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Dear Wayne State Colleagues, As we begin another academic year together, I am excited to share a few updates with you on behalf of the Office of Inclusive Excellence. Inclusive Excellence: Over the summer we adopted inclusive excellence as a framework for our work. Inclusive Excellence, which is now the name of our office, has been a framework for advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion work within higher education for about twenty years. I look forward to working alongside you to activate inclusive excellence within our campus community, and over this academic year there will be educational offerings open to faculty and staff regarding this framework. Religious Holidays and Observances Calendar: Over the summer, our office released an online religious holidays and observances calendar. The calendar is designed to be a resource for the campus community in support of our larger efforts to respect the faith and religious observances of students, staff, and faculty. Employee Engagement Groups (EEG): Our office supports seven employee engagement groups. These groups seek to make the campus a welcoming and inclusive space for all, and a description of and contact information for each group is within the link. We highly encourage you to get involved in one or more groups by simply emailing the chairperson(s). We also hope you consider attending our EEG Meet and Greet event scheduled for October 16th at 12 PM. Finally, I want to publicly recognize and appreciate the leaders of these EEGs who so graciously volunteer their time. Thank you, EEG leaders, for supporting our community in this way. Culture and Climate Study: In the weeks ahead, I will send a notice to the community about an opportunity to learn about key findings from the culture and climate study that we completed in the winter term. Be on the lookout for more information related to this. Office of Multicultural Student Engagement (OMSE): The OMSE team has been hard-at-work over the summer planning cultural and identity-based programs to celebrate the diversity of our student body. To stay in the loop about their programming and ways they can be a resource as you work with students, you can visit their website or join their listserv. I wish you all the best as we begin this academic year!
Donyale Padgett |
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