Equity Action Report: Academic Affairs
Published April 1, 2022
Equity Action Report: Academic Affairs
Cross Divisional Projects
- Reappointment, Tenure & Promotion policy referred to the Faculty Personnel Policies Council. The requests were to: explicitly attend to contributions of Black faculty and other underrepresented faculty in the RTP process, increase the weight and value of service, and make the policy more clear. The council will have a revised draft in Fall 2021 at the earliest and then it will be reviewed on the Senate floor with an estimated completion date of Spring 2022.
- Advisory Council on Strategic Enrollment Management. This council, which has been revived to include more faculty members and community members from local districts and community colleges that serve significant numbers of Black Students, began meeting Fall 2020. One of the questions they are taking up is how to increase the number of Black students admitted to the university, as well as to focus on retention and graduation rates of black students.
- Academic Senate retreat run by the National Inclusive Excellence Leadership Academy (NIXLA) titled “From Awareness to Action: Empowering our Campus Community through Inclusive Excellence” to be held on February 11, 2021. The retreat will be led by Dr. Damon Williams and the goals are to give the campus community a shared vocabulary for discussing Anti-Blackness and racial justice efforts on campus, and to support senators as they revise policies and change their practices.
- Equity Action Plan for the Academic Senate. The HERI Campus Climate Survey data is being released early Spring. The Academic Senate Executive Committee will help write sections of the larger report and will also use the data to write their own Equity Action Plan, which will lay out specific steps (e.g., increase the number of Black faculty on the Academic Senate and on Senate Councils and Committees). The Action Plan will be shared with the campus community by May 2021.
- Professional Development on Service. To the campus. The Senate Chair, Vice Chair, Nominating Committee Chair, and Faculty Center Director will create modules for professional development on service—from nuts and bolts of committee organization to how to make equity a line item on every agenda—and offer it to all faculty and staff. We are discussing targeted sessions for Black faculty and staff cohosted with the BFAS, and will consult with the LFSA to see if there is similar interest. The goals are to recruit more Black faculty to serve on the Senate and on Senate committees and councils and to support faculty in place. These will be offered Spring 2021.
- Campus Conversations. The Academic Senate is cohosting a series of “Campus Conversations” with the Provost this spring. The first one (1/21) was an open forum with no agenda; the second one will focus on spring 21 and fall 21 repopulation of the campus; and at least two more will focus on issues of representation on campus (the LFSA will share its data). On 3/22 the Latinx Faculty & Staff Association will share their data on representation, and on 4/29 the President’s Equity & Change Commission will share their preliminary report with the senate & campus community.
- Founded a speaker series that is in partnership with the Carpenter’s Center, DSA, and the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion for Academic Affairs.
- Developed a Data Fellows Team that is examining the Long Beach Promise pipeline to create recommendations for CSULB and LB Promise partners.
- Collaborated with the President’s Equity & Change Commission (PECC) to create a strategic diversity plan. Review of this document will begin in late spring.
- Scheduled townhalls by PECC centered on diversity, equity, and inclusion.
- John Hamilton and Ray Briggs – Megan Carpenter Center event – FEED – COTA
- 35 HIP leaders and staff that have been doing intergroup dialogue group – at the end of Fall 2021 – create a racial equity plan
- Racial equity plan Spring 2021 – implementing fall 2021 – 22
- Intergroup Dialogue for AS, Dean’s commission of equity and justice, advisors across campus
- Keynote speaker for the Advising Center about equity
Colleges
Empowering Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI): With the continuation of online instruction amid the gradual repopulation of the campus, efforts to safely navigate the return to face-to-face instruction bring issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion to the forefront in new ways. Each art discipline requires its own set of strategies to ensure the health and safety of students, staff, and faculty. Health and wellness as one aspect of equity and inclusion will continue to need attention, alongside other aspects of diversity, equity, and inclusion, in AY 2022-2023. In 2021-2022 the College of the Arts departments have worked to ensure the safety of all, while continuing the work needed to increase diversity, accessibility, and equity within their communities and programs.
- Each of the College of the Arts Departments have continued to provide opportunities for students, faculty, and staff to listen and learn from each other – focusing on issues of equity, race, institutional barriers to access and inclusion, and social justice. COTA Dean’s Office is working to support the efforts of the departments and to address diversity, equity, and inclusion and foster a sense of community among staff and administrators in the Dean’s office. COTA’s administration plans to re-engage with its DEI training and is taking steps to ensure that all staff, faculty, and administrators know that they are heard and that their contributions to the college are recognized and valued.
- The School of Art Inclusive Excellence Committee has made great strides over the past year. In support of their work, the school received a $10,000 grant, enabling the committee to bring BIPOC students and educators to The School of Art. This work is enhanced by the committee’s outreach to our local community. Contacting local schools, administrators, and arts teachers, the Inclusive Excellence Committee is working on coordinating visits to our campus, educating families regarding careers in the fine arts, and working with local BIPOC organizations. The School of Art has also worked with University Outreach on strategies and resources for deepening community engagement. Additionally, the School of Art Inclusive Excellence Committee is developing a promotional video series and social media campaign as a genesis for outreach.
- The Carpenter Center has continued its commitment to helping build a more equitable and just society. The Center’s goal is to ensure everyone - regardless of identity, ability, background, or personal experience - belongs at the Carpenter Center. The Center continues to widen the diversity of its programming to include more voices and reach broader audiences. In addition, the Carpenter Center will continue to offer the Voices for Justice: Equity & Arts series, an interdisciplinary exploration of systemic racism, social justice, activism, equality, and the arts. Each discussion is moderated by CSULB faculty and provides students and the community with front-line perspectives on how to achieve positive social change. The events are presented free of charge and are a collaboration of the Division of Student Affairs, the Carpenter Center, the Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Academic Affairs, and the Cole Conservatory FEED program.
- The Department of Dance has continued the EDI initiatives begun in 2018-2019, which included revising the curriculum with a focus on increasing diversity, access, and inclusion. During 2021-2022, two new tenure-track faculty of color joined the department, strengthening the curricular emphasis on African American and African diasporic forms and offering mentorship to students of color. Additionally, the department has been examining hiring practices and seeking opportunities to diversity PT faculty and staff hires, including commissioning female artists of color to set choreography on undergraduate majors for department concerts. The Department continues to monitor syllabi language for inclusivity and remains in dialogue with student groups regarding equity and accessibility. Continuing work begun in 2020-2021, the department has increased the inclusivity of auditions, which has had an immediate impact on student demographics, increasing diversity and bringing the proportion of native first-year to transfer students to a 50:50 ratio. In Fall 2021, three faculty collaboratively wrote a FRA-DEI grant, securing support for a community-focused diversity training to take place April 28 and 29, 2022. This training will focus on embodied social justice and will be led by the Diversity in Motion Collective, a group of social justice focused movement therapists. In preparation for the training, some faculty and students have been meeting monthly to discuss readings about racism, white supremacy, and accountability.
- The Department of Design intentionally and inherently values diversity, equity, and inclusion and continues to take guidance from the ongoing, excellent work arising within the design profession. They maintain an area dedicated to DEI on Beachboard to allow faculty to foreground DEI approaches to teaching and to capture industry-validated and data-driven resources for their courses. The Chair has drawn from best practices in the discipline to generate a DEI statement for syllabi (DEsIgn), which emphasizes diversity’s link to creativity, equity grounded in material experience, and inclusion’s focus on creating a feeling of belonging where everyone feels a part of the community and people feel safe and valued. These efforts are paired with an expanded focus on the increasing the diversity of PT faculty. Additionally, the department created a DEI Working Group whose Chair is their liaison to the LGBTQ+ University committee, which provides continuity in communication and action between the department and larger University community. They have also initiated a DEI workshop program called “Voices in Design” that they hope to continue but which requires additional funding.
- In the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music, Christine Guter organized a concert honoring Black Musicians, while the director, Alicia Doyle, assigned the Advisory Council to examine departmental policies for institutionalized bias. The conservatory undertook a comprehensive overhaul of the music history curriculum, creating new courses and revising existing ones to broaden and diversify the histories covered. By opening the history courses up to address music histories of all peoples, moving away from a Eurogenic focus, the new curriculum revision is an important step towards greater inclusion within the conservatory. \
- Since the Carolyn Campagna Kleefield Contemporary Art Museum reopened to the public in February, welcoming visitors with new levels of accessibility. As the only free art museum in Long Beach, they are oriented toward removing barriers to access and inclusion in all museum activities. Partnering with innovators from UC Berkeley, the museum now has four sets of specialty eyeglasses that allow visitors living with color blindness to see color, which visitors may checkout from the reception desk. The remodeled museum includes a lactation suite, Spanish-language texts, large-print texts, comfortable seating for visitors, all ground level facilities, and outdoor facilities with easy to roll on surfaces for individuals with mobility impairments. The museum’s opening included the work of three women, three artists of color, two immigrants, three local artists, and two members of the LGTBQ community. Ahead of our reopening, the museum hosted another intern through the Getty Marrow Internship, which is designed to resolve career pipeline and training challenges for students of color. Additionally, the museum hired its first Kleefeld intern and found funds to hire a previous intern, thereby further extending professional training opportunities and career development for three students. All interns are paid for their work; no students are forced to choose between working for free and preparing for professional leadership. The museum is honored to be a Getty Learning Community, which means they will host several dozen interns from across southern California for a day seminar in summer 2022. Furthermore, they continue to support the work for the CSU Museums and Galleries Consortium to host weekly artist lectures by BIPOC artists. Currently, they are working to launch an online database of the collection to further remove barriers to access for scholars and the public. Finally, the museum’s refreshed docent program continues to emphasize multi-generational exchange as they serve over 1500 students a semester from LBUSD and ABCUSD in addition to thousands of CSULB students—an average of 200 a day.
- The Department of Film and Electronic Arts has continued the work of the IAAM (Inclusivity Across All Media) collective, which was created in 2020 to measure, observe and promote equity, diversity, and inclusivity. It is composed of full-time and part time faculty, staff and student representatives and currently led by Lecturer Tasha Hunter and Assistant Professors Sharri Hefner and Ben Huff. IAAM continues to have Listening sessions that have informed the faculty’s work on re-envisioning curriculum, to create of EDI events, to organize anti-bias trainings, to continue to support inclusion and diversity in hiring practices, and more. FEA continues to hire BIPOC tenure-track and part-time faculty and guest artists/scholars. In April 2022, FEA will be holding two implicit bias workshops: one for faculty and one for students. These workshops are to be led by Dr. J. Ayo Alabi, who is a part of the Black Caucus for Academic Senate for California Community Colleges and a professional anti-bias trainer. Notably, the faculty workshops will be IAAM's first initiative directed toward improving instructor conduct and classroom content. The goal is to ensure that FEA continues to expand its environment of inclusivity and ideally create an equitable education for all. For Black History Month, IAAM honored the work of African American television directors in Q&A events. In 2021, POC director Seith Mann shared his creative processes through preproduction, production, and postproduction on shows like Elementary, The Walking Dead, Nurse Jackie and Californication. In 2022, POC director Christine Swanson not only shared her process in directing The Clark Sisters, MacGyver and Chicago PD but also gave advice for starting a career as a creative. Both were a huge success. IAAM aims to continue these guest filmmaker series with more professionals from diverse backgrounds.
