{"id":29195,"date":"2020-10-27T19:14:38","date_gmt":"2020-10-28T00:14:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/?p=29195"},"modified":"2020-10-27T19:14:38","modified_gmt":"2020-10-28T00:14:38","slug":"austin-peay-college-of-stem-announces-plan-to-prepare-our-students-to-thrive-in-a-diverse-and-inclusive-workplace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/2020\/10\/27\/austin-peay-college-of-stem-announces-plan-to-prepare-our-students-to-thrive-in-a-diverse-and-inclusive-workplace\/","title":{"rendered":"Austin Peay College of STEM announces plan to \u2018prepare our students to thrive in a diverse and inclusive workplace\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-324279\" title=\"Austin Peay State University - APSU\" src=\"https:\/\/www.clarksvilleonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/Austin-Peay-State-University-APSU.jpg\" alt=\"Austin Peay State University - APSU\" width=\"250\" height=\"64\"\/><strong>Clarksville, TN<\/strong> &#8211; The Austin Peay State University (APSU) College of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics on Friday released a diversity and inclusion statement and pledged to fight \u201cany form of racism, discrimination or prejudice.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As part of that pledge, the college announced <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.apsu.edu\/costem\/diversity_inclusion_costem.php\" >an action plan<\/a> to lower barriers that hinder equality and access to resources for underrepresented groups.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_503364\" style=\"width: 490px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.clarksvilleonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/APSU-Technology-Building.jpg\"  class=\"thickbox no_icon\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-503364\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-503364\" title=\"Austin Peay State University Technology Building. (APSU)\" src=\"https:\/\/www.clarksvilleonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/APSU-Technology-Building-480x320.jpg\" alt=\"Austin Peay State University Technology Building. (APSU)\" width=\"480\" height=\"320\"\/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-503364\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Austin Peay State University Technology Building. (APSU)<\/p><\/div>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe stand with all groups and individuals working to condemn all forms of oppression,\u201d the statement reads. \u201cWe recognize we need to do better.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>College of STEM faculty and staff have launched the action plan and will continue to do so through the spring semester, said Dr. Kallina Dunkle, associate dean of the college. They have been working on the statement and action plan since June.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA lot of us in the college are passionate about trying to make things more equitable and getting students of color and women more involved with these fields, and making it easier for all students,\u201d Dunkle said.<\/p>\n<p>A Diversity and Inclusion Committee called for in the plan formed earlier this semester and has been meeting routinely, Dunkle said. The committee comprises representatives from every department in the college.<\/p>\n<h3>The college also has:<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Hosted a diversity and inclusion townhall, called \u201cCoSTEM Conversations,\u201d and has another planned for November 10th.<\/li>\n<li>Hosted a featured speaker from an underrepresented group in its CoSTEM Lecture Series.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\u201cThe big thing is we didn\u2019t want to just have a static statement, this wasn\u2019t about just putting something on the website and saying, \u2018Oh, yeah, we care about this,\u2019\u201d Dunkle said. \u201cThe point was to create a plan for action. We wanted something we can update and modify every year as a community.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Diversity and Inclusion Committee will evaluate the successes and failures of the action plan each year, she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe can make changes in some of our teaching and in some of the ways that we run things in the college,\u201d Dunkle said. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to change all of the systemic issues in the United States overnight, but if we can start to work for those changes in our own community, we can make a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The APSU Department of Agriculture also is offering a one-credit hour class in the spring called \u201cDiversity in Agriculture and Natural Resources\u201d that will explore self-awareness, cultural awareness, multiculturism, privilege and discrimination.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>[470center]<\/p>\n<h3>What does the action plan call for?&nbsp;<\/h3>\n<p>The diversity and inclusion statement recognizes that the faculty and staff of the college do not reflect the student community.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn 2019-2020, 41% of students across campus (43% in the college) self-identified as persons of color, while only 21% of our faculty and staff identified as persons of color,\u201d the statement reads. \u201cForty percent of faculty and staff in the college identified as female, while across campus 59% of students (44% in the college) identified as female.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The college vows to correct these imbalances in representation \u2013 which can raise barriers for students and how they identify with mentors in their fields \u2013 by instituting several action items. In the action plan, the college vows to:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Form a Diversity and Inclusion Committee to provide oversight and to evaluate proposed actions in the plan and discuss future actions \u201cto further a collective college-wide effort towards institutional change.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Educate faculty and staff to act as advocates for students.<\/li>\n<li>Launch \u201cCoSTEM Conversations,\u201d a monthly forum for students and employees to share stories, concerns and ideas.<\/li>\n<li>Feature speakers from underrepresented groups in the CoSTEM Lecture Series.<\/li>\n<li>Establish CoSTEM Learns, a forum for employees and students to learn through reading, listening, viewing and discussing materials on systemic racism, ethnic oppression and gender equality.<\/li>\n<li>Provide pedagogical resources that foster diverse, inclusive and equitable learning for students.<\/li>\n<li>Recruit and retain faculty, staff and students from underrepresented groups.<\/li>\n<li>Collect and share demographic data to determine future diversity and inclusion needs.<\/li>\n<li>Support scholarships for underrepresented groups.<\/li>\n<li>Support Austin Peay\u2019s <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.apsu.edu\/about-apsu\/mission.php\" >diversity mission<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\u201cI care about this, and I care about the students,\u201d Dunkle said. \u201cI know I might not understand everything yet, but I know there are changes that need to be made. So, I think just having that spirit overall in the college and continuing to work on this to make sure we\u2019re making progress is important.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>[470center]<\/p>\n<h3>To learn more<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>To read the full statement and action plan go to <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.apsu.edu\/costem\/diversity_inclusion_costem.php\" >www.apsu.edu\/costem\/diversity_inclusion_costem.php<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li>To learn more about the College of STEM, visit <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.apsu.edu\/costem\" >apsu.edu\/costem<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Clarksville, TN &#8211; The Austin Peay State University (APSU) College of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics on Friday released a diversity and inclusion statement and pledged to fight \u201cany form of racism, discrimination or prejudice.\u201d As part of that pledge, the college announced an action plan to lower barriers that hinder equality and access to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[23,34646,10061,262,512,825,16079],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4xGYI-7AT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29195"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29195"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29195\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29196,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29195\/revisions\/29196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.discoverclarksville.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}