December 4, 2023, EDI Committee Meeting

Robin

Paula

Dane

Amy

Renée

Tom

The EDI committee discussed concerns with the information shared at Wednesday’s retreat from the Doctorate Students of Color focus groups with a desire to take action, both systemically and individually, toward improvement to better support students and so that our espousals align with our actions. We hope to support any further development deriving from those data. We hope to make necessary shifts to center student voice in our committee’s work, including master’s level and undergraduate students. Student voice is slow work and will require incremental shifts. The committee considered several possible action items: further examining DSOC statements for additional patterns, requesting time at faculty and/or faculty/staff meetings, implementing peer observation practices, and creating a Canvas shell to be shared with faculty and staff with resources related to equity and social justice. This conversation led to a more specific conversation about land acknowledgements and their constraints. Because land acknowledgements can be a hollow gesture, we discussed alternatives, like learning more about Indigenous-led work in one’s area, while also honoring the labor that went into the composition of CU Denver’s land acknowledgment, written by Gracie RedShirt Tyon, of the Oglala Lakota Nation. Robin shared the following resources: