New Student Equity Action Network launched

New Student Equity Action Network launched

November 15, 2022

New Student Equity Action Network aims to bring together students working on equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives at UBC and to catalyze collaborations, knowledge exchange, and maximize the impact of student efforts.

Creating change is hard, let alone at large institutions such as UBC. It’s easy to feel lost and overwhelmed within its vast ecosystem of knowledge, resources, and initiatives.

For students, it can be particularly lonely.

Network expands on similar faculty and staff efforts

While existing equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) networks and communities provide opportunities for cross-departmental collaboration, knowledge sharing, and learning, most are largely faculty and staff-focused. As a result, student leaders striving to make UBC a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive place are often left working in silos.

Launched in November 2022, the Student Equity Action Network seeks to fill this gap by providing a campus-wide network centred on supporting student experience and engagement. Undergraduate, graduate and doctoral students involved in an EDI initiative at UBC can tap into the network to find community, exchange ideas, and enhance their self-efficacy. Through resource-sharing, networking, and capacity-building, students can expect to develop competencies on justice, equity, decolonization, Indigenization and inclusion (JEDII), as well as a better understanding of barriers to JEDII at UBC.

Students to shape network’s direction

In the spirit of supporting student leadership and engagement and best address community needs, students are being invited to shape the direction and vision of the Student Equity Action Network at an upcoming Meet & Greet event on November 24.

News and Stories |

Time to Thrive: UBC Black Caucus brings back Black mental wellness initiative

November 15, 2022

“I didn’t know how much I was holding in from the overwhelming grief of all the people I have lost to the pandemic and the racialized violence happening at home until I had the opportunity to talk to a therapist who truly understood. The experience has been life changing.”

–  UBC student on the impact of the Black Mental Wellness Project

Everyone has a right to mental health. But not everyone has access to mental health services. Longer wait times, geographical and financial obstacles, and a lack of access to Black counsellors are just a few of the barriers that Black community members face. Barriers that have repeatedly been surfaced by Black students, faculty and staff at UBC.

In response, the UBC Black Caucus, supported through the IBPOC Connections: Faculty and Staff program and the Equity Enhancement Fund from the Equity & Inclusion Office, is bringing back the Black Mental Wellness Project to center the needs of Black community members and address barriers to accessing mental health supports.

Piloted in 2021, the project provides Black UBC community members with free access to Black counsellors. Within two weeks of the program first launching, fifty-one hours of counselling sessions had been booked, reinforcing a very clear need for increased access to Black counsellors.

“This was an amazing project, and I do hope UBC continues to do it as there is a need.”

–  Participating counsellor

Back again in 2022, for the month of November – and on a first-come, first-served basis – Black students, faculty and staff across the Vancouver and Okanagan campuses can access free 1-on-1 virtual or in-person counselling sessions with Black counsellors.

Visit the UBC Black Caucus website to get counsellor details and to book an appointment.

“I had been looking for a Black therapist for a while now, and I am ever so grateful that you found these therapists for us at a time when they were desperately needed.”

– UBC faculty member

“I really appreciated having a list of black counsellors and a short bio/description. This was my first time trying out counselling a one of the big reasons I hadn’t was because I didn’t know how to access a Black therapist. Thank you for putting this together and I hope this is something that continues.”

–  UBC staff member

“[…] through the UBC Black Caucus Black Mental Wellness Pilot Project, I was able to have a session with a Black, immigrant woman and honestly one session has already been so beneficial.””

–  UBC student

Did you know

Based on the results of a survey of Black Canadians conducted by the Mental Health Commission of Canada:

  • 60% said they would be more willing to use mental health services if the mental health professional was Black;
  • 35% were experiencing significant psychological distress, 34% of whom never sought mental health services;
  • 95% felt that the underutilization of mental health services by Black Canadian residents was an issue that needed to be addressed.

—–

November 1-30 is Thrive. Learn about, talk about, and explore ways to support your mental health.

News and Stories |

Remarks: A gathering to support the UBC Iranian community

October 19, 2022

The following remarks were delivered by Arig al Shaibah, Associate Vice-President, Equity and Inclusion, during a community gathering organized in support of the Iranian community at UBC and held of October 18, 2022.

—

Welcome…Assalammu ‘Alaikum 

My name is Arig al Shaibah, and I am UBC’s Associate Vice President, Equity and Inclusion. 

I want to start by acknowledging that we are gathered on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the Musqueum peoples.

This land acknowledgement is particularly salient today as we consider that land is body and body is land…

Our histories, identities, communities, sense of belonging and well-being are all tied up in complex notions of land – homeland, places we make home, and where we feel we are nourished and nurtured to thrive and flourish as peoples…

As a diasporic person from the middle east, having decades ago fled with my parents from my birthplace and country of origin, and then later in my young adult life leaving another middle eastern country – because of repressive regimes – I feel a tremendous sense of gratitude that I, and my immediate family, have had the opportunity to make a life in Canada. 

With that gratitude is also a great sense of responsibility to ensure that the promise of human rights, equality, dignity and freedom that my family and some of my peoples have sought from Canada does not come at the expense of the rights and entitlements of Indigenous peoples – that there is the possibility of reconciliation and peaceful, equitable, and anti-colonial co-existence. 

There is also a sense of humility that the legal right I currently have to imagine, aspire towards, and realize my full personal and professional potential as a queer, culturally Muslim Arab women is not a right enjoyed by others like me around the world. However, complicated my access to that legal right is here, it is nonetheless a legal right that is non-existent in the places I left.

So, I also appreciate the desire to find meaningful ways to make a difference – in whatever small or large ways – in the lives of those may not yet enjoy the same legal rights. 

These are very difficult times – I am pleased that the Equity and Inclusion Office was able to facilitate the organization of this gathering to offer one other venue for connection, grieving, and healing. 

Thanks to the Iranian Professionals Network, The UBC Persian Club and UBC Equity & Inclusion Office IBPOC Connections for hosting this event.

Especially, I want to thank: 

  • Maryam Nabavi
  • Afsanah SharifAal
  • Shadi Mehrabi
  • Naz Tavakolizadeh
  • Ava Tabatabaei
  • Madison Tardiff
  • Vanessa Kim

As we stand together we recognize that in our diversity there is unity in the aim to relentlessly promote gender equality and women’s choice as human rights. 

We celebrate the strength and courage of the women in Iran (our sisters) at the forefront of this effort.

We celebrate women, life, and freedom.

News and Stories, Remarks by the AVP | ,

$49,510 awarded to community-based initiatives that enhance equity, diversity, and inclusion

October 17, 2022

14 projects led by faculty and staff at UBC Vancouver and UBC Okanagan received funding from the Equity Enhancement Fund. The fund is designed to support community-led projects that advance UBC’s commitments to inclusion.

This spring funding cycle, the Equity & Inclusion Office received 59 applications to the Equity Enhancement Fund (EEF), with the total ask for funding across all applications amounting to $245,245. For this application cycle, $40,000 have been made available at UBC Vancouver and $5,000 have been made available at UBC Okanagan. An evaluation committee, convened by the Equity & Inclusion Office, assessed each of the applications and awarded funding to 14 projects, or 24 per cent of total number of applications. The total funding disbursed amounted to approximately 20 per cent of the total requested funding.

$42,900 awarded to nine projects at UBC Vancouver

At UBC Vancouver, awarded projects aim to advance equity and inclusion across the university including in academic programs, student services, arts and culture, recruitment, program evaluation, and health and wellness, and with an aim to enhance the experiences of Indigenous, people of colour, persons with disabilities and queer and trans communities at UBC.

