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DIVERSITY, INCLUSION, JUSTICE, & EQUITY

dije

The Marsal Family School of Education is proud to be a leader in the campus-wide initiative promoting Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity. Adding "Justice" to these values underscores the role of educators in the creation of just societies. Through research, public scholarship, community building, and the preparation of education practitioners and policymakers, we articulate and advance our dije agenda.

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A Statement of Institutional Commitments

At the Marsal Family School of Education, our effort to study and improve educational practice is inseparable from our determination to develop more effective and socially just systems of education. This mission is grounded in our commitment to promote diversity and to advance equity and inclusion.

Students at Graduation

As an organization, we value and seek to increase diversity along many dimensions, including race and ethnicity, gender and gender expression, socioeconomic status, sexual orientation, language, national origin, U.S. resident status, religious commitment, age, and (dis)ability status. We recognize the history in the United States of racial, ethnic, and gender discrimination and the intergenerational effects of poverty, and we commit to work assiduously to promote and extend opportunities and outcomes for members of those groups that have been historically marginalized by these profound inequalities. It is central to that mission to ensure that each member of our community has full opportunity to thrive in our environment, for we believe that diversity is key both to individual flourishing and to the advancement of knowledge. We know that without a vibrant community of people who identify as members of these groups, we cannot progress as a school. We also recognize that without building critical mass of these groups among our students, staff, and faculty, difference can be isolating rather than productive.

We commit to developing the institutional mechanisms and social norms necessary to ensure that differences are respected, welcomed, and used to support individuals’ flourishing and to advance our collective aims. The pursuit of equity entails institutionalizing policies and practices that facilitate the School’s ability to recruit a highly qualified and robustly diverse community of students, faculty, and staff. The pursuit of inclusion entails both removing barriers to, and providing support and encouragement for, full participation of all community members in our collective work.

Principles of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

The following principles guide the Marsal School's efforts to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion:

  • the diversity of our faculty, students, and staff should reflect the character and contours of our demographically diverse society and should be leveraged to develop the knowledge, interventions, and teaching and learning practices necessary for challenging entrenched educational and social inequalities;
  • each member of our community (students, faculty, staff) should be recognized both as an individual with distinct talents, perspectives, and insights, and as a member of social groups who have benefited from or been disadvantaged by historical and contemporary power inequalities;
  • our practices and policies must ensure the full inclusion and empowerment of persons who identify as members of historically disenfranchised groups, and must also cultivate among all community members shared competencies, sensitivities, and habits of mind fundamental to building an equitable and inclusive school environment;
  • diversity of identity, culture, perspective, language, and mode of expression should be protected and actively cultivated in our research, curricular, pedagogical, and work activities;
  • informal and professional interactions within the school or in relation to school business should enable courageous, respectful, and civil discourse across differences in opinion, perspective, identity, and power status;
  • our institutional responsibility to enact these principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion requires that each of us—individual faculty, staff, and students—contribute to an environment that supports the learning and interactions necessary for the effective, socially-just education that we seek.

Strategic Plan

The purpose of the Marsal Family School of Education’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Strategic Plan is to provide faculty, staff, and students with a framework and charge to prioritize, develop, and implement actions necessary to realize the commitments outlined in the school’s diversity, equity, and inclusion statement.

dije 1.0 Strategic Plan

dije Team

dije Instructional Support and Professional Learning Specialist
Assistant Dean
Assistant Dean for K–12 Recruitment and Special Projects; Instructor, Marsal Family School of Education
(734) 764-9567
Graduate Student Assistant
Associate Dean
Associate Dean for Diversity, Inclusion, Justice, and Equity, Marsal Family School of Education; Stephanie J. Rowley Collegiate Professor; Professor of Psychology, College of Literature, Science, and the Arts
(734) 647-0614

Student Advisory Board

Current Members
2022–23 Student Advisory Board Members
Name Program
Alin Mustafat TEPA
Brandy Marie Jones CSHPE (Ph.D)
Charles Mack Phillips Ed Studies (PhD)
Destiny Dianne Kerr TEPA
Jarell Akeem Skinner-Roy CSHPE (Ph.D)
Kate Morman CPEP (Ph.D)
Naivedya Parakkal Ed Studies (Ph.D)
Nando M Felten Ed Studies - DATL (Masters)
Noor Samer Klait Education Minor
Saba Gerami Ed Studies (Ph.D)
Sarah Burch Ed Studies (Masters)
Suveria Tiye Welch CSHPE (Masters)
Melissa Cathy Valerie CPEP (Ph.D)
Wynter Douglas CSHPE (Masters)
Yang Liu SECMAC
Zhixin Li Ed Studies (Masters)

CALENDAR OF EVENTS