- The Department of Theatre Arts faculty and staff engaged in a yearlong restorative justice workshop with the California Center for Equality and Justice (CCEJ). Based on concerns and complaints from students and alumni, the Faculty and Staff worked through a process of examining and addressing racial bias, racism, and white supremacy. This training included separate workshop and listening process for students. Additionally, addressing student concerns and a growing awareness in the broader field, the Theatre Arts department brought in Theatrical Intimacy Educators to foster a consent based, inclusive process to respect and honor student boundaries in relationship to scene and production work. The initial workshop was conducted in three separate phases: 1) a full faculty and staff introductory session to familiarize them with the terminology and department commitment; 2) an extended workshop for “performance” faculty who would be addressing this work in their classrooms and productions; 3) a student-only workshop so the students could both learn and address any concerns they might have in a space without faculty. Based on the success and importance of these workshops, Theatre Arts plans to continue to offer student-only workshops each year so that new students can benefit from the work. This work addresses not only the safe, respectful, non-sexualized staging of intimate scenes but also addresses actor comfort and safety regarding traumatic material of any kind. In addition, the department has brought over 25 guest artists from underrepresented communities into Theater Arts classrooms and used every opportunity to hire PT faculty that more closely resemble Southern California and the department’s student body. In response to student requests, department diversified its “season selection” committee, which historically only had one student voice; now, the committee is composed of 50% students and 50% faculty/staff. The committee has discussed selecting work for productions with a focus on centering historically underrepresented communities and better reflecting student demographics and experience. In conjunction with these discussions, the department is drafting an inclusive and transparent casting policy for the department along with a series of transparency documents on season selection and other key department processes. This student-centered committee resulted in Theatre Arts’ first in-person production being a student directed, student written collaboration called “American Distortion” that centered our diverse student body and their concerns and experiences.
- COB Legal Resource Center (LRC). LRC seeks to resolve injustice in the treatment of individuals, and is committed to empowering students through legal knowledge, thereby clearing pathways to future educational endeavors and achievements. Started in 2016 by California Attorney and COB lecturer Allison E. Butler, LRC provides legal resources aimed to serve diverse students and faculty through various means of action.
- LRC’s website contains various legal resources focused on legal issues commonly encountered by minorities and underserved students and faculty.
- LRC focuses on minority issues through student-formulated articles such as Native American Resource Guide, Critical Race Theory, Qualified Immunity, History of Anti-Asian Rhetoric, Cleaning Your Record, Changing Your Gender, Abortion issues, Lactation rights, and Sex discrimination.
- LRC provides office hours as well as online appointments to assist minority entrepreneurs and business owners on how to form business entities and related issues. It also assist minority students with issues ranging from employment and housing discrimination, domestic partnerships issues, ADA compliance, and workers compensation.
- LRC provides online events about an array of issues. In Spring 2022, research on the disparate impact of unregulated tattoo ink on minorities was presented to students.
- LRC partners with the Los Angeles County Bar Association to provide free legal consultation to minority students and with the CSULB Dream Center for DACA students regarding immigration.
- COB BLAW Certificate Program. Allison E. Butler created the COB BLAW Certificate Program to assist African American entrepreneurs and small businesses, and she worked with African American community leaders to develop its content and format. The BLAW Certificate Program has been offered in Spring 2021 and Spring 2022.
- This 8-week online program is delivered via Zoom. All material is free to participants, as is access to Beachboard and library resources.
- Successful candidates earn a Certificate of Participation and a BLAW E-Badge.
- Topics include business entities, employment and employment discrimination, torts, contract review, torts, criminal, real property, intellectual property, cryptocurrency, importing, bankruptcy, Proposition 65, and privacy issues.
- In Spring 2021, a majority of the 33 participants were from the African American Community. Other participants were from underserved communities, including Hispanic, Asian, LGBT, and Woman businesses. Fifteen participants successfully completed the program.
- In Spring 2022, there were 36 enrolled participants with a majority enrolled from the African American Community. The remainder of the participants all were from underserved communities, including, Hispanic, Asian, and Woman businesses.
- Human Resources Management (HRM) Diverse Faculty Recruiting Efforts. HRM recruitment efforts expanded to cast a wider net and increase diversity in our applicant pool:
- Working with Academy of Management (AOM) career services to feature our position with PhD Project candidate career workshop and with Garry Adams who oversees coaching for PhD Project applicants.
- Posting on Academic Mamas, a Facebook group that supports mothers in academia, with an inclusive definition of mothers, and WOB (Women in Organizational Behavior) with an inclusive definition of womanhood.
- Posting on AOM discussion boards (i.e., Listservs) that support academics and PhD students in underrepresented groups.
- Contacting those who support PhD Project’s applicants for one last push to highlight our HRM position.
Dr. Mona Zanhour, HRM Recruiting Chair, is working with AOM recruitment specialists on developing deeper recruitment partnerships to have wider outreach and connection with applicants that we might not have reached in the past. We plan to engage more with PhD Project programs, such as coaching programs, workshops, and “recruiter day” at Academy of Management conferences.
Dr. Kenji Klein, COB Faculty Equity Advocate (FEA), had Student Assistants examine webpages of AACSB business schools to locate potential diverse faculty members. (There are over 900 AACSB accredited business schools worldwide.) Candidates that didn’t meet criteria (clinical faculty/adjuncts without research profiles, tenured professors, non-PhD’s, etc.) were not contacted, but about twenty potential candidates were identified and contacted. COB plans to expand this effort in future years.
- Inclusive Marketing Initiative. COB provides inclusive marketing services to minority-owned businesses in the greater Long Beach area. Since its inception in Fall 2020, the Inclusive Marketing Initiative has served over 60 clients, providing free digital marketing services through semester-long, student-run projects.
Students partner with small businesses through Marketing 437 (Digital Marketing & Social Media) and Marketing 495 (Digital Marketing II). From organic and paid social media to website Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and email campaigns, students gain valuable real-world experience working with local clients. Student feedback echo positive experience:
- “The semester-long group project contributed the most to my learning in this course. It was such a precious opportunity for me to be able to work with a real client, and it definitely gave me an idea of what it's like working in real life.”
- “The client project was also super fun and interesting because we were actually working with real clients as we would do as marketers in the real world. I felt we were able to learn so much and put our digital marketing skills to the test.”
Sixteen clients were served in Fall 2021 with favorable feedback and reviews; 100% would recommend the program to other businesses. Client comments were positive:
- “Updating & reactivating the company's Facebook was very helpful. No additional questions - Student Group gets an A.”
- “The groups suggestion to add Reels to our Instagram greatly expanded our reach. The team was friendly, easy to work with and happy to make changes to things that matched up with our vision.”
Twenty-two clients were onboarded in Spring 2022. Our continued partnership with the Los Angeles Small Business Development Center (SBDC) at Long Beach City College helped build demand and exposure, with over 95 businesses requesting to take part in the Spring 2022 cohort. We will continue to nurture and grow this program.
- Partnerships with the Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship.
- Co-sponsored Behind the Screens: Discriminatory Algorithms. Organized and led by Dr. Ebony Utley, Associate Director, Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (IIE).Algorithms increasingly impact all our lives, but some, particularly women, people of color, and people experiencing poverty, are made more vulnerable by algorithms. Behind the Screens: Discriminatory Algorithms identifies this pattern of technology discrimination and poses solutions to address it. On October 27, 2021, this event featured a keynote lecture from Princeton’s Dr. Ruha Benjamin and an interactive algorithm audit led by Color Coded LA’s Chris Cuellar.
- Co-sponsored Social Justice Entrepreneurship through Apostle Enterprise Lab.
Dr. Ebony Utley, IIE Associate Director, offered a free five-week online workshop on Social Justice Entrepreneurship to teach participants how to earn profits while making positive community contributions and supporting the wellbeing of the entrepreneur, clients, customers, employees, and the environment from which they hail. Two-hour sessions were offered Wednesdays, March 2nd-23rd and April 6th.
- Support for Centro CHA Program. IIE is partnering with Centro CHA to support entrepreneurs and small businesses through both a cohort-based model and a series of stand-alone workshops. One workshop series targets existing small businesses and focuses on strengthening the skills of the business owner/operator to provide long-term stability while promoting growth. A second workshop series targets startup entrepreneurs that are interested in creating a new business. COB is providing faculty support for this program.
- President – Provost Initiative Faculty Research Awards in Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion President Jane Close Conoley and Provost Karyn Scissum Gunn sponsor this initiative that focuses on racial equity issues that are important to the campus EDI efforts. Dr. Jeffrey Bentley, Associate Professor of Human Resource Management, is COB’s 2021 recipient for his project, Supporting Black Small Business Owners Inside and Out: Evaluating and Developing Access to Financial, Human, and Identity Capital.
In the face of institutionalized racism, Black Small Business Owners (SBOs) in the U.S. must fill a deficit of both human capital (e.g., skills, experience) and financial capital(e.g., startup funds, interest rates) to thrive like their White or Latinx counterparts. CSULB and the City of Long Beach City offer resources to overcome these barriers, but the effectiveness of the resources is not clear, and these barriers may not be the only inequities. Unlike White SBOs, Black SBOs must also build the psychological capacity to preserve in the face of discrimination by many social structures. This belies a third deficit: identity capital.
- Strategic Planning. COB is in the early stages of developing a 2025-2030 strategic plan, and we want to explicitly include equity, diversity, and inclusion considerations as we create the new plan. COB held a college-wide meeting in October 2021 to examine how these issues are reflected in our mission and vision statements, curriculum, and intellectual contributions. COB then sponsored faculty and staff to attend the AACSB Global Diversity and Inclusion Conference in December 2021 to gain perspective from what other business schools are doing. In March 2022, COB held another college-wide meeting to review how COB will embed its commitment to equity, diversity, and inclusion in revised core values and mission and vision statements.
Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) is offered by the Accountancy Department. VITA is an IRS program provides free income tax preparation to low-income, students, the elderly, non-residents, and limited English proficiency individuals. They are hoping to engage more with diverse communities in Long Beach, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, VITA is operating in virtual mode this year, but in future years, they plan on engaging with diverse and underserved communities in Long Beach.
- The College has developed a DEI Curricular Innovations Initiative with the goal to build capacity, develop resources, and innovate programs and courses. All Departments in the College are participating in this initiative comprised of five components outlined below:
- Working with the college’s Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Committee to develop shared language regarding equity, diversity, inclusion, and equity-mindedness utilizing existing shared language from the university Equity and Change Commission and the CAMINOS project as a basis. Groups such as Staff Advisory Council, Faculty Council, as well as individual faculty, staff and students have had the opportunity to provide input. Once fully developed, this shared language will be used throughout the college’s work – in curriculum initiatives and beyond.
