2013 Diversity Forum in Review

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More than 800 participants attended the Oct.  21 and 22 UW Madison annual Diversity Forum on the UW-Madison campus. Hosted by the Office of the Vice Provost and Chief Diversity Officer, this year’s forum was expanded to encompass two days through a grant from the UW System and addressed an expanded agenda entitled “Diversity and Educational Achievement: A Wisconsin Agenda,” with the intention of expanding the achievement gap conversation to a state-wide discussion.

Interim Vice Provost and Chief Diversity Officer Patrick J. Sims pointed out that this year’s registration was at a historic high, exceeding past levels by 60 percent, including participants from across the state watching via live stream in Washington County.

UW-Madison Interim Vice Provost & Chief Diversity Officer Patrick J. Sims.
UW-Madison Interim Vice Provost & Chief Diversity Officer Patrick J. Sims.

“We want to build on the momentum that’s going to be generated by the ideas that emerge from today and tomorrow,” Sims said.  The day’s sessions highlighted the tremendous successes in diversity happening both on campus and off, in addition to “providing an opportunity to reflect on where we’re going and how we’re going to get there, he added.

Sims, who is heading the Office of the Vice Provost and Chief Diversity Officer with Interim Vice Provost and Assistant Vice Chancellor for Diversity Ruby Paredes, is a tenured member of the UW-Madison Theater Department.

“My research as a performing artist has always been about finding the ways to think about the impact of diversity and inclusion on sensitive subjects like race, gender, power and privilege, Sims said, and serving as interim vice provost will allow him to continue that work at a higher level.

Ruby Paredes, Interim Associate Vice Provost and Assistant Vice Chancellor for Diversity and Climate
Ruby Paredes, Interim Associate Vice Provost and Assistant Vice Chancellor for Diversity and Climate

Sharing a little about himself, Sims credited his father for teaching him to dream, and his mother for keeping him grounded in the realities of survival and setting high expectations that led to attending Yale. Growing up in Chicago was challenging for a young black male with proven intelligence when that particular profile is not respected or embraced, Sims said.

By age 9, his peers were already expected to “affiliate” socially, which eventually led to his brothers being sent to the safer environment of his grandparents’ home to live.  The pressure – which still exists today – resulted in their family’s move to the Chicago suburb of Riverdale and mounting the new challenge of being among the first African American families in their neighborhood. His father and his family landed on the frontlines of diversifying Chicago neighborhoods by working with the NAACP in federal court.

20131021_Diversity_Forum_026w Drawing a correlation between his life experience and that of another well-known UW-Madison student, Lorraine Hansberry, who documented a similar American history story in A Raisin in the Sun, Sims said some things have changed since the late 1940s, but in many ways the challenges of diversity have remained and grown more complex.

“I firmly believe that a healthy and frank conversation about these issues can go a long way toward creating an environment that is welcoming for all,” Sims said.  “The conversation is merely the first step in a long line of steps that will lead to action, curriculum and policy changes that will ultimately hold us accountable for practicing the kind of values to which we say we are deeply committed.”

Sylvia Hurtado, Professor & Director of UCLA Higher Education Research Institute
Sylvia Hurtado, Professor & Director of UCLA Higher Education Research Institute

This year’s Forum examined the manifestation of diversity in both theory and practice and the need to examine why the achievement disparity persists. morning keynote speaker Sylvia Hurtado spoke on the impact campus climate has on student success and development in higher education. As a professor and director of the Higher Education Research Institute at UCLA in the Graduate School of Education and Information Sciences, Hurtado also has been the Director of the Center for the Study of Higher and Postsecondary Education at the University of Michigan and was named by Black Issues In Higher Education among the top 15 influential faculty whose work has had an impact on the academy.Hurtado recognized UW-Madison for being actively engaged in learning and training on diversity through the UCLA-based HERI before it was a hot topic.

“This is the Wisconsin way,” she said. “Diversity is a resource, it’s not the problem. Inequity is the problem.”20131021_Diversity_Forum_057w

Issues of campus climate have many dimensions which aren’t accurately grasped, she said, including the four dimensions of: 1) the historical legacy of inclusion and exclusion; 2) compositional diversity, i.e. the numbers and representations; 3) the behavioral dimension where interactions occur; and 4) the psychological dimension, or how people feel. There also are the areas of organizational dimension of funding, policies and decisions making process and the curriculum dimension.

20131021_Diversity_Forum_035w Nationally, only about 10-11 percent of college students report an incident of discrimination to a campus authority, Hurtado said. Students’ personal identity is at the center of her research, which explores the links among incidents of discrimination and learning outcomes. Every institution can move their students from where they are to beyond what is expected for their ability, background, income, etc., Hurtado said.  Helping students navigate college – especially low-income and first generation students – is key because they are relying on others to survive the personal dimensions in unfamiliar social and psychological, as well as educational, territory.  Academic validation in the classroom is also key to success, along with a sense of belonging.

Afternoon keynote speaker Derald Wing Sue, a pioneer in the field of multicultural psychology, multicultural education, multicultural counseling and therapy, and the psychology of racism/antiracism, spoke about the impact of ‘micro-aggressions,’ or the small infractions of disrespect, that people inflict on one another both consciously and unconsciously.

Derald Wing Sue, Professor of Psychology & Education at Columbia University
Derald Wing Sue, Professor of Psychology & Education at Columbia University

Wing Sue is Professor of Psychology and Education in the Department of Counseling and Clinical Psychology at Teachers College and the School of Social Work at Columbia University.“Micro-aggressions are the everyday slights, insults, indignities, put-downs and invalidations that people of color, women — any marginalized group — experiences in their day-to-day interactions with well-intentioned individuals who are unaware that they are delivering a micro-aggression,” Wing Sue said.

The research dates back to an African American psychiatrist named Chester Pierce, who in the 1970s published research micro-aggression on African Americans, but it was ignored, Wing Sue said. That Pierce’s research was invalidated by his professional peers was itself a micro-aggression, he added. Wing Sue resurrected Pierce’s the work in 2007, and interest in the topic has since escalated.As an American-born person of Asian descent, he constantly experiences micro-aggressions by people who ask where he was born. These communications appear to be positive on the surface, but underneath is a “meta-communication” with a completely different meaning, Wing Sue said.

John Karl Scholz, Dean of the UW-Madison College of Letters & Science, opens the second day of the Forum.
John Karl Scholz, Dean of the UW-Madison College of Letters & Science, opens the second day of the Forum.

Micro-aggressions can be both verbal and non-verbal. It can be stated, or as simple as touching your wallet when passing a group of African Americans. Environmental micro-aggressions on a campus can include the message sent by non-diversified ranks of faculty and administration, Wing Sue said.  It says that minorities are not welcomed, won’t get hired or promoted to tenure and as a student, they may not even graduate. This creates a hostile campus environment that is completely invisible to whites, he added.

20131021_Diversity_Forum_062w Micro-aggressions represent a class of racial realities and psychological dynamic that is very real.

“When a person of color points out that a biased response or reaction has just occurred, we’re often told that we are over sensitive, we’re paranoid,” Wing Sue said. “What you have here is a world view that is being imposed on groups that have lower power to define reality. The power to define reality is power itself.”

Every American born and raised in the United States has inherited unconscious biases, which is what makes micro-aggressions so pervasive, cumulative and a constant reminder of one’s second-class citizenship, Wing Sue said. We don’t operated on a level playing field, even if you didn’t personally commit an injustice, certain groups are still the beneficiaries of the inequitable distribution of wealth and power.