Funded projects:

  • Foundations to assess and enhance EDI: Preparing to surf the data wave
    Faculty of Science
  • UBC ARTIVISM: Minding The Body
    UBC Arts & Culture District, Office of the Dean of Arts
  • Inclusive Publishing: Increasing Accessibility of BC Studies
    Office of the Vice-President, Students
  • Transdisciplinary Day of Disability Research, Education, and Activism
    Department of Asian Studies, Faculty of Arts
  • IBPOC Connections for Students
    Student Health and Wellbeing
  • Diversifying Access to UBC Health Profession Educational Programs
    Department of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy, Faculty of Medicine
  • Expanding Staff Capacity, From Recruitment to Professional Development
    Office of the Vice-President, Students
  • Student Staff – EDI Initiatives
    Department of Athletics & Recreation
  • Mentorship to promote diversity in the graduate pipeline
    Department of Psychology, Faculty of Arts

$6,610 awarded to five projects at UBC Okanagan

At UBC Okanagan, funded projects and initiatives similarly focus on supporting for example Indigenous and queer and trans communities, and across programming related to orientations, health and wellness, community engagement, and athletics and recreation.

Funded projects:

  • IDEA Orientations – Physical Indigenization of space and increasing knowledge and awareness of Indigenous communities during JumpStart
    Student Experience Office
  • Indigenous Programs and Services and Harm Reduction: A Collaborative, Capacity Building Initiative
    Campus Wellness and Education Unit
  • Indigenous Reads Book Club
    UBC Okanagan Library
  • EDI Book Club
    College of Graduate Studies
  • UBCO Heat Pride Night
    Athletics & Recreation

You can learn more about each of the projects funded, as well as previously funded projects, in our recipients database.

Interested in applying next year?

The EIO is currently reviewing the EEF with an eye to improve our ability to respond to community needs and better align funds awarded with strategic initiatives that advance accessibility, equity, and inclusive excellence in the context of student experience and success. Please visit the equity.ubc.ca/eef or sign-up for our newsletter or social channels for updates.

 

 

News and Stories |

Centering care and supporting community-led affinity spaces in response to global events: A message from the AVP

October 6, 2022

On September 27, a university statement was posted to express concern for the situation in Iran emerging after the death of Mahsa Amini, and to acknowledge the courage of those standing up for human rights and freedoms. As the situation unfolds, and thousands of change agents and allies continue to gather in Iran, in Canada, and around the world, it is clear that the impacts on the Iranian diaspora and international scholars and learners at UBC will be protracted and profound.

In addition to a symbolic statement of support from the institution, there is much we can do as individual colleagues and as a collective community to demonstrate substantive actions in support of members of impacted communities. In particular, unit/people managers and academic instructors are encouraged to review the Equity & Inclusion Office’s Guidelines for responding to collective tragedies and hateful incidents, which center an ethics of care. An ethics of care invites us to exhibit compassion towards and afford flexibility for impacted students, faculty, and staff in the classroom and the workplace in the aftermath of such tragic global events. This guidance document is relevant for other current, ongoing, and future global and local events that profoundly impact the campus community given our rich diversity and our deep value for human rights and freedoms.

Among the ways to make a substantive difference to the experiences of impacted communities is to support community-led affinity spaces. Already, a number of such initiatives have been organized at UBCO to support Iranian communities. In the coming days and weeks, the UBC Iranian Professionals Network and the UBC Persian Club will be co-leading the curation of an on-site gathering and co-convening other spaces at the Vancouver campus for Iranian students, faculty, and staff. The goal is to offer safe spaces for connection, to give and receive community support, and to counteract feelings of isolation and helplessness. The Equity & Inclusion Office is pleased to assist in raising awareness for and helping to support this community-led initiative. More information about the gatherings will be forthcoming.

