The Department of Geography is committed to fostering inclusive learning and working environments that embrace the diversity of experiences, perspectives, and interests represented in our communities and the broader world. We value diversity, equity, inclusion, interdisciplinarity, transparency, shared decision-making, and accessibility as integral components of excellence in teaching, scholarship, service and outreach.
We recognize that we live in a world of systemic inequalities, oppressions, and exclusions that are encoded in the structures, policies, practices, traditions, and procedures of our discipline and our academic institutions. Therefore, the Department seeks to promote open, critical dialogues and practices aimed at dismantling past and present injustices and at addressing social and environmental challenges. As geographers, we support pedagogies that seek to understand and challenge inequities and oppression in their multiple manifestations in and out of the classroom, in online learning spaces, in the field, on campus, in our professional organizations, and in our broader communities. We believe that these pedagogies can support transformative justice within and beyond the academy.
We recognize that our community, scholarship, teaching and public work is stronger through the participation of individuals with different perspectives and backgrounds who can offer creative problem-solving strategies. We seek to improve inclusion, transparency, and shared decision-making within our community and to provide a welcoming atmosphere for all students, scholars and staff in which to thrive. We commit to cultivating a working and learning environment that does not tolerate discrimination, harassment, intimidation, and exploitation.
The Department of Geography commits to advancing these values in several ways including and not limited to:
● Establishing and maintaining a permanent departmental climate committee, with representatives from across the department;
● Meaningfully expanding the inclusion of minoritized and marginalized groups in the Department, the discipline and profession of geography, and in academia through active improvement in recruitment, retention, and advancement efforts;
● Increasing the representation and participation of different groups in Department activities, including governance, through reassessment and revision of policies and practices;
● Offering courses that engage centrally with diverse cultures and values and equity concerns;
● Producing research that addresses issues of social and environmental justice in a diverse range of communities located domestically and internationally;
● Advancing ethical practices in publicly engaged scholarship, education, outreach, and research;
● Integrating values of diversity, equity, inclusion, transparency, shared decision-making and accessibility into the Department’s practices that support ethically-informed teaching, research, service, leadership, and outreach;
● Reevaluating departmental needs through regular surveys of its community, policies, and practices.