At its Annual Meeting just before Commencement, Wesleyan’s Board of Trustees’ Equity and Inclusion Task Force presented the full Board with a statement of principles. This task force’s work grew out of the board retreat in 2014 at which trustees made the commitment to pursue fairness and community building throughout the University’s functions. Here is the statement:
The Wesleyan University Board of Trustees is committed to a campus culture characterized by diversity, equity, and inclusion. We believe that in order to meet the University’s educational mission and provide a thriving educational environment, the University’s governance, curriculum, and operations should be regularly reviewed and renewed to ensure that they reflect and address the broad diversity of the Wesleyan community.
The members of the board commit to conversations regarding diversity, equity and inclusion, and to monitoring progress in promoting equity and inclusion in all aspects of University life, including:
Eliminating the comparative disadvantages in educational experience that may separate student groups on the basis of race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and/or other factors; and
Honest conversations, openness, and metrics regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion and evidence reflecting student success, faculty and staff recruitment and retention, and institutional performance.
This morning I read an article in The Chronicle of Higher Education that noted that efforts to promote diversity, equity and inclusion can be most effective with strong commitment from the top of the organization. I am proud to work with trustees who have embraced these goals and are working to integrate them throughout our operations.
On the inclusion/diversity topic — are you also referring to those with challenges as for example those on the autistic spectrum? My Asperger grandson is in the top 10% of his large city high school class, scored “5” on his AP History exam in his junior year, is a National Merit Finalist, an excellent guitarist, and a vocabulary-rich, gentle, retiring young man, with of course some anxiety and limited but improving social skills. Will Wesleyan make a place for him, with supports, if he is admissions-qualified? He has visited the school and loves it, placing it on his short-short list but is concerned he will not get in or if so not understood. Thank you.