2023-24 Provost Grants to Promote Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Belonging, and Justice Within the Classroom Award

Congratulations to the following faculty members who have been awarded a grant to promote diversity, equity, inclusion, justice, and belonging within the classroom! Each project was awarded up to $2,000 to full or part-time faculty to support innovation in one or more of the following three areas:

1. Creating a welcoming classroom community that cultivates belonging. These projects focus on developing, documenting, and transparently sharing routines, community-building activities, norms, etc., as related to student identities, student needs, respect, compassion, and empathy.
2. Critically analyzing the content and practices of a course through an antibias, antiracist lens. These projects lead to the implementation of culturally sustaining practices in the classroom, including strategies for identifying and countering implicit bias, microaggressions, and stereotype threats.
3. Supporting the planning and creation of new courses to support Black and Latinx Studies and/or study of other groups/cultures, especially in STEM and the Social Sciences.

2023-24 Grant Recipients

Ju-Yong Ha

Humanities, Hillyer College

Project coordinated with MUB/HLM 200 World Music Survey and UISC 165D Silk Road: Music, Art, Culture and Identity to support a three-day Multicultural Residency Festival in Spring 2024. During the festival, students will interact with the musicians from different cultural backgrounds to learn what it means to create a distinctive artistic experience that shares knowledge and promotes intercultural dialogue.

Philip Estes

English and Modern Languages, College of Arts and Sciences

Project in WRT 215W Introduction to Professional Writing using parts of The Antiracist Business Book by Trudi LeBron to discuss cross-cultural and transnational communication both in the private sector and between government institutions.

Song Wang

Civil, Environmental, and Biomedical Engineering, College of Engineering, Technology and Architecture

Project involves the creation of a website where UHart students can share their stories of facing challenges and overcoming adversity. As part of this project, during spring “diversity week”, there will be a student panel discussion on this topic. The themes captured through this project will be used to inform pedagogical and/or curricular changes in CETA.

Jack Banks

School of Communication, College of Arts and Sciences

Project involves the use of Hartford student preceptors in the design and implementation of Media Day, an outreach program to Connecticut high school students focused on media literacy and digital storytelling. The student preceptors will gain skills in student teaching including developing assignments and strategies for incorporating diverse experiences and backgrounds of students into the workshops.