- Working with the Endowment Committee on a special call for DEI Curricular Innovation awards, providing the opportunity for several teams of faculty to engage in DEI curricular innovations at the course and/or program level.
- Working with Academic Technology Services to develop 1) a professional development series for Spring 2022 that incorporates DEI into course design alongside technology and 2) a program for enhancing online and hybrid courses that also incorporates DEI content and accessibility into the courses.
- Developing a new college syllabus template incorporating the new shared language, along with sharing resources for making syllabi equitable and inclusive.
- Working with the College Curriculum Committee to incorporate the shared language into the curriculum forms and developing sustainable resources for faculty to use when developing course or program curriculum proposals that integrate DEI content and demonstrate equity and inclusion.
- The College of Education has invited Dr. Deborah Faye Carter to offer a Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) workshop series this semester for CED faculty. In alignment with CED’s ongoing work on a comprehensive initiative integrating DEI throughout its curriculum and courses, the series focuses on equity-minded practices in curriculum, pedagogy, and technology. These workshops run through the semester and are open to full-time CED faculty and part-time lecturers. Dr. Carter is associate professor of higher education in the School of Educational Studies at Claremont Graduate University. Carter’s areas of research include the impact of college on students, especially students of color and/or low-income students, students’ degree aspirations, students’ transition to college, and the effects of undergraduate research on students’ major choices and graduate school attendance.
- The CED has introduced the Advancing Inclusive Graduate Admissions initiative. The purpose of the initiative is to work towards equitable and inclusive graduate recruitment and admissions processes in CED that scholarly work suggests can result in the increased access and successful admission of talented students from historically underserved, underrepresented communities and marginalized backgrounds. Through engaged learning and independent exercises—led by Dr. Josephine Moreno, a Graduate Diversity Director at UC Davis and expert on holistic graduate admissions—department chairs, faculty program coordinators, faculty admissions committee members, faculty application reviewers and graduate studies staff are addressing key elements of inclusive graduate admissions. Over the course of the academic year, CED participants will develop new learnings and skills that can be applied directly to practice in the current admissions cycle and in the years to come.
- Our BLM@School faculty committee (Drs. Oscar Navarro, Noah Golden, Jolan Smith and Heather Macias with support from Amber Smith) hosted the second annual Black Lives Matter at School series of events in January through March 2022. The College of Education's slate of BLM at School events started with a virtual kickoff, "Black Lives Matter at School: Defining the Movement" featuring Denisha Jones, Jesse Hagopian, Awo Okaikor Aryee-Price, and Lisa Covington. Events were held on celebrating and supporting Black LGBTQ+ youth; wellness; and the series culminated with a session on developing relationship-centered schools that featured a dialogue with youth organizers from Californians for Justice who described what schools based on collaboration, care, and restorative justice can look like in practice.
- CED Outreach has formed committee to focus on attracting and retaining BIPOC students to become educators. One strategy for meeting this focus is a monthly virtual Racial Justice in Education (RJE) series. The RJE series provides a forum for current and potential students to come together to dialogue about contemporary and meaningful topics related to racial justice in the field of education. Educators of color also are often invited to discuss their experiences navigating in educational environments. Topics have included “disrupting the school to prison pipeline” and “debunking myths about CRT,” among others. Community partners are also invited to participate in these noontime events.
- The CED Faculty Council revised the RSCA call for proposals such that projects that advocate for racial equity and justice in education or disrupt anti-Black racism received priority in the review process.
- The College Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Committee is planning a self-study to investigate the experiences of BIPOC faculty, staff, and students in the College in order to develop actions to address inequities.
- In Spring 2022, the College hosted Dr. J Luke Wood as our Veffie Milstead Jones annual speaker who addressed the topic of, "Educators' Perspectives on Student Equity: A Taxonomy and Strategy for Change."
- The HSI Caminos Project (a USDE Title V grant funded project) has been working alongside faculty leads to create a professional learning community focused on disseminating culturally responsive pedagogy and practices for all faculty within the Multiple Subject Credential Program (MSCP) and Education Specialist Credential Program (ESCP) this year. The goal of these faculty learning opportunities was the implementation of culturally responsive practices beginning in teacher preparation through clinical practice and student teaching. Faculty are revising signature assignments and program activities in light of this work.
- The Department of Teacher Education hosted a workshop and discussions on “What can equitable trauma and healing informed care look like in Teacher Education” with presenter Dr. Stephanie Cariaga.
- In partnership with the CSU Center to Close the Opportunity Gap, the Office of Educational Partnerships, and the CED Office of Outreach, the Department of Liberal Studies launched a teacher pathway project with Paramount Unified School District. The project is intended to develop a teacher pathway model to recruit, prepare and retain teachers of color who are prepared to work in post-pandemic schools.
- The Department of Liberal Studies is working with a graduate research assistant to use the CSU Dashboard as a springboard for starting Department dialogues on equity gaps and graduation rates. The goal is to enable Liberal Studies faculty and staff to develop an understanding of equity gaps between historically underserved students and their peers, and to identify strategies to improve success rates among students of diverse ethnicities, socio-economic backgrounds, gender, etc.
- In Spring 2022, the Department of Liberal Studies faculty participated in PD to improve course content and expand teaching that aligns with culturally relevant and sustaining practices.
- Building on their experience with intergroup dialogue in 2020-21, the Department of Educational Leadership has institutionalized a Racial Equity Committee (REC). That committee both collaborates with/advises the Racial Equity Fellows and coordinates the department’s efforts to build a healthy culture focused on equity and racial justice. This year, they have set up guidelines and processes for faculty to have relationship-building and support-based conversations (1:1, affinity groups, and in the department).
- For the last 2 years, the Department of Educational Leadership has instituted a Racial Equity Fellows program. They have given fellowships to 6 students (5 EDD, 1 SDHE) for $5000 each per year. These students have led ongoing dialogues (for students across the University) as part of our Race, Racism, and….series, which is intended to normalize conversations around these topics, and build skills in having these challenging conversations.
- The Department of Educational Leadership is engaged in an effort to expand recruitment of Black men into their programs. The Department has convened a 12-person community advisory board to help them conceptualize and implement this work.
- Dean’s Commission on Equity, Diversity, and Racial Justice — This Dean’s Commission started as a way for faculty, staff, students, and administrators can meet to address issues of systemic racism in the college. Four students, four faculty, four staff, and three administrators are meeting monthly for Intergroup Dialog. These sessions are facilitated by experts in the field, Dr. Shametrice Davis (CSULB) and Dr. Carmen McCallum (Eastern Michigan University). This commission is off to a strong start and hope it will lead to concrete suggestions for improving equity in the college.
- Beach Engineering Student Success Team (BESST) — BESST is an ongoing student success initiative that serves freshmen who are unprepared for the demanding mathematics courses they need as engineering majors. BESST uses a cohort model to give students who come from primarily underrepresented and Pell Grant backgrounds the extra assistance and sense of belonging they need to succeed in engineering and computer science. BESST students take all mathematics and engineering classes in one classroom with tutors, mentors and guest speakers coming to them. Now in its sixth year, this initiative has a remarkable average completion rate for Calculus 1 of 90%.
- TT Hiring — The college is working to ensure the Tenure-Track hiring practices are designed to be equitable for all candidates. The COE Faculty Equity Advisor serves as an ad-hoc member on all search committees, reviews all candidates' files, and advises the dean on diversity issues within each search.
- Integrating high-impact practices into the Student Success Programs — The Engineering Student Success Center (ESSC) is designed around high-impact, best-practices for student success. The center consistently initiates new programs based on data-driven assessment. Current success initiatives in the program include high-touch point advising, tutoring, first-year experience activities, MESA programs, professional development workshops, and internship preparation.
- Collaboration with CNSM on an HSI-STEM Grant — Through a dynamic collaboration between CNSM and COE a jointly lead HSI-STEM Grant has brought additional resources for student success into both colleges. This grant works closely with college associate deans and student success center staff to bring peer mentoring to first-year classes for both freshmen and transfer students. In addition, the grant provides a summer bridge program called STEP-into-STEM for pre-freshmen who need help with mathematics.
- Faculty Champions — The COE Faculty Champions were created to assist faculty in their efforts at taking classes to on-line mode during the pandemic. The champions consist of representatives from each department who are dedicated instructors. Their efforts include educating faculty on the equity issues facing underrepresented students in the current online environment.
- 100+ Women Strong — Nationally, women account for only about 18 percent of college students studying engineering and 13 percent of women teaching engineering. COE has made strides in both areas—increasing the proportion of female engineering students from 14 percent in 2010 to 20 percent currently and ranking fifth nationally for the proportion of female tenure/tenure-track faculty. However, more needs to be done. COE’s 100+ Women Strong initiative brings women from industry into the college to support and mentor women engineering students. The goal is to increase the percentage of female engineering students to 25 percent by 2025.
- Engineering Ambassadors for Recruiting Women Engineers — Through a generous donation from Southern California Edison, the college formed the Engineering Ambassadors group to outreach to local high school juniors and seniors. The Ambassadors visit local high school STEM classes making presentations and encouraging female students to consider a degree in engineering of computer science.
- BEACH Women in Engineering Conference - This conference was initiated by the 100+ Women Strong organization, and is planned to run annually. In 2022, we have over 140 students from universities, community colleges, and high schools signed up to explore career stories from over 70 women engineers and faculty moderators. The goal of the conference is to foster the development of engineering identity in prospective engineers, which research shows improves retention of women in the field after graduation.
- Diverse Pipeline Subcommittee of the Dean's Advisory Council - This newly formed subcommittee will be advising the dean on industry concerns with diversity in the engineering pipeline, as well as collaborating on supporting projects of mutual benefit to industry and academia.
- The CHHS Data Fellows presented the findings of their secondary descriptive analysis which investigated the current status of DEI in the college and individual departments. The project also examined how CHHS has done historically in recruiting, admitting, and retaining Black or African American students and identified areas for improvement.
- CHHS has appointed a Beach 2030 Leadership Fellow to facilitate the coordination of strategic goals across departments. Based on the Data Fellows DEI Report, designees from each department were selected and worked with faculty to develop an action plan with specific initiatives and timelines. Common threads between departments have been identified and the next phase will focus on enhancing partnerships between departments and related University programs as well as developing interdepartmental initiatives.
- Creation of a DEI standing committee has been implemented by four CHHS departments with others currently in process.
- The School of Social work (SSW) continues with its five-year systematic campaign to move all levels of the program beyond a multicultural orientation towards critical race theory (CRT) and a critical consciousness pedagogical model for change across all areas, inclusive of course overview and reconstruction, engagement of matriculating students, and admissions. In September 2021, staff and faculty attitudes and perceptions of the shift to CRT and Critical Pedagogies were collected. These data have informed the next steps in addressing diversity, equity, and inclusion in the SSW.
