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Syracuse University’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion plans to hire at least four new staff members in an effort to implement the university’s initiatives for campus diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility, administrators announced during its Monday afternoon campus forum.

Around 160 SU students, faculty and staff participated in the forum, both in-person at the Schine Student Center and via Zoom to hear updates on campus-wide DEIA projects and engage with issues of diversity and inclusion for SU’s student population.

Mary Grace Almandrez, SU’s vice president for diversity and inclusion, said the office intends to hire a program manager for 119 Euclid Ave., as well as an administrative fellow, an access specialist and a graduate assistant to work for SU’s office. The Office of Diversity and Inclusion also hired a DEIA learning and development specialist, and a director of inclusion and belonging who will begin on March 1, Almandrez said.

Almandrez – who took over the role of vice president for diversity and inclusion at SU in June 2022 after being hired in March 2022 – said the office plans to continue its growth over the next few years and eventually have a staff of about 15 people.

“With the expansion of our office and bringing more staff and support onto the team, that’s going to be extremely beneficial to us achieving the initiatives, as well as the deep partnerships that we’ve made across campus,” said Eboni Joy Britt, executive director for strategic communications and initiatives for the office of diversity and inclusion.

Almandrez said the office also plans to create a DEIA symposium to take place every other year focused on interactive workshop and discussion sessions. She said the symposium is set to launch in the fall 2023 semester, likely in September.

Before presenting upcoming projects for the spring 2023 semester, Almandrez gave updates on advances from fall 2022. She pointed to previous achievements in DEIA initiatives, like its hiring of executive assistant Rachel Scalisi in September 2022, its hosting a campus conversation with 1619 Project creator Nikole Hannah-Jones and the CultureFest event it organized.

In-person forum attendees worked in small groups, which Britt said SU student leaders – including Graduate Student Association DEIA Committee Chair Kellin Tasber, Student Association Executive Vice President Adia Santos and SA President David Bruen – pushed for as an open dialogue format.

Bruen said the dialogue between students and faculty was valuable and necessary, adding that conversations like those at the forum allow the university community to better pursue diversity and inclusion through collaboration. Group discussions focused on seven issues, including accessibility, belonging, LGBTQ students, professional development, support for native students, bias incident reporting and faculty and staff diversity, Britt said.

Moving forward, Bruen said he hopes the university community can work to boost current initiatives in DEIA, while also ensuring marginalized communities feel included and involved on campus. He emphasized the role students need to play in bridging these issues.

“As Student Association and student leaders, we need to engage with the administration and the people that are enacting a lot of our wants and needs when it comes to disability, equity, inclusion and access,” Bruen said.

Jennifer Stromer-Galley, SU’s senior associate dean for academic and faculty affairs, said that given recent pushback against diversity and inclusion projects in South Carolina, Florida and Oklahoma, she’s especially supportive of putting more resources into DEIA initiatives.

“I’ve seen it in other universities where you appoint somebody who leads DEIA work in the university, but you’ve given them literally no resources to do that and then they can’t be successful,” Stromer-Galley said. “As a faculty member, it’s really helpful to know that the university is going to put additional support in place so that I can have a more inclusive classroom.”

Almandrez’s efforts to prioritize DEIA initiatives stem from the university’s DEIA Strategic Plan, which was approved by SU’s Board of Trustees in 2019 in the aftermath of #NotAgainSU, a series of protests led by Black students against SU’s response to multiple racist, antisemitic and homophobic incidents on campus. A draft was completed in June 2021 with a coordinated effort between the Office of Diversity and Inclusion and 33 university members of the DEIA Strategic Plan Taskforce.

Almandrez also serves as a co-chair for the DEIA working group involved with the university’s efforts to update its Academic Strategic Plan, a roadmap for SU’s development over the next five years. Almandrez said a final draft of the DEIA strategic plan will be released by the end of March.

Stromer-Galley, who is also DEIA director for SU’s School of Information Studies, said the university’s positioning in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic allows the SU community to better focus on DEIA initiatives moving forward.

“You can tell where an organization’s priorities are by where it puts its resources and where people’s passions are,” Stromer-Galley said. “The fact that… the university is putting in resources in an area like DEIA that we know that there’s a lot of passion around, speaks to the strengths of SU as a university (and) as a community.”

Contributing writer Isabella Flores contributed to the reporting for this article.

Published on February 13, 2023 at 11:16 pm

Contact Dominic: dcchiapp@syr.edu | @DominicChiappo2