Finally, to promote respect and inclusion, it is important to recognize that the UBC Iranian community is diverse, including across ethnic and religious identity. Among those who identify as Muslim, there is a diversity of ways that individuals may choose to present and practice their Islamic faith, spirituality, or cultural identities. None of these should be implicitly conflated with support for the Iranian government’s regime, including a community member’s right and choice to wear hijab. More broadly, building one’s cultural competency and global literacy can enhance intergroup relations in the aftermath of these events. Community members are encouraged to broaden their sources of information and to take the initiative to learn about the relevant social, political, and historical contexts surrounding such global events. The UBC library is one great resource for such learning.

Sincerely,

Arig al Shaibah, Ph.D.
Associate Vice-President, Equity & Inclusion

 

“I raise my voice not so I can shout, but so that those without a voice can be heard. We cannot succeed when half of us are held back.” ~ Malala Yousafai

 

“A world full of empowered women isn’t one where men are marginalized. It’s a world where everyone thrives.” ~ Purnima Mane

 

Resources for community members seeking support:

Students

Students Assistance Program – a free 24/7 confidential wellness resource for crisis, grief, and trauma counselling:

A variety of health and wellbeing resources, services and programming is also available to UBC Vancouver students at students.ubc.ca/health and to UBC Okanagan students at students.ok.ubc.ca/health-wellness/.

UBC Persian Club – a non-profit student organization and social hub for UBC Iranian community and Iranian-related activities.
Website: facebook.com/ubcpersianclub/
Email: president@ubcpc.com

 

Faculty and Staff

Employee and Family Assistance Program – a confidential and voluntary resource providing professional and emergency counselling services and additional support via phone, video, web or mobile app.

All mental health resources, including access to UBC’s Extended Health Benefits Plan, can be found on the HR website: hr.ubc.ca/health-and-wellbeing/mental-health.

UBC Iranian Professionals Network
Website: equity-theiranianprofessionalnetwork-2022.sites.olt.ubc.ca

 

All community members

Healing in Colour has an extensive list of racialized counsellors
Website: healingincolour.com/about

Messages from the AVP |

Orange Shirt Day

September 28, 2022

Events |

New case study library offers examples of inclusion in action

September 23, 2022

A new case study library hosted by the UBC Equity & Inclusion offers a promising and growing list of examples of how departments and units are advancing equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) across UBC.

The library has been launched as a way to support UBC units and departments by providing some practical examples of how others across the university are advancing EDI. The library seeks to draw out transferable lessons-learned which units might be able to apply in their own contexts, even when working on different initiatives.

The initial six case studies are drawn from presentations that have been made at past meetings of the EDI Action Network. They were originally selected for presentation to the network as representative of the breadth of different types of initiatives that are advancing EDI and to show how units and departments have worked proactively to identify what initiatives are most relevant and useful in their own contexts.

Some of the case studies demonstrate how the units involved leveraged Activating inclusion Toolkit tools and guides, and all case studies contributed to specific Inclusion Action Plan goals, including: recruitment, retention, and success, learning, research and engagement, and system change.

The following case studies have been published to date:

EIO will continue to add examples of promising and inspirational efforts to the case study library. The case studies will aim to represent efforts across each of the IAP goals.

As we continue to refine how the case studies are structured and presented, let us know if you have suggestions, ideas or other feedback.

If you are interested in submitting a case study for consideration, please ensure your example contributes to one or more Inclusion Action Plan goals.

To learn more, share your feedback, or express interest in showcasing your project, please email us at info@equity.ubc.ca.

News and Stories |

Actioning UBC’s commitments to equity and anti-racism: A message from the AVP

September 23, 2022

Dear UBC Community Members,

As the fall term begins, it is an opportune time for me to update the community about UBC’s progress on its commitments to equity and inclusion.

