Ongoing Inclusion Efforts

Admission

We will engage in a series of professional development opportunities about anti-racism in college admissions. Our goal is to better understand how racial bias could occur in application review.

Advancement

We will develop talking points to be used by staff and student fundraisers. Our goal is to ensure clear and positive responses to questions from the community about Wheaton’s beliefs/policies/actions regarding anti-racism as well as diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Athletics and Recreation

We will create and publish a department-wide policy, as well as supporting materials on trans inclusion. Our goal is to support trans-identifying and non-binary identifying individuals in collegiate sports.

Beard and Weil Galleries

In partnership with the Permanent Collection, we will create an internship program to support students from populations that are historically underrepresented in the museum and gallery fields. Our goal is to provide students from diverse backgrounds with the mentoring, work experience, and professional development opportunities needed to gain employment in these fields and to further diversify the arts and culture sector.

Bias Response

We will examine all levels of campus response for training, protocols and response practices. Our goal is to ensure a focus on anti-racism, equity, and belonging.

Campus Life

We will collect and analyze engagement data in areas such as access to departmental resources, participation in leadership positions, program attendance, etc. Our goal is to identify any racial (and other identity-based) gaps in our services.

Campus Safety

We will focus on coming into compliance with the Massachusetts Police Reform Bill passed in January of 2021. All sworn officers have completed their Massachusetts Police Training Committee (MPTC) eight-hour Fair and Impartial Policing training. A review of our training records will be conducted and the MPTC will determine any further training that officers need to be POST (Police Officer Standard and Training) certified. Our goal is to be more aware of the role of bias.

Counseling Center

We will audit and adjust our Masters level clinical training page on the Counseling Center website. Our goal is to effectively and directly identify the true aspects of the training program, and state our explicit model of training rooted in social justice and the decolonization of mental health.

Early Education Center

We will collect data to ensure that we are headed in the right direction to provide an equitable and inclusive environment. We intend to collaborate with Institutional Research to develop a comprehensive survey to track racial and ethnic gaps as we move forward. Our goal is to understand racial gaps in our program and what they are.

Filene Center

The Filene Center will examine our student engagement and usage data with the goal of better understanding who is, and more importantly perhaps, who isn’t accessing academic and career advising & resources, and accessibility services. Furthermore, we want to know if there is a late initiation stage and/or an early drop-off of students. Are there trends/patterns for this student behavior? We will look at two types of data: qualitative (what experiences) and quantitative (what numbers). Our next steps will be to analyze the information and then act upon it.

Finance, Business Services and Facilities

We will focus on vendor diversity. Our goal this year is to utilize data analytics to assess and identify the minority business enterprises that we already do business with and to explore opportunities to include more minority-owned businesses in the procurement process at Wheaton.

Global Education

We commit to helping Wheaton students consider the impact of race and racialization and how it shifts across borders. Our goal is to equip them with the skills and attitudes to travel the world with curiosity, empathy and open-mindedness, and to provide them with educational opportunities/cross-cultural interactions for them to observe how racism manifests itself in different contexts, to be exposed to diverse perspectives, to reflect on their own perceptions of race, and to recognize evidence of change and opportunities for advocacy.

Innovation Spaces and Programs

We will work towards creating a relevant campus wide marketing program. Our goal is to increase awareness of the resources available within the Innovation Spaces and Programs.

Institutional Research

We will apply what has been learned in a workshop about indigenous ways of knowledge and evaluation to the Campus Climate Diversity Survey (CCDS) administered this year (October/November implementation time frame). The goal is to be more inclusive in how data is presented and evaluated.

Information Technology Services

We will focus on access to technology. Our goal is to continue to loan computers to students, provide Adobe Creative Cloud licenses, and virtualize academic software when legally possible.

Madeleine Clark Wallace Library

We will use qualitative (e.g. PhotoVoice), quantitative (e.g. MISO), and advisory (e.g. Student Advisory Board) data to inform changes to be made to services and spaces. Our goal is to improve library services for BIPOC students.

Marketing and Communications

We will eliminate procedural barriers and build different relationships with more students and campus partners. Our goal is to diversify student representation within our student ambassador and divisional work-study programs.

Marshall Center for Intercultural Learning

We will invite students to serve on the Marshall Center Advisory Council. Our goal in establishing this Advisory Council is to hear from a variety of student voices about their experiences and what we can be doing to better serve and support students.

Office of the Arts

We will continue the work begun in spring 2021 to reimagine the Visiting Artists Program (VAP) proposal process as a merit-based system informed by equity and with consideration for multiplicity of thoughts and cultures and across departments and programs. Our goal is to build connections that enable us to broaden the VAP’s reach and ensure that its commitment to social justice, diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging remains integral to our programming.

Permanent Collection

In partnership with the Beard and Weil Galleries, we will create an internship program to support students from populations that are historically underrepresented in the museum and gallery fields. Our goal is to provide students from diverse backgrounds with the mentoring, work experience, and professional development opportunities needed to gain employment in these fields and to further diversify the arts and culture sector.

Social Justice & Community Impact

We will create new presentations and create space for reflection to build the capacity of our student leaders to be anti-racist in their work. Our goal is to improve our student interns and early arrival program assistants’ professional development in this area.

Student Financial Services

We will hold learning sessions, and create communications that are specifically targeted to first-gen students who may have otherwise not had previous experience, and/or support from their families or high schools around financial literacy. Our goal is to make our office known as a welcoming space, staffed by counselors who want to educate and assist students with the challenges they face when paying for, and borrowing for, college expenses.

Title IX

We will review and further develop our formal trainings being offered to those responding to sexual misconduct to center anti-racism, equity, and belonging. Our goal is on promoting better preparedness by first responders and overall more inclusive and equitable support for all who may intersect with the Title IX process.