Contact Us
Vice President, Office of Transformational and Inclusive Excellence
Hanna House
513-529-1715
vpDiversity@MiamiOH.edu
Transformational Excellence is a continuous process through which individuals and units actively and intentionally use an intersectional lens to innovate and improve processes, experiences, and policies. The goal is for inclusive excellence to be intentionally embedded into all processes and policies, as well as throughout the Miami community collectively. Through these proactive steps, we embrace transformation to more fully reflect an inclusive and intersectional Miami. In our everyday work as well as in our short and long-term strategizing and planning, the following core values guide our efforts:
We recognize the multiple identities and experiences of individuals in the Miami community to be a fully inclusive and accessible community. We strive to foster an environment in which all are welcomed, valued, treated fairly, respected, and able to thrive. We are committed to examining and thoughtfully addressing how policies, practices, and structures impact the multiple identities of individuals, in the service of building a more inclusive Miami.
We are committed to eliminating systems of inequality, supporting and promoting inclusive opportunities, and ensuring that different perspectives are heard and valued in order to ensure a more just, equitable, and fair Miami community. In line with this commitment, we approach both interactions and policies with a focus on respect, dignity, and fairness.
As members of the Miami community, we are committed to building a fair and respectful campus that values trust-based collaboration and partnerships. Through a culture of transparency, empathy, compassion, and active listening we strive to create trust and vulnerability where all perspectives are respected.
We are stronger, more innovative, and more creative in our approaches and data-informed solutions because we draw on the breadth and depth of our shared experiences and expertise. We intentionally nurture open spaces of trust and dialogue so we can bring our full authentic selves. We are committed to supporting and uplifting individuals and groups as we work together to bring about systemic, transformational change for the Miami community.
We approach innovation and creativity through data-informed strategies that focus on identifying and addressing opportunities for growth within the Miami community. Through awareness, education, and professional development, we work to expand the knowledge of the Miami community. We provide and encourage practical and sustainable solutions for continued innovation.
We foster a culture of collective accountability through transparency and dialogue. We empower the Miami community through knowledge and resource sharing, interactive engagement, and practical skill development which encourages shared responsibility.
In the Office for Transformational and Inclusive Excellence we understand that to be excellent we need to be intentionally inclusive, and in 2023-2024 we continued our work to more fully support and lead the Miami community in our inclusive excellence journey. This means we center and move forward university-wide efforts that contribute to capacity-building, systemic change, and cultural transformation through research, innovation, and collaboration. We understand that we’re a stronger community, within and across units, when we recognize and work to communicate across differences and to meet common goals.
In OTIE, I am very fortunate to work with an amazingly skilled and talented collaborative team. The initiatives and projects we focus on and lead, and the university-wide collaboration we value and center to embed inclusive excellence across Miami, would not be possible without this team’s efforts. We are also grateful for the efforts of so many other colleagues across Miami who use their expertise and skills to continue to move our community forward.
Our comprehensive approach to building a more inclusive Miami is multipronged, and this Spring semester we shared the results of the “Your Voice. Your Miami” 2023 climate survey as another way to better understand our community’s experiences and needs and proactively identify ways to continue to make progress. We undertook the climate survey because we are committed to doing the work that is necessary to ensure an inclusive, welcoming, and accessible Miami, and we look forward to drawing on the findings as we develop additional initiatives.
We understand that our inclusive excellence journey is ongoing, and are excited to recognize our progress and accomplishments even as we recognize that there is still much work to be done. This year, Miami again received Insight into Diversity’s HEED award, making this Miami’s fourth consecutive year winning this national award in recognition of our inclusive excellence and diversity efforts. We also congratulate Libraries, Farmer School of Business, and Alumni Relations for the unit-specific awards from Insight into Diversity in those areas. Miami also appeared on Forbes America’s Best Employers for Diversity 2024 list, as No. 16 overall and as the only institution from the Education industry listed in the top 29.
Building on this year’s efforts and looking to 2024-25, one initiative we are especially excited about is the university-wide roll-out of Constructive Dialogue. This initiative is central to our ongoing efforts to equip Miami students, and more broadly the Miami community, with critical skills to effectively communicate across differences of perspectives, values, and belief systems. This Spring we partnered with ASPIRE, the Honors College, and the Menard Family Center for Democracy to launch the Constructive Dialogue Initiative. After a very successful pilot with about 100 student leaders, we are ready for the university-wide roll-out in 2024-25, which will include student, faculty, and staff components and support.
It has been another very busy year in OTIE and throughout Miami, and the OTIE team is proud of the accomplishments across Miami, and excited to continue to collaborate to move forward systemic, transformational change to ensure Miami is an inclusive space for all. We invite you to read about ongoing and new initiatives, accomplishments, and plans in this annual report.