Since my term as Associate Vice-President, Equity and Inclusion began on July 1, 2022, I have been meeting with key campus partners and affinity groups to learn about what has been accomplished and where there are opportunities for further achievement. While I will continue these meetings through September, it is abundantly clear to me that a remarkable amount of effort and expertise has been committed by students, faculty, and staff to develop a comprehensive set of distinct yet complementary plans and recommendations for institutional transformation and systems change. These include the following:

  • The 2019 Inclusion Action Plan (IAP) and the 2020 Indigenous Strategic Plan (ISP) remain foundational strategic documents, developed to meet inclusive excellence and Indigenous reconciliation commitments articulated in the University’s 2018 – 2028 Strategic Plan: Shaping the Next Century.
  • The 2019 Employment Equity Plan and 2019 CRC EDI Action Plan also remain particularly relevant strategic documents to help achieve UBC’s obligations and aspirations to advance equity in employment systems and in the processes for nominating and selecting research chairs.
  • The 2022 Task Force on Antiracism and Inclusive Excellence (ARIE) Final Report provides a nuanced set of recommendations to guide efforts to address systemic racism while maintaining a commitment to intersectionality in the pursuit of equity and inclusive excellence – these recommendations not only support UBC’s pledge to the Scarborough Charter [external link] to address anti-Black racism and promote Black flourishing, but they also invite transformative thinking and action towards the university’s broader racial equity and social justice goals.

Additionally, the following plans and recommendations are nearing completion:

Now, to guide the UBC community through a more comprehensive, cohesive, and coordinated phase of implementation, I am pleased to announce that a Strategic Equity and Anti-Racism (StEAR) Framework has been developed. In the coming weeks, the EIO will launch a new online platform to host information about the emerging StEAR Framework and regular implementation progress reports.

In the meantime, you can read about ongoing equity initiatives in various annual reports prepared by the EIO, and you can preview a sampling of some activities the EIO has contributed to in support of UBC’s antiracism commitments and that have been underway since the 2021 update on institutional anti-racism actions was shared with the community. Many more initiatives are currently underway across UBC. An inventory of cross campus initiatives will soon be conducted to enable reporting on the more robust list of initiatives being undertaken.

While the EIO will oversee UBC’s institutional commitments to equity and anti-racism broadly, the Indigenous Guiding Network will continue to oversee UBC’s specific commitments to Indigenous rights and reconciliation. I look forward to continued consultation and coalition-building with the Network to support and elevate Indigenous priorities.

As I have a pan-institutional mandate, I will be working collaboratively with student, faculty, and staff partners and champions across campuses, and especially closely with the Associate Provost appointed as the UBCO champion for inclusion, diversity, equity, and anti-racism (IDEA) to best meet the local needs of the Okanagan campus community.

I am immensely grateful to all community members who have contributed to our progress to date. I look forward to renewing our commitments and continuing our journey to actioning these over the next several years.

All members interested in contributing to these renewed efforts are most welcome to contact me.

Sincerely,

Arig al Shaibah, Ph.D.
Associate Vice-President, Equity & Inclusion

Messages from the AVP |

Supporting diverse prospective graduate students through a mentorship program in the Department of Psychology

August 31, 2022

Context

UBC’s Department of Psychology Equity Committee was formed in 2017 and leads equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives in the department. The committee is composed of faculty members, graduate students, and staff. In 2021, the committee decided to focus on enhancing the diversity of the graduate student population.

EDI initiative implemented

The UBC Psychology Equity Committee organized a diversity mentorship program for prospective graduate students from underrepresented, under-resourced, and/or marginalized backgrounds. The program is open to individuals from all over the world as they prepare for applying to graduate school in Psychology. In its first year, the Diversity Mentorship Program was supported by the UBC Anti-Racism Initiatives Fund and the UBC Department of Psychology.

The program was inspired based on research that has found that a good mentor is one of the key predictors of success in the field of Psychology, both academically and professionally. Leadership chose this particular program to increase diversity within the field and to support students as they navigate the stressful and complicated process of applying to graduate school, while at the same time increasing the EDI knowledge and skills of the current members of the department who participated in the program as mentors.

Goals of the program:
● Advancing diversity in the academic/professional pipeline in Psychology;
● Providing support & enhancing inclusion for prospective graduate students from under-represented backgrounds;
● Training and professional development in EDI for current graduate students and postdocs.

The mentorship program spans about 9 months, from early summer to the winter/spring of the following year. Mentors and mentees meet at least three times during the period and are encouraged to participate in a Discord community. Mentees in the program are advanced undergraduates or recent Bachelor’s graduates (from within & outside UBC), and mentors are current UBC Psychology graduate students, postdocs, and lecturers.

In the Spring of 2021, 101 mentees were selected out of 200 applicants and paired with 34 mentors. The mentees attended virtual workshops, talks and meetings during the summer and applied for graduate school and fellowships in the fall (or alternatively, with guidance from their mentor, some decided to delay their applications to graduate programs or decided that they did not want to pursue research-oriented graduate training in Psychology). As part of the program, mentees have their application fees waived when applying to UBC Psychology for grad school. They also received support in preparing for admission interviews and in navigating academic and career decisions during the winter and spring.

The mentors were all UBC Psychology graduate students, postdocs, or lecturers; each mentor had 3 mentees. Mentors received various training and supports such as a Canvas mini-course on mentoring students from diverse backgrounds, synchronous training via Zoom, and a Discord community. The program also included guest lectures, workshops, panels, & small group meetings.

Tracking progress and learning

The leadership built evaluation into their programming with a questionnaire after virtual events and talks, and they will survey mentees and mentors on their experience with the whole program after the program has concluded. So far, there has been very positive feedback about the program from both mentors and mentees. This program, along with other work done by the Department of Psychology, has encouraged conversations about EDI in classrooms, laboratories, and other settings.

This program also resulted in reflection about ways to incorporate training and discussions about EDI in the current graduate psychology program at UBC. This work is being done alongside other efforts to implement EDI training into the curriculum (e.g., monthly EDI workshop series, decolonizing curriculum, diversifying research), which will have an impact on the EDI skills and knowledge present in the field of Psychology more broadly. Information about the UBC Department of Psychology’s work to enhance inclusion is available at https://psych.ubc.ca/edi-recommendations/.

Lessons learned

Dr. Nancy Sin, the Director of the Psychology Diversity Mentorship Program, believes the program’s core aspects—such as providing training around EDI in mentorship for graduate students is transferable—and could be adapted by other departments. She believes having a strong EDI committee and people who could dedicate specific time to advancing the program would be crucial to its success. Critical for moving this initiative forward, the program has secured funding for the upcoming year and will have support from a Work Learn student and Graduate Academic Assistants. Based on extensive survey feedback from program participants, the leaders will implement the following changes for the upcoming year:

  • Professional development programming: Workshops will be held throughout the year instead of concentrating them on several days. The workshop content will be modified to be applicable for students at various points in their professional journeys, from students who are still exploring different academic and career options, to those who have a fairly clear sense of their intended path.
  • Social connections and support: Mentees have expressed the desire for more opportunities to connect with fellow mentees. Thus, the program will be holding regular virtual group meetings throughout the year and will build their online community on Discord.
  • Mentoring: Many undergraduates and recent graduates want the chance to learn from graduate students and postdocs, but they might not have well-defined mentoring needs yet or may want to “test the waters” before committing to a mentoring relationship. Thus, the program will hold mentoring sessions in small groups, where mentees can meet with different mentors each month to discuss a range of professional topics. At any point during the year, if a mentee wants additional one-on-one support, they can request which specific mentor(s) they’d like to be matched with. The leaders anticipate that this approach will enhance retention and will offer greater flexibility for the mentors and mentees.