- CHHS Faculty Council created an ad hoc Social Justice committee in the fall. This team has had college-wide breakout discussions to develop collegewide goals and strategic actions that will fold into the CHHS strategic plan.
- Based on our Sonia Nazario follow-up roundtable event, a report is being drafted on the participant discussions regarding the role of the college and university in advancing the health and well-being of migrants and their families. This report will be completed by the end of February.
- CHHS faculty meet regularly in an ad hoc group with community leaders on advancing anti-racism in the community. This team has narrowed their efforts to focus on working with the community to participate in the Black Health Equity Collaborative and to assist in an updated report on the State Black Long Beach Report. This effort is currently reflected in our strategic goal to strengthen and advance community partnerships and is reflected in strategic actions. Another related action we have in this area is to establish a Center for Evidence-Based Policing.
- Long Beach Black Health Equity Collaborative: Black Health Equity Town Hall
- Black residents in Long Beach have experienced significant health disparities. For example, the rate of hypertension-related hospitalizations for Black adults (11.9 per 10,000) was double the rate of other race/ethnicity subgroups. The rate of infant death (7.3 deaths per 1,000 live births) is highest among the Black residents. In addition, the average life expectancy for Black residents is 71.5 years, more than seven years lower than other racial/ethnic groups.
- This has contributed to COVID-19 disparities within the Black community in Long Beach. Black residents in Long Beach comprise 13% of the population but account for 15% of all COVID-related deaths. The disparity in COVID-19 related death is related to underlying health (e.g., hypertension, asthma) and socioeconomic (e.g., essential workers, limited access to health care, discrimination) conditions.
- To address these disparities, the Long Beach Black Community, CSULB, and the City of Long Beach have partnered to develop strategies to achieve Black Health Equity in Long Beach. During the town hall, learn about the newly formed Long Beach Black Health Equity Collaborative and participate in a discussion with our panel of experts in health equity.
- Hiring Diverse Faculty
Of CLA’s current group of assistant professors:- 69% identify as women
- 75% identify as people of color
- 16% identify as African American
- 20% identify as are Latinx
- 23% identify as Asian or South Asian
- 3% identify as American Indian
- 13% identify as Middle Eastern/Muslim
- 22% identify as part of the LGBTQIA+ community
- 3% identify as differently abled
This is the result of action taken over the last five years to make hiring committees aware of implicit bias, and to recruit more actively to create diverse pools of candidates.
- Sample High-Impact Practices
Over the last year we have made significant progress in several areas of career readiness including enhancing equitable access to internships and piloting new internship models. For example, in 2021-2022, CLA
- Recruited, trained, and fostered partnerships with 246 agency partners hosting 900 CLA student interns annually.
- Continued to offer department and college-level internship courses (including summer sections) that make it possible for every CLA student to complete an internship before graduating.
- Supported faculty-led themed internship courses that guaranteed internship placement for students, increasing access to internships for non-traditional students.
Dozens of CLA courses have service-learning components. CLA faculty in a wide range of disciplines work with students on research projects and in labs. For example, well over 100 students a year work with Psychology faculty in labs, often co-presenting at conferences or co-authoring publications.
- The College of Liberal Arts Equity Scholars: Graduate Recruitment Initiative
In 2021-22, the inaugural year of this graduate recruitment effort, CLA provided 21 first-generation, historically underrepresented, and/or low-income graduate students with a graduate assistantship of either one or two semesters. Benefits of this program include:
- ensuring we have role models for underrepresented undergraduate students;
- enhancing the intellectual life of the college and uplifting the graduate community;
- contributing to a faculty pipeline for state education;
- contributing to local, regional and state professional pipelines;
- offering a preferential pathway for our talented CSULB undergraduates seeking graduate degrees, as well as an opportunity for local, regional and state residents seeking to retrain or upskill;
- building in and contributing to future access and equity.
- Misty Jaffe Early Leaders Program
The Early Leaders Program (ELP) is a leadership development program in which historically underrepresented faculty and junior faculty are strongly encouraged to participate. The twofold goal of ELP is to increase capacity of CLA leadership going forward and to foster CLA diverse leadership. Since 2019, the program has served two cohorts for a total of 32 participants. Participants report:
- Through readings, guest speakers, activities, and group discussions, the program allowed me to develop a complex understanding of what leadership entails and gave me tools that will be essential for taking on leadership positions in the near future
- The ELP has been helpful to understand various aspects of leadership in academia. I enjoyed meeting people, sharing experiences, and building networking with them through the Program.
- Transfer Learning Communities
Since its inception five years ago, the Transfer Learning Communities have represented from 2 – 8 CLA departments with an average of 300 students per year (given COVID impact for two years) participating
- Strategic Planning Focused on Equity
CLA’s Draft 2030 Plan is nearing completion, having directly engaged over 70 diverse faculty, staff, administrators, and students in a year-long process
- CLA and Social Justice
CLA and Social Justice tab on the CLA website provides samples of two curricular/pedagogical efforts:
- Improve Student Success
- Continuing to identify and implement evidence-based high impact practices to improve student success
- Ensure Student Research Symposium restarts post-COVID.
- Begin implementation of the Keck Undergraduate Research Experience (KURE) Incubator grant.
- Integrating authentic research experiences into lower division lab courses
- First year implementation of NIH funded Bridges to the Doctorate Grant.
- Submit NIH URISE grant to extend our current MARC and RISE grants (see below).
- Ensure CNSM first year students have access to peer mentor programs.
- Ongoing Student Success initiatives/programs
- APS/Google Bridge program
- Maximizing Access to Research Careers (MARC)
- Research Initiative for Scientific Enhancement (RISE)
- Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (LSAMP)
- The Mentored Excellence Toward Research and Industry Careers (METRIC) Scholarship Program
- HSI-STEM
- Bienvenida
- Step into STEM
- Peer-mentoring was institutionalized through the HSI-STEM program
- Thrive Series
- CNSM Resilience Project
- CNSM Freshmen Success Seminar (NSCI-190A) including evidence-based program boosting growth mindset and sense of belonging of students via Lay Theory Interventions
- Student Success Committee is looking at low completion rate courses, central foci
- Curricular mapping in chemistry; completed in Summer 2021.
- Investigating how to improve Gen Chem/OChem sequence.
- 25 faculty participate in learning community (via Faculty Center) focused on redesign of low completion / high equity gap courses including BIOL 208, BIOL 342, BIOL 260, CHEM 220A, MATH 113, 115, 233, and 361A.
- Examining possibility for alternative pathways to STEM majors.
- Examine and improve Chemistry and Math placement processes.
- Raise money for MCAT study support programs for students with need to be overseen by our Health Professions Advising Office.
- Continuing to identify and implement evidence-based high impact practices to improve student success
- Community EDI Initiatives
- Support for Hesabu Circle
- Young Scientist Camp
- Physical Sciences for High School Girls
- Science Education Experience to help Underserved Students Succeed! (SEE US Succeed)
- Faculty Programs for student success
- Ensure all second year Tenure Track (TT) faculty and selected key lecturers participate in the CNSM Faculty Learning Program (FLP).
- Support TT faculty in completing BEACH Mentor Program.
- Create lecturer cohorts for BEACH Mentor program.
- The College is working to create a more standardized process of hiring and onboarding lecturer faculty.
- Professional Development Opportunities and Training
- Annual workshops for search committee members focused on recruitment strategies, candidate evaluation, and bias reduction strategies.
- Participation in Equity & Change Network
- Create an “Equity in Advising” self-study
- Revamping TT hiring procedures
- Ensure all job ads are written to forefront diversity
- We have integrated language into our ads that forefronts diversity in Biology, Chemistry, Geology, Mathematics, Physics, and Science Education.
- Intentional recruitment strategies to ensure a highly diverse candidate pool
- Establish disciplinary faculty-developed rubrics for all faculty searches to promote more equitable judgments
- All 6 departments have created such rubrics. Rubrics are updated annually to reflect specific position criteria.
- Ensure commitment to equity and inclusive teaching are part of the selection and decision-making process; reframe the idea of the “best” candidate to reflect these commitments.
- These items are in our rubrics.
- Faculty Equity Advocate(s) now serve as ad hoc member(s) on all search committees with the ability to stop searches based on equity concerns.
- Ensure all job ads are written to forefront diversity
- Reappointment, Tenure, and Promotion
- Faculty Equity Advocates and Dean meet with RTP committee members to help them better focus on equity and bias reduction strategies in candidate evaluation.
- Normalizing mini evaluations as formative assessment.
- Developing TT retention programs through Director of Faculty Retention
- First-year flourishing weekly tips to all new TT hires
- RTP Writing Retreats
- Personalized mentoring
- Fostering Language of Inclusion and Support within CNSM
- Biweekly messaging from the dean
- Include implicit bias training and elements of ongoing guided reflection on class climate as part of mandatory professional development for CNSM faculty and teaching associates in key gateway courses
- Colloquium Talks Highlighting research on EDI, open to all.
- Math Colloquium series:
- Making the Modern Mathematician: Identity, politics, inclusion, exclusion, and the accidental rise of a "young man's game".
Speaker: Dr. Michael Barany, University of Edinburgh - Inquiry Oriented Instruction Is Better, but Just for Some?
Speaker: Dr. Estrella Johnson, Virginia Tech - Adapting High-Leverage Teaching Practices to the Abstract Algebra Classroom
Speaker: Dr. Kate Melhuish, Texas State University - Do You See What I See? Teachers' Mathematical and Cultural Noticing in Children's Books
Speaker: Dr. Cristina Runnalls, Cal Poly Pomona - Instructors’ (and Students') Racialized and Gendered Benevolent Perceptions across Calculus Instruction
Speaker: Ms. Brittany L. Marshall, Rutgers University - Adopting the Corequisite Model: A Depiction in Four Frames
Speaker: Dr. Amelia Stone-Johnstone, CSU Fullerton - Implementing Active Learning: Opportunities and Challenges Presented by the Current Moment
Speaker: Dr. Priya Prasad, University of Texas at San Antonio
- Making the Modern Mathematician: Identity, politics, inclusion, exclusion, and the accidental rise of a "young man's game".
- Math Colloquium series:
- Established a Ricard D. Green Lecturers fund to provide departments with money for hosting diverse lecturers in STEM.
For additional information on these resources, CNSM Inclusive Excellence Page
- The College of Professional and Continuing Education (CPaCE) is in the process of forming a Deans Advisory Council on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. Membership will include staff, faculty, students and members of the College administration. The Deans Advisory Council will develop DEI plans and initiatives and schedule meetings, webinars and presentations to address DEI issue the college is facing. The group will also be charged to audit current practices in place to further social justice causes, and ensure that DEI is top of mind and create a goal that is part of the college strategic plan that has action items.
