Diversity Committee

I. Membership

List of ppl applying for our committee – we accept all of the applicants. Barbara will be informed.

Allison Sharp Bolorizadeh

Erin Moore

Dan Green

Ppl returning

Thura

Allison Roberts

Annazette McCane Houston

Laurie & Jerry Roberson

Rotating off

Jeanine Williamson

Marielle Veve

Sandy Allen

II. Volaware updates

a. JW has contact Connie Briscoe – director of Volaware – mental health awareness group. Distressed/distressing student helpline. Will come talk to us about Volaware in September…this will be a “Let’s Talk About It”

b. Future volaware events

1. Volaware street fare 11/7

2. Concert – 10/6

a. JW will probably attend the above functions. The theme is Poverty.

b. She can have posters rdy for the event.

ii. The library usually has presence at these functions.

III. We’ll host a welcome back thing in August

a. We usually pass out ice water and literature – last time we used cases of water.

1. We can pass out water during lunch….Tuesday the 25^th of August and the August 27^th

2. Allison will bring a banner we already have prepared.

3. Thura and Trisha will each bring two cases of water. Allison will supply an ice chest. Jeanine will make a financial contribution. Thura will accept it. Jerry will bring water (and has volunteered Laurie)

4. We’ll set up right on Melrose

5. If we can set a date on the volaware “Let’s Talk About It”, we can have promotional materials for that at our table at the welcome back.

IV. Let’s Talk About It – feat. Beverly Watts

V. Conflict – the timing of this allows us an hour…but there’s a retirement function at around the same time as the let’s talk about it.

a. Allison will get the let’s talk about it in the beacon, metropulse, and sentinel.

i. Trisha has created flyers, and some of them will go to the display that Shantrie is creating on the1st floor

ii. Allison will bring in some old child’s shoes…these can be part of the display (tossed over a phone line).

iii. Trisha has some other images of poverty Shantrie might use form when she was working on the posters.

1. We’ll eschew movies in favour of the welcome back activity – the movies will be depressing.

2. Advertising – hang flyers in Sociology, Poli Sci, the Golden Roast? TM and JW will help with hanging flyers.

VI. Reception for residents program completion

a. 8/24/09 – 10:30am in 605

b. There’s a committee planning the party

i. Gail Watson

ii. Sharon Boring

iii. Wanda Rosinski

iv. Melanie Feltner-Reichert

v. Sara Foster

vi. JoAnne Deeken

vii. Thura Mack

c. The theme is – “Sail away…but welcome to sail back!”

d. Trisha may be photographing the festivities

e. It’ll be a brunch – we can bring food.

VII. Allison Roberts will be the new co-chair of the committee – hopefully. TM will ask Barbara if it’s okay.

VIII. Volunteering Rocks – see the AgVet facebook and youtube..see Allison Roberts for details.

8-28-08 Diversity Committee

Inviting outsiders is an opportunity to look at how and why we do what we do

Censoring minutes? No – the released transcript of the meetings are more of a highlight than censorship. We will continue to release our notes as we have done.

Getting to know you exercises!

Just for fun, think about diversity among members

Common ground

Uncommon ground

Campus Diversity Calendar

We tried to contact Eric Bledsoe the day of our last meeting, to no avail

Trying to get our events out there to the campus at large

Possibly piggyback onto existing events

possibly get onto the International House calendar

Committee technology features

Email

Can be set up to share the calendar with all members

so we can share available meeting dates

libdiv emails can go here rather than thru Thura

Back up info source

calendar and mail folders can be shared among members, as per Roger Weaver

Shared calendar is AR’s main concern

Listserv

Workable idea, Allison can create this – will email the credentials to the group

JR and JW agree

One place for information, plus it has an archive

As per AR, listserv would be a good place for our conversation

Will we need both?

Yes – both have specific features that can help us, says AR

New meeting dates proposed

We’ll only have these meetings if we’re working on a project

Meetings will be cancelled if we’re not

CMN committee

1pm 10/16/08 Pat Gozemba and Karen Kahn authors of “Courting Equaility” at the UC

Documenting GLBT Boston

Commission for LGBT people will need no funding, but promo and breakfast for authors events need planning

Possibly have a forum for people to speak or a breakfast

We might be able to work on other projects with them as well

TM suggests turning this into a campus wide Let’s Talk About It” during one of our regular meeting times rather than a breakfast

Committee is game for a campus-wide program.

Mary Greer room or Auditorium

JR – auditorium would be stark without a large crowd. Greer room can be adjusted depending on crowd size

Group is for Greer room

We could provide snacks

Cookies!!!

This will involve some promo work as well

The commission is trying to fill the day, as the main program is at night.

JR: does the commission have a PR dept for this, or will the onus be on us?

TB – we’ll need to do poster work for the film series anyway – may as well include info for this program on those posters as well

Donna Braquet is on the GLBT advisory commission – she might have ideas RE promo, numbers, venues, etc.

Films?