2022 - 2023 |
2023 - 2024 |
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105.1% increase in programming (or community) engagement this past year (8722-4252 = 4470/4252 = 1.051*100 = 105.1%) |
This past year, the Office of Transformational and Inclusive Excellence (OTIE) team has been working diligently to support students, faculty, and staff as we respond to the Miami community’s needs, expand offerings, and resources. It has been a busy year, and we have completed several large-scale projects and initiatives, including having the first cohort of Inclusive Excellence Faculty Fellows; launching a new cultural competency certificate program for students; launching a pilot for Constructive Dialogue; and sharing findings from the 2023 Campus Climate Survey. Our revamped webpage reflects our multi-pronged approach and efforts, and we invite all Miami community members to visit it for the most up to date information on the OTIE team, projects, initiatives, and plans.
In the context of our commitment to an inclusive Miami community, OTIE developed “Building an Inclusive Miami,” a two-hour facilitated discussion on inclusive leadership and organizational change for teams across Miami. This new offering became available during Fall 2022. The interactive facilitated discussion centers the interconnections between individual identities and experiences, and system-wide practices, policies, and change. Through the lenses of organizational change processes, the facilitated discussion provides opportunities to individually and collaboratively identify components of an inclusive organization and apply this knowledge to evaluation of policies and practices in your units and organization more broadly. It also provides an opportunity to identify plans for next steps individually and as a team within the framework of organizational change in the service of an ever more inclusive Miami.
This past year we had 10 workshops (representing 10 units across the university) with 266 participants. This resulted in 509 hours of facilitated conversations with faculty and staff to reflect and consider ways of making our community more inclusive.
During the 2023-2024 academic year, the Office of Transformational and Inclusive Excellence (OTIE) engaged in a multitude of programmatic initiatives with academic and divisional units, as well as with student groups and leaders. In fact, we had over 56 points of partnership throughout the year with 37 of those partnerships being unique partners: 19 were academic units, 7 student groups, 8 divisional units or faculty and staff associations, and 3 off-campus partners.
OTIE’s offerings have encompassed Heritage and History Month Programming, Constructive Dialogue, Reimagining the Academy Conference, and much more. Throughout the year we have offered 66 events with a total of 7,565 attendees of faculty, staff, and students. This is 19 more programs than last year and an increase of 4,589 attendees (154% increased event engagement).
During 2023-2024, OTIE’s social media reach saw a massive increase of both reach and impressions. We are excited to be one of the highest-yielding social media platforms at Miami University. Our Instagram account has had steady engagement with target audiences throughout the academic year. Social media utilization and optimization have allowed for more streamlined communications with Miami students, faculty, staff, and the community at large. By increasing OTIE’s social media reach, we have been able to increase awareness of resources and programming offered by OTIE, along with educational opportunities through silent programming and promotion of partnered events.
This year, we piloted our first social media-based event: Scholar Spotlights. This newly created series will allow us to engage with our audience in new ways and feature members of our community who are contributing to building a more inclusive Miami through their research, initiatives, programming, and more. The pilot program for this initiative had over 130 viewers and featured graduate student Amanda Kaufman and her master’s thesis research which focuses on LGBTQ+ identities in intercollegiate athletics.
In addition to the expanded Religious Observances and Inclusive Scheduling calendar from last year, we have grown this resource to offer posters that highlight key observances for our community. These posters were created and selected based on the largest religious, spiritual, and secular groups identified through the 2023 “Your Voice. Your Miami” Campus Climate Survey. These posters will provide Miami University community members more in-depth education and understanding of key dates for our campus community.
This year we also partnered with Intercollegiate Athletics and University Communications and Marketing to begin to prepare a new educational campaign for 2024-2025 centering educational videos about high holidays and observances recognized by our campus community. These videos (30-45 seconds long) will feature Miami University undergraduate and graduate students who identify as members of the community.The videos will showcase brief educational information about the observance (ex. Hindu student-athlete Nishi Saravanan is featured in the video about Diwali, which explains the holiday and customs). Each of these videos will be featured at sporting events prior to the observance, to foster more cultural awareness and understanding.
A fully inclusive Miami community includes a welcoming climate for faculty, staff, students and the broader community of different religious, secular, and spiritual identities. Through interfaith programming we invite people from various worldviews and religious backgrounds to come together for workshops, dialogues, and events to promote interfaith dialogue, education, and collaboration. Our intersectional approach provides our campus community an opportunity to learn about the various identities and practices in our community, as we each learn how variables shape and impact experiences. These initiatives are open to people of all faith traditions, including those who identify as secular or non-religious in an effort to foster an environment where all perspectives are valued and respected.