The committee could also help explain, promote, and encourage the DEI mission of the university within the college. It will have the charge of holding CPaCE accountable that DEI remains a priority and could report out on the efforts to the dean. - The College of Professional and Continuing Education (CPaCE) and its Center for International Trade and Transportation (CITT) is working closely with tribal partners both in the State and regionally to build workforce capacity within transportation for tribal members. Tribal workforce development was a focus area for our State of the Transportation and Mobility Workforce Report 2020-MOBILITY-REPORT-published.pdf (swtwc.org); and we are currently working with the Santa Rosa based National Indian Justice Center (NIJC), as part of a California Energy Commission grant, to develop training on battery electric transit systems. The grant develops the tribal workforce while seeking to expand transit access to and within tribal nations. NIJC has also included CITT in a proposal to develop a regional Tribal Technical Assistance Program Center under guidelines established by the Federal Highway Administration. CITT currently administers the California Local Technical Assistance Program, a related program designed to provide training support to the State's local transportation agencies.
- CPaCE offered three courses at no cost to the community as part of the “Courses for Causes” in response to COVID-19 pandemic, an initiative started by the Professional and Continuing Education division at the Chancellor’s Office. The courses being offered include:
- Personal Creativity (40 enrolled)
- Creativity in Teams & Organization (7 enrolled)
- Southern California Logistics: Surviving COVID, Preparing for the Future (30 enrolled)
- CPaCE’s Center for International Trade and Transportation (CITT) secured SB1 funding to move forward with the CSU talent pipeline blueprint initiative: “Implementing Industry-Supported and Demand-Driven Talent Pipelines for the Trade and Transportation Sector.” The goal of the project is to develop a Talent Pipeline Blueprint for trade and transportation occupations in Greater Los Angeles. That blueprint will serve as a guidebook that documents the steps required to build cross-campus CSU talent pipelines that target the most in-demand trade and transportation occupations requiring specific degrees, certificates, and non-credit professional development. The blueprint will be developed in partnership with career and workforce development leadership at CSU5 campuses and leading trade and transportation employers to identify, train for, and recruit for the most in-demand occupations in the region.
With the diversity of the workforce in mind in the logistics industry, CITT will work with leading trade and transportation employers and trade associations to build talent pipelines for in-demand occupations. Those pilot pipeline programs will showcase how CSULB—through its professional and extended education infrastructure within CPIE—provides certificate and professional development opportunities to connect undergraduate and graduate students as well as incumbent and displaced professionals to career opportunities in trade and transportation. - CPaCE management staff (Anna Behar-Russell) is designated as representative in the CCEJ programs and activities including its Annual Breakfast.
- Staff Hiring — CPaCE continues to make sure that its workforce is representative of our community as well as the student, faculty and staff body at CSULB. Hiring practices are designed to be equitable to all candidates. Special efforts such as reaching out to various networks and personal outreach are made to recruit members of the underrepresented candidates.
- AVP and Dean Joshee sits on the Board of Sister Cities of Long Beach Inc. (SCLB). The Board members are nominated by Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia, which works with all Long Beach Sister City organizations. SCLB works to diversify our city creating partnerships with cities around the world. AVP Joshee’s representation on this Board is focused on raising global diversity CSULB brings to the community.
- CPaCE issued a statement against racial injustice and police brutality in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. CPaCE showed solidarity with African American and other minority communities in the continuing struggle against racism, sexism, xenophobia and bigotry. The college displayed a strong commitment to inclusive excellence, diversity and increasing global-understanding among students and members of our community.
- International Students Ally Training (ISAT) - Global and domestic events have directly impacted the lives of international students at CSULB. With the aim of increasing understanding and awareness about international students, the Center for International Education (CIE) conducts ISAT programs on an ongoing basis. Often, ISAT training programs are targeted among faculty, staff, advisors and students. These sessions have created increased support for international students on campus.
- The library will recruit for a DEIA (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, & Access) Librarian in the fall of 2022. The DEIA librarian will be responsible for the following subject areas/departments:
- American Indian Studies
- Chicano Latino Studies
- Africana Studies
- Asian & Asian-American Studies
- Women, Gender, & Sexuality Studies
The DEIA librarian will be responsible for serving as the main communication conduit on behalf of the library to these departments as well as providing library instruction sessions, individual consultation sessions as requested by students and faculty, and they will also be responsible for all the electronic and print collections in these areas.
The DEIA Librarian will ensure the Library’s collaboration with the colleges in support of the statewide Ethnic Studies curricular requirement as outlined in Assembly Bill 1460 (AB 1460).
In addition to the subject specializations, the DEIA Librarian will serve as a key advisor, working closely with library administration as the library begins a crucial step towards a comprehensive and strategic DEI library plan. The DEI Librarian position will help others in the library (library faculty, staff) recognize, understand, value, and embrace our differences as crucial to our communal work.
- The Librarian Faculty have been working hard to create individual DEI statements that will be incorporated into the bylaws of the library faculty constitution, as well as the bylaws of the three main faculty committees dedicated to Reference and Instruction, Collection Development and Management, and Professional Development and Planning.
- A group of five librarian faculty members (Nicollette Brant, Michelle DeMars, Kelly Janousek, Alexis Pavenick, and Tracy Gilmore) applied for the President & Provost’s Faculty Research Awards in Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (FRA-EDI). Their proposal was recognized and awarded funding. The Library proposes to establish a process of thorough examination of the collection that is sustainable over time. The librarians authoring this proposal, as well as librarian volunteers, will work with each other, library staff, consortia, student assistants, and students and faculty across disciplines to establish and perform the first examination. The outcomes of this investigation will enable the growth of EDI content in the collection and inform further and perpetual examinations so that the Library creates a habit and structure of EDI evaluation of the collection that is sustainable and progressive.
- During the 2022-23 academic year, the Library will contract with Dr. Kawanna Bright of East Carolina University to retain her services so that she may conduct a DEIA audit on the Library. Dr. Bright has already worked with the University Libraries at CSU San Luis Obispo, CSU Channel Islands, and very recently, CSU Dominguez Hills.
The audit contains an assessment tool created by Dr. Bright that is distributed to every member of the library. Her work also includes focus groups with members of the library. The final product of the DEIA audit will be a completely original, customized to our institution, assessment of the DEIA work we have done thus far, the DEIA work we have ahead of us, and a plan and road map (again, customized to our Library) on how to get there.
Dr. Bright has had a lengthy and rich career in libraries and her research area is in DEI integration to all aspects of libraries. The tools she uses for her consultations and DEI audits are completely unique as she has created them herself. The three CSU Libraries who have worked with Dr. Bright thus far have raved about the experience and the work that came out of the process.
Academic Units
- Double Admissions to Historically Challenged Applicants Effective Fall 2021
- CSULB will double its efforts to increase admission based on a holistic review. The application process targets communities based on low socioeconomic status and applicants who historically have low college-going rates. These students typically do not do well in standardized tests. Hence, we encourage targeted freshmen applicants to submit materials for a holistic review.
- Holistic review is a collaborative effort between Enrollment Services and The Office of Outreach and School Relations, called Beach Pathways. The applications are reviewed by a committee, including representatives from Outreach, Educational Opportunities, Disabled Student Services, Student Services, Academic Affairs, and faculty. Admissions criteria include the potential for degree completion, community involvement/leadership, and overcoming significant hardship. All applicants must meet CSULB minimum eligibility. Typically, we allow for 200 applicants through this admission process. Effective Fall 2021, we will double our efforts to target 400 applicants.
-
Guaranteed Access to Local Underserved Population
- CSULB admits all qualified students who apply from the local area high schools. This local access guarantees access to higher education for any local student. The majority of the freshmen African American and Hispanic students have access to CSULB through this unique program. Giving preference to all local students who apply from the high schools surrounding the campus is a strategic priority for CSULB. CSULB defines local based on high school of origin for incoming First-Time Freshmen and Transfers. The geographic boundaries used to determine local area high schools for first-year students are also used to determine incoming transfers' local preference.
- To see a current geographic representation of the local preference area, along with a list of schools and districts, please visit the Local Preference Admission Consideration site.
-
Data Fellows Symposium
- This year the symposium session will explore Equity, Access, Retention, and Pathways to Student Success. Over 70 participants involving faculty, staff, and students will present their research findings. The purpose of the symposium is to allow the diverse teams to present their findings to campus constituents. We also hope to generate discussions and campus awareness around the critical attributes that can be translated into action to improve student success. The event is planned for Friday, May 14th, from 9 AM to 11:30 AM.
- Visit the Data Fellows website for more details.
- Assessment: Goal to view program review through an equity lens. The program's self study template is being modified to include more dashboards available to programs for them to analyze their equity gaps.
- Programs will be asked to address this prompt: Guideline: Discuss the program’s efforts to support equity, inclusion, and the academic success of diverse learners (race, ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic status, physical/mental health ability, etc. as defined by the US Department of Education in 2009). This should include relevant information regarding, for example, quality of learning, DEI curricular revisions, retention & graduation rates, advising, etc.
- For each degree level, programs will be provided URM/NRM, Pell/Non-Pell and 1st-Gen/Non 1st-Gen data for retention and graduation rates for both transfer and FTF students. Data will be provided for graduate programs if applicable.
- Add a migration out / in to the major to complement the 5th semester junior snapshot which seems to be a more effective measure.
- Combine all of those with a new survey we will require all departments to conduct with students regarding DEI issues.
- Assessment: Incorporated “Diversity is our strength” into an Institutional Outcome (IO).
- Will work with programs to map IOs to PLOs and SLOs, so in conjunction with our new Ethnic Studies courses, student knowledge of DEI issues can be measured in our students
- Will work with Beach 2030 leaders and other Divisional leaders to incorporate outcomes from campus Diversity initiatives into our institutional assessment of this IO.
- Curriculum: Goal to look at our curriculum through an equity lens
- Sent faculty to the LBCC Curriculum audit program, where they were guided through an evidence-based step-by-step equity analysis of a course and its curriculum.
- These faculty are now developing a proposal to build a program to guide other faculty through the process.
- Curriculum: Goal to review curriculum offerings and provide more courses to meet the needs of our community
- Provide more supplemental curriculum through CPIE that students can take at times/places that meet their needs
- Assess the need for non-degree curricular opportunities that meet the needs of our diverse community.
- Grad Studies: Goal to provide our Undergraduate Students with pathways to Graduate Studies
- GSRC currently serves that need
- Sally Casanova pre-doctoral program currently serves that need
- Developing a new 4+1 program that will allow students to double count up to 12 units of undergraduate study between their Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees. This will encourage many of our current students to continue on to graduate study if it will only take 1 additional year.
