How can a faculty member create cultural inclusiveness in the classroom? How can they best support students during uncertain times? How can they make diversity a strategic priority?
Those are just some of the questions that will be discussed this weekend at the Consortium for Faculty Diversity. CFD is a group of liberal arts institutions that supports a fellowship program with the goal of diversifying the pipeline of faculty into the liberal arts.
Every year, CFD brings together the program’s new fellows for a professional development conference featuring workshops and speakers to discuss topics to support the fellows’ professional growth. This year, CC hosts the annual conference, in various campus locations Friday, Sept. 23, and Saturday, Sept. 24.
Michael Benitez, a leading national social justice educator and activist-scholar, will lead a presentation and dialogue titled, “The Time Is Always Now: Advancing Legacies of Diversity and Social Justice Leadership in 21st Century Higher Education.” Benitez is known for his down-to-earth insightful commentary and critical perspectives on social and cultural issues. Currently, Benitez is chief diversity officer, dean of diversity and inclusion, and Title IX officer at the University of Puget Sound.
Dena Samuels, director at Matrix Center for the Advancement of Social Equity and Inclusion, and assistant professor of women’s and ethnic studies at the University of Colorado-Colorado Springs, provides the closing keynote address, “Transforming Ourselves to Become Culturally Inclusive Educators.” Her presentation is directed at educators of any experience level teaching any subject who are willing to engage in self-reflection and who are specifically interested in increasing their teaching effectiveness by making their classrooms more culturally inclusive.
At CC, the Riley Fellows Program is run in conjunction with the Consortium for Faculty Diversity fellows. CC was a founding member of the consortium, which aims to: serve students’ learning by bringing in emerging teacher-scholars to offer courses and to be a part of the diverse intellectual community at CC; serve the fellows by providing pre-doctoral and post-doctoral appointments where they can be immersed in an excellent liberal arts institution, helping advance their scholarship, develop their teaching, and be more successful in the academic job market; and serve the entire liberal arts community by supporting inclusive excellence by diversifying the faculty candidate pool for the liberal arts.
