University President Anthony Monaco last Wednesday announced the creation of a new Council on Diversity at Tufts consisting of students, staff and faculty representatives from each of Tufts' three campuses.
The council held its first meeting on Feb. 29 in Alumnae Hall, where it discussed the questions it would like to see addressed on the Hill.
The council's goal is to produce a proposal by the end of the year that will recommend to the administration how to best address diversity issues at Tufts.
The council, which is chaired by Monaco, also considered past diversity initiatives at the university, Monaco told the Daily.
"We kind of touched on what's been done before and what we are going to do now, and what are the big questions," Monaco said.
The council is comprised of three working groups. The first will focus on administrative policies, faculty, staff issues and community engagement issues. The other two will focus separately on the undergraduate experience and on the graduate and professional school experience, according to Monaco.
Each working group will meet more frequently than the larger council and will work to address diversity issues among its own constituency, according to Program Manager for the Center for STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) Diversity Travis Brown.
The council will review past diversity initiatives the university has undertaken, including a 1997 report from the Task Force on Race and recent reports by the Equal Education Opportunity Council of Arts, Sciences and Engineering, all of which Monaco called "very thoughtful documents." Additionally, members of the council mentioned recent faculty recruitment and retention rates as an area the council might address.
The council at its first meeting considered diversity at Tufts across the undergraduate, graduate, faculty and staff populations.
"We basically went around the room and asked people what did they think about these questions, what was their experience in the school or what they wanted to bring to the committee, and also what questions hadn't we asked," Monaco said. "It was very good input, things I hadn't thought of."
Council member and Associate Director of Career Services at the Fletcher School Branden Grimmett further explained the goals of the council.
"Each committee will be looking at the constituents, finding ways to support current diversity initiatives, and to look for ways to increase areas where there may be a greater need," he said.
The committees will also involve people outside of the official council, including representatives from the offices of student life, staff life and faculty life, according to Grimmett.
A faculty member nominated council member and sophomore Corey Mason for the group. His role is as a student representative on the undergraduate committee.
"I'm hoping to give my input as an engineer and as a student coming from a low income background," Mason said.
The undergraduate working group's goal is to help produce the proposal that the diversity council will submit to the administration, according to Mason.
In the coming months, the working groups will hold meetings and prepare recommendations for the next full council meeting, Monaco said.
"[I'm] really looking forward now to setting up the working groups, and we kind of brought up things that we'd like to set on the agenda for the next meeting," Monaco said. "In the meantime, [before] our next meeting, we hope that these three working groups will start to be formulated and meet to take on the tasks of those three separate areas."
Brown said he hopes the council will create diversity and change at the university.
"I'm hoping that we'll come up with some things that will create some real change on campus and make this a place where everybody feels like they're a Jumbo and not that they just happen to go to school at Tufts," he said.
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