Develop new programs to financially support our local diverse students
- Dual Enrollment
- Long Beach College Promise 2.0 participated in Promise outreach events with Long Beach City College in Spring 2022. These outreach events included campus-based affinity-group supports and organizations, and opportunities for parents and prospective Promise students to connect with them individually. Some of these events were livestreamed to provide more accessibility to the community who were unable to attend the events in person.
Additionally, Long Beach College Promise 2.0 partnered with CSULB's EOP program to provide CSULB application support for students considering applying to EOP. This included a workshop presentation from CSULB EOP staff, and follow-up individual outreach with students from LBCC staff. The presentation was recorded and sent to all Promise 2.0 students unable to attend the live presentation.
- Learning Center
- The Learning Center’s Data Fellows Project examines 3-4 years of data to look at usage trends by traditional opportunity gap populations (First-Generation, Pell, Underrepresented Minorities as well as any gender differences). Overall usage trends and usage by LC Programs (Academic Coaching, Content Tutoring, ESL Tutoring, SI). The LC is looking at additional variables (such as membership in special populations support programs, such as Educational Opportunity Program and GPA, among others) to try to take other factors that might influence usage into account. The LC is also collecting qualitative data. A pilot interviewing 7 students who used services was conducted and more expanded qualitative research is planned. These studies will be used to:
- Improve the effectiveness of outreach and services provided to OPGs and other special populations (including removing or reducing barriers to OPG usage)
- Increase usage by CSULB student population – a large percentage of which are OPGs.
- Contribute to reducing attrition - specifically by OPGs
- Academic Coaching has been working with the Gen Excel (First-Generation Students) Program, EOP, and the Bob Murphy Access Center to design workshops and other academic support resources specifically tailored to those populations.
- The LC is working to develop new partnerships with the Colleges to investigate how its programs, specifically Academic Coaching and Tutorial Services, can better serve them. Those conversations have recently started with some focus on opportunity gaps. We have piloted programs using Academic Coaching and embedded tutoring for ESM courses and ESW courses, which has a large URM population. We are including trainings related to equity issues, including social justice, inclusive language, imposter syndrome, and accessibility issues (related to BMAC students) in our orientation and training for our student employees – tutors, peer tutors, peer academic coaches, and supplemental instruction leaders. We continue to explore training and speaker opportunities that focus on equity in the non-advising academic support realm (tutoring, etc.). Efforts will be available campus-wide.
- University Center for Undergraduate Advising
- Fall/Spring Institute for Advisors and Counselors - Annually, Dr. Kerry Johnson, AVP for Undergraduate Studies, in partnership with the Division of Student Affairs, convenes a Fall and Spring Institute for Advisors and Counselors. This professional development series is an opportunity for CSULB advising community members to participate in action-oriented workshops dedicated to serving the needs of the University’s diverse student population. This year, Blane Harding, a recognized thought leader in the field of higher education, led two virtual and interactive sessions titled Making Connections That Count: Engagement, Inclusion and Student Success Part I (Fall 2021) and Part II (Spring 2022). These interactive sessions provided CSULB advisors and counselors with practical strategies to enhance their work with students. Mr. Harding’s sessions included his facilitation of a campus-wide discussion on how to integrate and promote equity throughout University advising practices.
- Enacting Equity through Advising Intergroup Dialogue (IGD) Series - Supported by the Provost Karyn Scissum Gunn, Associate Vice President for Undergraduate Studies Kerry Johnson and Executive Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for Academic Affairs Angela Locks, teams of academic advisors from each College academic advising center applied to participate in an IGD series customized for professional staff in academic advising roles.
- Intergroup Dialogue (IGD) is a social justice educational model that blends theory and experiential learning to facilitate learning about social group identity, social inequality, and intergroup relations as a method to explore the connections between self-work and reflection and systemic exclusion and oppression.
- In Fall 2021, advising teams from across campus began equity self-studies for their unit and/or college and in spring term completed racial equity plans. For the 22-23 academic year, the IGD workshops will support implementation and assessment of racial equity plans.
- Equity Mini-Series - In collaboration with Dr. Angela Locks, Executive Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for Academic Affairs Academic, CSULB Academic Advisors and Counselors participated in a monthly Equity Through Advising professional development mini-series. Topics included: Culturally competent, Holistic Equity Minded Advising; Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP); Delivering Tough Messages: Empowering Students Through Choices/Options (Reframing “No, you can’t do this”); Best Practices for Engaging & Mentoring paraprofessional staff.
- University Honors Program
- Shift to more supportive communication. . We shifted our language from students being on probation to needing to attend mandatory success workshops.
- IRB Faculty Liaison and student retention. Established an IRB liaison position Fall 2021 to help all students more successfully complete and submit human subject research applications. This effort supported our retention and time to graduation for all students. We are also in the midst of planning a shift for our course offerings and requirements so that we are better able to retain all our students as they enter their final year, which requires them to complete a senior honors thesis or creative project. This will lead to greater equity in understanding the research and creative process, giving our students more time to complete which is important for diverse students who many times must juggle work and familial obligations along with their studies.
- Support for diverse students’ conference presentations. 3 UHP students were able to participate in the 2022 APAHE (Asian Pacific Americans in Higher Education) Conference, 10 UHP students presented their research at the WRHC (Western Regional Honors Conference), and 3 students have been granted permission to participate in NCHC (National Collegiate Honors Council) next fall where we will focus on issues of inclusivity, particularly for LGBTQIA+ students given that the conference is in Texas.
- Efforts for a more inclusive application process. We removed the word “elite” from our website and ensured we are using inclusive language that is more appealing to students from diverse backgrounds. We continued collaborating with the President’s Commission on Equity and Change to help read, score, and rank applications. We held UHP info sessions for EOP, Guardian Scholars, and MSI students to recruit more diverse current students to honors. During the Fall 2021, UHP reached out to the Multicultural Centers, BMAC, GenExcel, EOP, MSI, Guardian Scholars, and McNair Scholars to share UHP information and achieve greater equity in terms of our applicants to the program. UHP also collaborated with admissions to recruit more FTF and Transfer students to UHP by sending invitations to 15,000 students. Lastly, UHP is in the midst of solidifying a new partnership with McNair Scholars to recruit and support their students.
- Advising Racial Equity Self Study. Our two Associate Directors and our academic advisor during Fall 2022 participated in the Advising and Racial Equity Workshops and prepared a self-study.
- Moving towards gender neutral restrooms. Through studying our student data, we realized that 25% of our UHP students identify as non-binary. There are currently no gender neutral restrooms in the library. Through conversations with the library’s interim dean and our facilities coordinator, we are planning to make our UHP restrooms gender neutral in the coming months.
- Video presence. UHP supported a new video for recruitment and support of diverse students. The director participated in the creation of a research video for the BUILD program to show diverse faculty.
- University Writing Center
- The UWC provides writing tutoring to a diverse range of students from across the campus, adiversity that reflects the race/ethnicity, gender, and linguistic identities of the campus population at large. The staff of the UWC are committed to equity and inclusion and take a three-pronged approach to promoting an antiracist and inclusive agenda through its practice of thoughtful and intentional self- work, radical tutor training, and diversity-focused tutor recruitment and hiring practices.
- Self-work: The staff of the UWC is committed to engaging in the ongoing self-work that is necessary to participate thoughtfully and carefully in a student-serving capacity and in alignment with the antiracist and success-oriented mission of the university. Beginning in the summer of 2020 and with the support of Academic Affairs, the staff and tutors of the UWC participated in an antiracist discussion group interrogating what it means to be an antiracist and how to advance an antiracist agenda at the writing center. The group read and discussed two texts—How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi and White Fragility by Robin D’Angelo—with a view to examining the racist structures inherent in conventional writing center practice. Reading these texts helped staff and tutors to examine their own positions of privilege (or otherwise) and how those positions informed their work in the writing center.
- Tutor Training: Each year, UWC tutors are also engaged in a semester-long, intensive study that includes culturally-relevant, antiracist, and anti-ablist tutoring pedagogy. To that end, tutors read and discuss as set of texts that promote radical writing center pedagogy and resist racist, ablist and linguistically- othering practices. These readings enable an honest examination of how racism might play out in the writing center, what practices might contribute to (overtly and covertly) or even deepen the inequities that exist in society. These discussions foreground the conversation around diversity and equity, while at the same time provide tutors with practical and pedagogical knowledge they need as practicing tutors.
- Diversity-focused Recruitment and Hiring: The UWC works closely with units across campus to recruit and hire a diverse staff of writing tutors, including Chairs of Ethnic Studies departments, BMAC, EOP, GenXcel, Women’s & Gender Equity Center, as well as the Guardian Scholars program. We are committed to hiring tutors from a diversity of backgrounds that reflect our campus population. Currently, a majority of our tutors come from historically-minoritized backgrounds, and we have one blind and one deaf tutor. Our center is furnished with computers loaded with the latest accessibility software, and we offer our tutors training in how to work with students having a diversity of abilities. We will continue with our outreach and hope to attract even more tutors that better represent the student population at CSULB.
- Staff Hiring: Academic Technology has made a particular effort to hire staff from a diverse background. A holistic approach is used in reviewing candidates, looking beyond just the candidates’ technical skills. ATS jobs are posted on different websites available to specific minorities and underrepresented groups. ATS team members are also encouraged to post jobs on their social and professional networks to encourage recruitment of underrepresented candidates.
- Blackboard Ally: Academic Technology Services (ATS) has initiated Blackboard Ally, which helps identify accessibility issues within course content, and provides students the ability to view content in multiple accessible formats. Faculty are provided with support, and training opportunities in using the Blackboard Ally tool, which is fully integrated with the Beachboard (LMS). In addition, ATS student workers are trained to fully remediate course content into accessible formats. This service is provided to all CSULB faculty at no cost.
- Student Online Learning Support Program: A student-centric program was developed to support, and train students on the technology, and soft skills needed to be successful in learning in an online, or hybrid format. The course was initially offered as a live training session but was later converted to a self-paced asynchronous course that students could complete over a period of time. The program has received a lot of positive feedback from students, many of whom are taking online courses for the first time and are not technology savvy. The program has since been opened to all CSULB students taking courses in any modality.
- For internal grants, the campus decided to incorporate the following statement in its call for proposals for Mini-Grants and Summer Stipends: "For research and scholarly projects that seek to disrupt anti-Black racism and/or promote racial equity, please clearly indicate this goal in the application."
- Building Faculty and Student Diversity at CSULB: In 2014, California State University, Long Beach (CSULB) was one of 10 universities nationwide awarded the ten-year Building Infrastructure Leading to Diversity (BUILD) grant ($44 million), funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). BUILD aims to enhance the diversity of the health-related research workforce (including behavioral health and biomedical sciences and engineering).
- During the award period (2014-2024), CSULB BUILD provided research training, academic, career, and personal supports to over 300 CSULB undergraduates, targeting historically underrepresented groups.
- The program trained over 100 faculty members as research mentors for BUILD trainees, and provided faculty with pilot project funding, equipment grants, and access to interdisciplinary workshops and student research symposia.
