate a commitment to equity, justice and diversity. By spring of 2020, communities across the U.S. exploded in reaction to video of a white police officer in Minneapolis pressing his knee into the neck of George Floyd, an African American man who died following the incident. As protests raged, professor Phoenix Matthews helped the UIC Nursing community grapple with complex feelings, thoughts and opinions about the role of race and police in America. Matthews embraced the opportunity, sharing resources and holding a series of open meetings for faculty, staff and students to learn and listen. Calling the sessions, “A time to talk,” Matthews assured the college community that the conversations would be open and informal: “No authority; no right answer; no right approach.” Matthews’ initiatives are part of the college’s overarching goals of creating a more equitable, inclusive and diverse environment. The spring of 2020 brought not just renewed attention to racism in policing, but also sharply exposed the way communities of color suffer from healthcare inequities. Black and African American people in the U.S. were hospitalized 4.7 times more often than white people due to COVID-19, and were dying twice as often, according to the CDC.
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College of Nursing
Growing ‘champions of change’ When the college began looking for an associate dean for equity and inclusion, Matthews , who uses a gender-neutral pronoun, was well-suited to the position because of their commitment to the college, their research expertise, and their deep-seated interest in improving access and inclusion. Matthews, who is also the college’s Helen K. Grace Diversity Scholar, has focused their career on health disparities research, particularly as it relates to tobacco use. They helped pass Chicago’s first restrictions on menthol-related tobacco sales, and last year, helped shepherd through legislation requiring every single-occupancy restroom in the state of Illinois to be labeled gender-neutral. In addition to their own research on health equity, Matthews recognizes that UIC Nursing has an integral role to play in preparing future nurses and nurse leaders to level health outcomes globally. “We’re in a moment in time in which a lot of polarization in our country related to equity and access has resurfaced,” Matthews says. “I think it is important to create a culture in the college in which we can have respectful dialogue and exchange of ideas about how to move forward toward our goals in our work as nurses, researchers and champions of change.”