September – patriots day, deaf awareness month

October – GLBT –

Brokeback Mountain,

If These Walls Could Talk

Priscilla of the Desert,

3 films will suffice

We can show a film a week, Oct 7^th ,14th, 21^st

Unfortunately, time is constrained, as movies cannot be piped thru the building anymore due to the media center

Trisha will look into room availability

At or around 1pm

Thura will talk to Roger about the GLBT program to get a clearer sense of what needs to be done

Publicity can be held til we’ve a better idea of what’s going on – 9/11/08, we will discuss publicity

AR – partner with faculty, as there are classes around GLBT filmmaking – this could be extra credit?

Christine Holmund – Trisha knows her/will contact

AR can contact some faculty as well Rosa Thomas – who is doing a human sexuality course

Mid September promotion, so people can plan in advance.

Once this is done, we can begin planning November

Diversity Definition

include Gender identity in our diversity definition?

Unanimously approved.

AR will change this on the web page

JW – next steps

decide what other projects we want to do this semester aside from Oct LGBT

All of us need to bring ideas for projects to the next meeting

TM – we’ve got the culture corner running, but we need to think about the next incarnation

TM – Native American month = November. We should start planning for this soon

JR – we’ve always looked at obvious diversity issues (ethnicity is big)

Mary Papke talked about us all being part of a culture

We should look for less obvious fare

Geographic regions and original settlers?

International awareness

AR – there might be an Irish Heritage month. We’ve done Appalachian culture…it was 2 – 3 years ago past.

TB – we could do that again

Irish Heritage month is in March…programming for this?

Sometimes people appreciate having their cultures talked about

LEA will be doing student association – we won’t need to do the bulk of it as a committee. We will have time in March to do Irish Heritage

December? – last year, we did disabilities

It’s near a major Christian holiday – should we look at other cultures during that time that people might miss?

December is Universal Human Rights Month

http://www.va.gov/dmeeo/calendar/december.htm

December planning will be on our next agenda

A culture corner could continue to speak to the issue even after the programming has ended.

TM – the more global our project are, the more people we can attract

JR – is there any way to identify how many African students are here?

Connect with International House

Bill Dewey is a professor of African art – we can get him to do a presentation

TM – we need a 9/11 meeting to discuss projects

TM — If we can line up projects til December, we’ll be in good shape

Trunk and Treat? Mainly done by sororities and fraternities

Diversity Committee meeting – August 14, 2008

 

Introductions/Committee Roster

 

Members Present:

Thura Mack – Diversity Co-chair and Training Coordinator for UT Libraries

Jeanine Williamson – Diversity Co-chair and Engineering and Art & Architecture Librarian in Research Services & Collections, UT Hodges Library

Trisha Brady – Supervisor for Media Center/Studio, at Hodges

Shantrie Collins – Diversity Resident, UT Libraries

Damon Campbell – Diversity Resident, UT Libraries

Laurie Roberson – Director of Student Services in the school of architecture and design.

Jerry Roberson – Professor at the Veterinary school and adviser to the Native American Student Organization.

George Hoemann – Chair of LGBT, Assistant Dean of Distance Education

Sandy Allen – Technical Services & Digital Access, at Hodges

Allison Roberts – Supervisor at Ag/Vet library, Diversity Committee web mistress

 

Members Absent:

Marielle Veve – Cataloging & Metadata Librarian, UT Libraries

Jane Row – Head, Research Services at UT Libraries and Ready for the World library point person

Jill Keally – Diversity ex-officio and Executive Associate Dean of UT Libraries

Donna Braquet – Diversity ex-officio and Librarian in Research Services & Collections

Annazette McCane – Director, UT Disability Services

 

Overview of the committee

Diversity definition and mission statement were included to provide in-depth background for new members (if you were not at the meeting, please attached Agenda document with these descriptions). We’ve been criticized about past programs’ validity. We are striving to be more accountable to the diversity definition. However, we do leave ourselves room to take risks.

 

Annual Report

Report was in draft form and shared to get feedback from members, and review types of programming that this committee is committed to.

Suggestion to add titles of the films and some specific hot topics that we feature for display. It was agreed that these changes will be incorporated.

Committee agreed to get card for Sarah Green, former co-chair of the Diversity Committee, for a job well done.

 

Calendars for best meeting dates

Members agreed that Thursdays at 1 p.m. is the best time for the committee to meet.

In the beginning of the Fall semester, we will meet twice a month. Once our projects are underway, we will meet once a month. Meetings are scheduled for an hour and a half.

The next meeting date is August 28 at 1 p.m. in Room 605.

Allison Roberts will get the committee an outlook account and set us up for shared calendars.

 

Announcements

There was an invitation from Roger Weaver to host LGBT program on October 16.

Evening presentation is about the book Courting Equality: Gay & Lesbian Marriage by Patricia A. Gozemba and Karen Kahn.

The committee’s role would be to create a day-time program about the digital history project these authors have launched and to help with advertising of the overall program.

 

Agenda Items for Next Meeting

Discuss significant diversity dates and create Diversity Committee calendar. Collaborate with Erik Bledsoe to submit calendar to UT’s Diversity and Intercultural page.

We will do one or two getting-to-know-you exercises.