- In addition, BUILD promoted an enhanced research culture across the CSULB campus.
- BUILD initiated and partially funded the Faculty Equity Advocates program designed to increase the diversity of faculty, not only in hiring, but also in the retention, tenure and promotion process across the campus.
- Another effort to increase faculty diversity includes the development of a Pre-Professor Program (PREPP) in collaboration with the University of California Irvine’s Graduate Division to allow underrepresented graduate students and post-doctoral fellows to experience what it is like to be a faculty member in a comprehensive university such as CSULB.
- Finally, BUILD also developed an ad for diverse hiring campus-wide in the Chronicle of Higher Education.
- The Office of Undergraduate Research Services (OURS) offers opportunities for students to engage in undergraduate research opportunities through the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP) and OURS Connects. UROP has expanded access to transfer students in partnership with CSULB Building Infrastructure Leading to Diversity (BUILD) Program to provide students with hands-on research and training opportunities for undergraduate students interested in health-related research. Additionally, the OURS Research Certificate program is being developed by CSULB BUILD and the Office of Undergraduate Research Services (OURS) to promote undergraduate research on campus and broaden access to faculty-mentored research opportunities for all undergraduate students. OURS and UROP students engage in research and creative projects with research mentors across all colleges. Both programs provide the opportunity for students to engage in faculty-mentored research which has been shown to increase student retention rates and enrich student experiences. OURS makes an intentional effort to involve students in undergraduate research with specific emphasis on students from underrepresented groups. Additionally, undergraduate research has been shown to be effective at increasing retention and opening career pathways for underrepresented populations. OURS and UROP create conditions for an equitable, inclusive, and supportive educational environment where every student is given the opportunity to engage in research experiences that is of interest to them.
- Office of Undergraduate Research Services (OURS)
- Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP)
- OURS Connects
- Faculty Research Awards to promote Racial Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (FRA-EDI) for AY 2021-22 - A President-Provost Initiative,the University seeks proposals for Faculty Research Awards to promote Racial Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (FRA-EDI) for AY 2021-22. Through this program, we encourage and accept proposals which aim to investigate issues of racial equity, diversity, and inclusion on the CSU Long Beach campus and/or our immediate geographical region that support student access and success. For the purpose of this program, we are using the following definition of Equity adopted by the CSULB President’s Equity and Change Commission (PECC):
- Crafting solutions that meet the needs of different groups based on their histories and access to resources -outcomes oriented (different than equality or sameness; equity deals with specificity). Equity is unfair- deliberately and intentionally so to lead to the outcome of fairness by considering different starting places. (USC, Equity Now! Fall 2020; Adopted by the CSULB PECC)
- The goals of the inaugural issue of the new FRA-EDI program feature reliance upon our significant Beach intellectual capital to interrogate campus processes, programming, practices, policies, and norms through a racial EDI lens. The new program supports opportunities to examine the broader scholarship of racial EDI in all disciplines, which can prove valuable in many ways, such as how the campus approaches faculty, staff and student recruitment, retention and success; valuation of teaching, scholarship and service; and knowledgecontributed by the Beach to broader national conversations around racial EDI in higher education. Finally, the new program provides a process to explore ways for the Beach academic community to engage in strategic partnerships within the greater Long Beach Community as mutual partners for public good. Results of the research should ultimately help stimulate evidence-based directions toward achieving our campus racial equity goals. Following the inaugural 2021-22 FRA-EDI, other/additional scopes of focus can be considered.
- Proposals with merit will be considered from across 4 themes. Preference points should be considered for proposals submitted promote and accelerate discovery with potential for direct campus racial EDI impact and/or demonstrate alignment with and potential to advance targeted Beach 2030 Action Plan(s).
- Project Themes
- EDI Campus Programming - describe development and evaluation of programming with high scalable potential to advance campus goals toward equity, anti-racism and social justice within the Beach community
- EDI Campus Information - use institutional data or collect new data to unpack issues of inequity around student enrollment; persistence; engagement; course and degree completion patterns; Beach faculty, student and employee experiences, or gaps in institutional inclusiveness
- EDI Scholarship Across Disciplines – engage in unique scholarship that examines racial EDI processes, norms, practices across disciplines
- EDI Partnerships – describe exploration, development and evaluation of high promise partnership concepts with LBC and surrounding community entities toward promoting shared investment in various educational and entrepreneurial racial equity opportunities between CSULB and the community
- Faculty Equity Advocates - The Faculty Equity Advocates (FEA) program was designed in spring/summer 2019 and began in Spring 2020. Beginning January 2020, the FEA group studied the tenure-track faculty member hiring cycle and identified ways in which it could be made more equitable. In collaboration with deans and Faculty Affairs, the FEAs each created a plan for the work they would do in the colleges. The specific work varies by college and the needs of the college. Some FEAs are focused on working with search committees, some are focused on retention of faculty members already hired, some are offering professional development, some are leading strategic planning. The group uses their experiences as case studies to make changes to/or advise that changes be made to practice, policy, and processes, including those at the institutional level. Recent areas of growth/changes to the program include:
- Piloting having an FEA on administrator search committees. In 2020-21 this included having an FEA on the College of Engineering Dean search committee, and the search committee for the honors director. In 2021-22 there is an FEA serving on the College of Liberal Arts dean search committee and the College of Professional and Continuing Education dean search committee.
- Conducting an evaluation of the program is underway, it is due to be completed in early fall 2022.
- Submitting a proposal to the National Science Foundation’s ADVANCE program to adopt and adapt The Faculty Workload Project. A project in which departments examine the distribution of workload and use these data to change the practices and policies that affect how workload is assigned, specifically to make these assignments more equitable.
- Providing feedback to FPPC on the proposed RTP policy, particularly around cultural and identity taxation.
- Drafting a proposal for FEAs to assist with recruitment (and retention) of lecturer faculty members. Ditto to assist with promoting greater equity in the faculty evaluation process.
- Beginning to explore how to disseminate the work of the group to the scholarly community.
- Tenure-track faculty member hires by ethnicity 2018-19 to 20-21
|
Hire year |
Asian/Pac. Isl. |
Black |
Hispanic |
Native Am/Alaskan |
White |
Two or More |
Not specified |
Total |
|
2018-19 |
10 |
<10 |
<10 |
|
20 |
<10 |
<10 |
44 |
|
2019-20 |
<10 |
<10 |
<10 |
|
15 |
|
<10 |
31 |
|
2020-21 |
19 |
<10 |
11 |
|
20 |
|
<10 |
57 |
|
Total |
37 |
10 |
17 |
|
55 |
<10 |
11 |
132 |
- Workshops for Faculty Search Committees - Faculty Affairs workshops for search committees continued to place greater emphasis on strategies for hiring a diverse faculty and the role of implicit bias in the search process. The workshops are focused on implicit bias, how it might manifest in the search process, and how to mitigate against it. New in 2021–2022, was a pilot to create implicit bias workshops tailored to colleges; the pilot took place in CNSM and COE.
- Workshops for RTP Candidates and, Evaluators - Faculty Affairs partnered with the co-chairs of the Academic Senate’s COVID Equity in Faculty Evaluation Taskforce to offer workshops for Reappointment, Tenure and Promotion candidates and the faculty members serving on the peer reviews committees evaluating these candidates. The workshops focused on how to equitably evaluate candidates given the differential impact the pandemic had on some individuals and groups.
- COVID Equity in Faculty Evaluation Task Force - Actively participated in the work of the taskforce, including:
- The development and dissemination of guidelines for tenure-track faculty members and their evaluators to assist them in how to consider the impact of the pandemic as they created and reviewed, respectively, materials.
- The development and dissemination of guidelines lecturer faculty members and their evaluators to assist them in how to consider the impact of the pandemic as they created and reviewed, respectively, materials.
- Providing feedback to FPPC on the proposed RTP policy, particularly around cultural and identity taxation.
- Presenting, with the taskforce co-chairs (Sabrina Alimahomed Wilson, Emily Berquist Soule, and Jessica Russell) the work of the task force at the AACU 2022 conference on Diversity, Equity and Student Success.
- PageUp - The implementation of PageUp, the online recruiting system chosen by the CSU for use at all CSU campuses provided us with the opportunity to further examine our recruiting process for ways in which it could be made more equitable. In 2021-2022 this led to three pilot projects:
- The use of reference phone calls in place of letters of reference. The latter have been shown to be inherently biased. The former might also be biased but a phone call allows for follow-up questions and probing.
- Providing the search committee with access to applications prior to pool approval. Research has shown that bias is more likely to play a role in decision-making if decisions are made rapidly (or when the decision-maker is distracted, tired, hungry, etc.). Providing search committee members with access to the files earlier in the process allows for them to extend their review over a longer period.
- Creating easy to access, comprehensive reports regarding the demographic information of the applicant pool to assist in decision-making.
- Diversity, Equity and Inclusion: Teaching to Include Each Student - This National Science Foundation funded program is in its third year of five. It is based at CSUDH, LACCD and CSULB are partners. The goal of the project is to create an identity-based Community of Practice (with Faculty Learning Communities at its core). The objectives of this faculty learning project are to:
- increase faculty participants’ knowledge about how learning works, particularly as it relates to social and cultural factors such as identity, power structures, implicit bias, and institutionalized systems of oppression;
- increase faculty participants’ ability to use this knowledge to shape their curriculum, teaching and assessment practices, interactions with students;
- increase faculty participants’ ability to use this knowledge to shape their hiring, mentoring, and evaluation practices; and
- build the capacity and sustainability for offering faculty professional development that consistently embeds attention to the role context, culture, identity, and power plays in learning and that is responsive to our student population, student learning and assessment data, faculty needs and interest, and the institute’s evolving context
- Employee Basic Needs Task Force - In recognition of the fact that we have employees who struggle to meet basic needs and that the impact of the pandemic was disproportionately high for some groups, Kristina Lovato, Deborah Hamm and Corrie O’Toole (under the auspices of Faculty Affairs) worked on creating a plan to provide assistance, and support for these employees. This led to the formation of an Academic Senate taskforce. The Faculty & Staff Wellness taskforce is charged with developing campus programming and guidelines for supporting faculty and staff who have been negatively impacted by COVID-19 and/or are at risk of experiencing challenging circumstances. The taskforce will deliver its recommendations to the Academic Senate in spring semester 2022. The taskforce’s work will be ongoing.
- Faculty Center
- Faculty Professional Development Learning Community on Inclusive, Accessible, and Equity-Minded Instructional and Classroom Management Strategies - Three cohorts of yearlong Faculty Learning Community introduce faculty participants to best practices for teaching and working with ethnically diverse, first-generation, low-income, and/or differently abled students and building a culture of implementing equitable and inclusive pedagogical practices in the classroom. Interactive sessions and assignments helped participants develop strategies that foster equity and inclusivity in the classroom environment and implement culturally responsive pedagogy in their instruction. Interactive sessions and assignments help participants understand the intersecting identities of our students and how they could be used to facilitate learning in the classroom; learn about challenges and strategies of safeguarding student mental health in various modes of instruction; learn how to create an accessible learning environment and support students with varying abilities within the classroom; and build community, so that once the program is completed, participants will have a cohort with whom they can remain connected personally and/or professionally.