SUBMITTED BY

Nancy Sin, Associate Professor, Department of Psychology

YEAR OF IMPLEMENTATION
2021

Case studies | , , , , , ,

Building a more inclusive Arts Co-operative Education Program

August 17, 2022

Context

The Arts Co-op Program at UBC Vancouver offers undergraduate and graduate students enriched educational experiences through workplace learning in a diversity of organizations.

Arts Co-op’s equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) initiative was started in 2019 as a result of strong motivation from staff and leadership to understand what opportunities existed for advancing EDI through Arts Co-op’s internal processes, as well as the programs and services it offers.

In summer 2019, the program piloted an early version of the EIO’s Inclusion Self-Assessment Tool, which provided a foundation to launch further EDI initiatives in the years that followed.

EDI initiative implemented

In summer 2020, Arts Co-op undertook a comprehensive audit of practices, processes, materials, and all student and community facing written materials and programs. The program hired two student staff members to complete a comprehensive environmental scan (reviewing materials, surveying existing students, and conducting focus groups). Student staff were also involved in the creation, coordination, and analysis of the data collected from the survey and focus groups. From their data, they wrote a 65-page report outlining 43 recommended actions to improve inclusivity. Using this report, the Arts Co-op team used the prioritization tool from the Activating Inclusion Toolkit to determine where to begin the process.

The student staff also participated in an EDI advisory committee comprised of Arts Co-op staff members and other campus partners.

In Fall 2020, the program revised the student application process by creating two different intake forms: 1) to collect students’ personal information and 2) to answer open-ended questions to describe their experience. This allowed the Arts Co-op staff to adjudicate applications without any of the students’ personal information. They also held focus groups among undergraduate Arts students who didn’t apply to join Co-op.

In Fall 2021, the program revised and sent some of the interview questions in advance so that students could prepare for the group interviews. During these interviews, staff directly messaged questions to the participating student in the chat for more accessibility.

The program also requested funding for ten awards from the Dean of Arts in their annual budget submission to be distributed to Arts Co-op students who had financial need, highlighting their priorities for the coming fiscal year. Being able to tie this request directly to the Faculty of Arts strategic plan priorities and unit level priorities helped them make a strong case that was ultimately supported. To implement these awards in Fall 2021, the unit consulted within the Faculty of Arts as well as Enrolment Services and Student Financial Management to develop and design an application and adjudication process in alignment with general student recruitment policy.

Tracking progress and learning

During Summer 2022, program staff will survey the co-op students to understand the impacts of the recent changes the Co-op Program has made thus far. Staff also convened an Advisory Committee—with co-op employers, Arts co-op student reps, and Arts faculty members—to give advice to move the work forward. Committee members were recruited with an eye to their own expertise on EDI initiatives.

In the short-term the goal is to see more students applying to the Arts Co-op Program from a wider range of backgrounds, and hope to see those in the Program supported across their diverse career development needs. The longer-term changes Arts Co-op hopes to see are: new resources for employer partners to help increase their capacity to recruit a diverse range of students, and to provide effective workplace learning experiences for the students they employ. They will also look to develop assessment mechanisms that can be regularly used to gauge impact of the changes.

Lessons learned

While implementing the Pilot Financial Support Award, the Arts Co-op Program ran into several challenges including difficulties assessing financial need, creating secondary evaluation criteria and questions in the financial award application, and having enough time and resources to implement the process.

Arts Co-op believes that using the ISAT and having all staff involved in the EDI conversations early on helped lay the foundations for a successful process. Also, gaining an in-depth understanding of their program materials as well as student experiences of the program, through the audit and focus groups, was crucial in helping them understand where to focus their efforts. Taking the time to find resources to carry out the work, including the funding to hire two student staff, was also key to their success.

SUBMITTED BY
Kathy Ma, Co-op Career Educator, Equity & Inclusion, Arts Co-op
Letitia Henville, Manager, Graduate Work Integrated Learning Programs, Arts Co-op

YEAR OF IMPLEMENTATION
2020

TOOLKITS USED

Case studies | , , , , , , ,