Glenn E. Singleton gives the keynote address in the Purdue Memorial Union South Ballroom at the start of the Iverson Bell Midwest Regional Diversity Summit.
Nearly 120 faculty, staff, and students from eleven universities across the country attended the Iverson Bell Midwest Regional Diversity Summit held at Purdue University May 18 – 20. The biennial event is a collaboration among the colleges and schools of veterinary medicine at Purdue, Michigan State University, the University of Minnesota, The Ohio State University, and the University of Wisconsin, with additional sponsorship by Zoetis.
The summit kicked off at lunch Friday, May 18, with a keynote address by Glenn E. Singleton, founder of the Pacific Education Group, which seeks to achieve racial equity in education. The author of Courageous Conversations about Race: A Field Guide for Achieving Equity in Schools (2006), a protocol for sustained, deep dialog, Singleton has devoted more than 30 years to constructing racial equity worldwide and developing leaders to do the same.
Iverson Bell Midwest Regional Diversity Summit participants listen to facilitators Anna Yeakley, program director for the Intergroup Relations Program at UCLA, and Kathleen Wong(Lau), San Jose State’s chief diversity officer, during the start of afternoon workshops on Friday, May 18.
Kathy Wong (Lau), chief diversity officer at San Jose State University, and Anna Yeakley, Intergroup Relations Program director at UCLA served as facilitators for the summit, which included workshops focused on the theme of “Courageous ConversationsTM”. Purdue Veterinary Medicine faculty members also assisted as facilitators for different tracks. Summit participants were able to choose between the topics of “Diversity Curriculum Infusion – in the Classroom,” facilitated by Dr. Henry Green; “Student Affairs for a Multicultural Environment – Institutional Framework,” facilitated by Dr. Susan Mendrysa; and “Putting Inclusion into the Institutional Culture,” facilitated by Drs. Kathy Salisbury and Sandy San Miguel.
“Putting Inclusion into the Institutional Culture” is the title of a track facilitated by Drs. Kathleen Salisbury and Sandy San Miguel during the Iverson Bell Midwest Regional Diversity Summit.
Additional sessions included Intergroup Dialogue Skills and a panel discussion featuring students, staff, and faculty. Throughout the event, participants took time to develop role play scenarios to demonstrate how to have both planned and spontaneous, courageous conversations in the context of the curriculum, student affairs, and institutional culture. The summit concluded with group presentations and role play in Lynn 1136.
Besides the attendees from Purdue and the collaborating veterinary schools and colleges, participants also came from Oklahoma State University, the University of Georgia, Tuskegee University, the University of California – Davis, the University of Florida and the University of Illinois.