- Workshop Series on Diversity, Equity & Inclusion in the Classroom - This (spring 2022) semester-long initiative introduce faculty participants to best practices in teaching and interacting with students of diverse backgrounds and encouraged them to examine their beliefs about diversity and equity, gain knowledge and understanding about how diversity and identity influence higher education practices, create inclusive classrooms by recognizing the diverse strengths and abilities that students bring to the classroom, and incorporate students’ diverse experiences into their curriculum. Participants learn about how race and culture mediate student development and how everyday racism shape the experiences of diverse students in the classroom; understand the nature of micro-aggression and micro-affirmations and how instructors can manage them in the classroom; and develop inclusive, learning-centered syllabi, transparent assignments, active learning techniques, and classroom assessment techniques.
- Series of Workshops/Sessions on Accommodating Our Vulnerable Student Population - Sessions on accommodating our differently abled student population guide faculty on how to work with and support students with varying disabilities and needs in different instructional modes. Sessions on Gender, Race, and Immigration Status Biases in the Classroom engage faculty in a critical discussion on understanding biases towards individuals with intersecting identities in the classroom and strategies that faculty could employ to improve student success and their college experience.
- Advancing Inclusive Mentoring Initiative - The Faculty Center partners with CSULB BUILD on a mentoring program, as part of the Advancing Inclusive Mentoring initiative. The program includes a series of online modules that focus on best mentoring practices for faculty who work with students across all disciplines (and staff serving students in an advisory capacity). The commitments include watching video snippets addressing each module followed by a group discussion of each module facilitated by the Faculty Center Director. Faculty and staff members who complete the training receive a Beach Mentor certification issued by the Faculty Center.
- Spring 2022 Reading Group/Book Club for New Faculty on Micro Intervention Strategies - This is a semester-long initiative in which new faculty and facilitators engage in an interactive book study of Micro-Intervention Strategies: What You Can Do to Disarm and Dismantle Individual and Systemic Racism and Bias (by Derald Wing Sue, Cassandra Z. Calle, Narolyn Mendez, Sarah Alsaidi, Elizabeth Glaeser, December 2020). Assigned readings explore individual and institutional micro-interventions strategies in combating micro and macro-aggressions targeted at marginalized groups (racial/ethnic minorities; LGBTQ groups, women, those with disabilities; etc.) and reducing impact of sexism, heterosexism, ableism, and classism in the academic community. Two sections of the Reading Group/Book Club are offered.
- Women of Color in Academia @ CSULB - This group was instituted in 2018 to provide structural, institutional, communal support for women of color faculty. Maintaining a community of peers, collaborators, and mentors aligns with university’s goal to increase faculty diversity by recruiting/retaining faculty from underrepresented groups. The group provides recognition of impact of intersectionality of gender, race, & ethnicity on professional experience of faculty women of color on campus and strives to increase institutional support to promote the success of faculty women of color (a group with one of the highest attrition rates among tenure-track faculty). The group provides opportunities for members exchange information about actions and opportunities intended to improve existing work conditions and contribute to feedback that is shared directly with the institution about the status of women faculty of color at CSULB. Current membership is about 50 and comprises faculty varied by rank & department. The Faculty Center provides publicity, logistical, and other forms of support for this group
- Workshop: CSULB Faculty of Color Navigating a Successful Career Path (Offered by the Faculty Center in Collaboration with the Office of Multicultural Affairs) - This interactive workshop explored challenges that faculty of color encounter in developing their careers at CSULB and discussed ways in which such challenges could be addressed. Information provided in this session as well as discussion and activities addressed navigating micro-aggressions and stereotypical assumptions of faculty of color; how to handle the invisible workload; developing a successful RTP dossier; and strategies for seeking out mentors & institutional support.
- Faculty and Staff Basic Needs Workshop Series (Sponsored by the CSULB Faculty Center and the CSULB Faculty & Staff Basic Needs Initiative) - Three workshops for faculty and staff on mental health and emotional well-being; physical well-being; and financial well-being were offered.
- The Misty Jaffe Early Leaders Program (ELP) - This leadership pathways initiative arose out of discussions about diversity and leadership development within the College of Liberal Arts and across the campus community and is delivered in partnership with the Faculty Center. It is a 1-year cohort program designed for faculty seeking or serving in new leadership roles and faculty from historically under-represented groups are strongly encouraged to participate. Sessions take the form of a facilitated reading group intended to as a pilot upon which the Faculty Center will build for future university-wide efforts. Invited campus leaders, mostly from underrepresented groups, are invited to share their leadership pathways with the group. Sessions are currently cofacilitated by the CLA Associate Dean Deborah Thien and Faculty Center Director Malcolm Finney
- Inter Group Dialog - The entire CCE team is a part of the campus’s year-long Inter Group Dialog (IGD) for HIPs at CSULB initiative led by Dr. Angela Locks, which includes conducting a HIPs Racial Equity Self Study and the implementation of a HIPs Racial Equity Plan for the CCE. The IGD Working Group helps provide guidance for our campus’s IGD initiative. For more information, please see the link provided to the IGD Working Group.
- Curriculum Design Series - The center will be beginning a new Curriculum Design Series this March 2021 with a focus on offering courses and curriculum re-evaluating civic roles and responsibilities and what it means to be a democracy as well as reckoning the role of race and racism in our country. The approach to this year’s Curriculum Design Series is based on supporting students, faculty and local communities through this lens.
- Student Town Hall - The center hosted a Virtual Student Town Hall on The Economic Impacts of COVID-19 on Students of Color and their Families: Equitable Resilience and Recovery Strategies, on November 19, 2020 focused on centering and lifting up student’s voices; particularly students of color and the impacts of COVID-19 through an economic resilience and recovery framing.
- Latino Economic Report and Summit - For the last three years, the center has partnered with Centro CHA (a community-based organization) and CSULB’s Department of Economics to produce and host the Long Beach Latino Economic Report and Summit. This also includes a component of presenting and disseminating the report to key community stakeholders.
- Data Fellows Project - The center has been participating in the campus’s Data Fellows project led by Dr. Beth Manke for the past two years. This project focusses on Service-Learning and Community-Engaged Learning as a High Impact Practice (HIP), paying particular attention to how “student success” is understood in the relation to HIPs such as Service Learning. As a part of this, they are looking at key student success indicators in relation to the impacts of HIPs for first-generation, poor, students of color.
- Kellog Grant with UROP and COE - The center is partnering on two separate Kellog Racial Equity 2030 Grant submissions with UROP and the College of Education (March 2021 submission). One proposal (UROP) is focused on undergraduate and community-based research (in partnership with two other CSUs), and the other (COE) is focused on Catalyzing Black Educational Equity in Long Beach.
- U.S. Census - In partnership with the City of Long Beach and L.A. County U.S. Census officials, the center constituted, convened, and hosted the CSU’s first Campus Complete Count Committee focussed on a complete and accurate census count for Hart To Count (HTC) populations (including but not limited to low-income individuals, immigrants, non-native English speakers, houseless individuals, communities of color, students, renters, seniors) for the U.S. Census 2020 efforts.
- Creation of the Long Beach Community Internship Project: Collaborative project between CSULB and Long Beach nonnprofits designed to place graduating Long Beach Promise students in paid internships with local nonprofits. Currently 39 students placed with 38 nonprofits.
- Initiation of the Internship & Service-Learning Working Group: Initiated to create a brave space where conversations about high-impact practices, challenge structures, gather input, hold ourselves accountable, and prototype ideas are compiled. Includes administrators, faculty and staff from across campus and community stakeholders (over 35 members; co-lead by Beth Manke and Juan Benetiz). Our priorities include providing access to and equitable participation in credit-bearing internships and service learning courses for all CSULB Students. We are developing a racial equity plan for organizing this work. The aim is to also develop culturally relevant and inclusive pedagogical resources for faculty teaching internship and service-learning courses and explore new and innovative opportunities for students beyond internships and service learning that may include community-based research, project-based learning and other forms of community engaged learning.
- Revamping of the online Essential Skills Modules to better reflect the diversity and needs of CSULB students. Video topics now include: communication, professionalism, diversity & inclusion, problem solving & critical thinking, time management, teamwork, and initiative. Videos and a full series of wrap-around activities were completed in February 2021. They will be posted and ready for use by the entire campus in March. Team work on this project includes Michelle Chang, Internship Specialist from CLA (lead), Jeanna Trammell from Career Development Center, and Justin Gomer, faculty in American Studies.
- Expansion of Design Your Long Beach, a campus program that facilitates CSULB students designing their way forward towards careers that positively impact our local community. Team leading this effort includes Amy Cabrerra Rasmussen (Director), Michelle Chang, and Beth Manke. Work this year focused on collaborating with campus units including College of Education and University Honors Program and working with the Stanford Design School to revamp materials to make them more inclusive.
- Participation in Intergroup Dialogues for High Impact Practices lead by Shametrice Davis. Beth Manke and her Faculty Champions completed an equity self-study of campus internship efforts and will be drafting a racial equity plan with the Internship and Service Learning Working Group this Spring.
- Interdisciplinary research team examining High Impact Practices at the CSULB: How (and for whom) Do They Promote Student Success. This Provost—funded, 2-year project includes four faculty members (Kelly Young—CNSM, Kim Kelly—CLA, Claudia Lopez—CLA, and Brian Trimble—COTA) and an administrative mentor/coach (Beth Manke). The overarching goal of this multi-method study (surveys, focus groups, Photovoice, and institutional data) is to examine the role that three types of HIPs—service learning, academic internships, and unpaid undergraduate research play in CSULB student success, including persistence and timely graduation. Special attention paid to who is left out of HIPS why some students do not participate.
- Expansion of the Data Fellows for Student Success curriculum to address equity and data issues. Data Fellows Teams were also encouraged to include an examination of equity in their team projects. At the May 14, 2021 symposium, five teams will present their project findings as part of thematic sessions. Beth Manke is leading the session on Equity and High-Impact Practices. In this session, the Center for Community Engagement, Career Development Center, the Learning Center, and two teams from Academic Affairs will discuss who has access to high-impact practices on our campus and who does not.
- Students Respond to the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Photovoice Project: With colleague Brian Trimble, Beth Manke solicited photos and narratives from CSULB students about how COVID-19 has affected them, their families, and their communities. Over 600 submissions have been collected and team of students, supervised by Beth Manke, is currently coding narratives. Themes of equity, navigational capital, mental health, and hope are emerging as significant, affirming that CSULB students are diverse and resilient.
