Broadening Participation
SpectrumX’s vision is to foster a team that creates space for us to recognize and mitigate dynamics created by power differences and bias, and engage with perspectives that may have been traditionally excluded. Our strategy is to infuse best practices of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) into the culture of the Center and all aspects of its work.
Our Broadening Participation Working Group (BWG) developed a three-pronged approach to broadening participation:
Assessing and evaluating Intercultural Competence: The Broadening Participation Working Group administers the Intercultural Development Inventory to all members of the SpectrumX Center. This tool helps each member understand their level of intercultural competence and provides recommendations to improve.
Improving Intercultural Competence through Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Education: The Broadening Participation Working Group hosts a number of DEI workshops on topics such as the journey to inclusive cultures, understanding bias, racism and sexism, understanding microaggressions and interrupting racism and sexism. Additionally, a host of DEI resources are available to SpectrumX team members in an internally managed repository. This repository includes links to books, articles, organizations, videos and podcasts. The group continues to research and offer other relevant learning opportunities to the team members.
Fostering Partnerships with Minority Serving Institutions to attract diverse faculty, student and staff talent: The Center is working with key stakeholders to develop mutually beneficial relationships with select Minority Serving Institutions (MSI), including Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs), to bring students, faculty, and staff into conversations and research spaces created by the Center to increase representation in SpectrumX research areas and related areas of the workforce.
For more information, contact Scott Barker, Interim Broadening Participation Director, SpectrumX Center and Research Support Office, College of Engineering and Applied Science at the University of Colorado Boulder.