This year Miami participated in the Interfaith, Spiritual, Religious, and Secular Campus Climate (INSPIRES) Index, which measures efforts to establish a welcoming climate for students of different worldviews and religious backgrounds. We received a score of three out of five stars, and continue to identify ways to develop our interfaith programming and resources. In OTIE wee hosted over 10 events, educational programs, and experiences for faculty, staff, and students. These events included experiences such as panel discussions: (1) Thriving as LGBTQ+ individuals in Religious and Spiritual Spaces, (2) Making the Invisible Visible: Celebrating Black Faith Traditions, (3) Heritage and History Month Celebrations, (4) Understanding & Combating Islamophobia: How to create a safe space and support our Campus Communities (workshop), (5) Unpacking Antisemitism on College Campuses Today (multiple workshops), (6) Interfaith site visits to The Nancy and David Wolf Humanities and Holocaust Center and (7) the Islamic Center of Greater Cincinnati. For more information about OTIE’s interfaith programming, visit our Interfaith Engagement webpage to learn how you can be a part of the experiences.In the context of our commitment to an inclusive Miami community, OTIE developed “Building an Inclusive Miami,” a two-hour facilitated discussion on inclusive leadership and organizational change for teams across Miami. This new offering became available during Fall 2022. The interactive facilitated discussion centers the interconnections between individual identities and experiences, and system-wide practices, policies, and change. Through the lenses of organizational change processes, the facilitated discussion provides opportunities to individually and collaboratively identify components of an inclusive organization and apply this knowledge to evaluation of policies and practices in your units and organization more broadly. It also provides an opportunity to identify plans for next steps individually and as a team within the framework of organizational change in the service of an ever more inclusive Miami.
This past year we had 10 workshops (representing 10 units across the university) with 266 participants. This resulted in 509 hours of facilitated conversations with faculty and staff to reflect and consider ways of making our community more inclusive.
To advance a more inclusive Miami for all, Leadership Councils continued to meet with the Office of Transformational and Inclusive Excellence (OTIE) regularly during 2023-2024.These councils include the Academic Leadership Council, Divisional Leadership Council, and the Student Advisory Council. Academic and Divisional Councils meet monthly, and the Student Advisory Council meets twice a semester.
To end the 2023-2024 academic year, the Councils came together to participate in two workshops connected to antisemitism and Islamophobia: Understanding & Combating Islamophobia: How to create a safe space and support our Campus Communities workshop facilitated by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), and Unpacking Antisemitism on College Campuses Today facilitated by the American Jewish Committee. Furthermore. The Councils were also included in two site visits this year - one to The Nancy and David Wolf Humanities and Holocaust Center and the other to the Islamic Center of Greater Cincinnati. These opportunities were a space for our Academic and Divisional Leadership teams to come together in community to dialogue and explore how we can all better serve our Jewish and Muslim students in our respective areas.
We are incredibly grateful for the work Miami faculty and staff leaders take on regularly to make Miami more inclusive, and recognize the significant efforts involved in this work.
OTIE, in collaboration with the Office of the Provost, launched a new Inclusive Excellence Faculty Fellows program. In recognition of the efforts and role of faculty in fostering a more inclusive Miami, this program is a professional development opportunity for faculty to deepen their knowledge and expertise as leaders in actively advancing change. Fellows collaborate with OTIE in the Fellow’s chosen area, as well as collaborate more broadly on programming and initiatives, to advance Miami’s inclusive excellence approach.
Our inaugural Faculty Fellows were Dr. Anita Mannur (English), Dr. Haifei Shi (Biology), and Dr. Fauzia Ahmed (Sociology and Gerontology). Both Dr. Mannur and Dr. Shi worked on building the infrastructure and resources needed to launch a faculty mentoring program. They collected data through surveys sent to chairs and tenure-track faculty, to see what was being offered and the needs our tenure-track faculty have as it relates to mentoring. With this data to inform next steps, they hosted two workshops: (1) tenure-track in-person experience to build community and dig deeper to explore the needs of tenure-track faculty and (2) another workshop for interested mentors to gain some skills and strategies to be effective mentors. The Faculty Fellows also researched best practices and resources, to build a Tenure Line Faculty Mentoring Program webpage with useful information. OITE and the Office of the Provost look forward to drawing on this strong foundation to explore ways to move these efforts forward.
Dr. Ahmed’s project was centered on a research project that explored the needs of international faculty at Miami. This project yielded insights that will be helpful for both OTIE and the Office of the Provost moving forward, as we consider the best way forward in supporting our international faculty.
We are also excited to announce our 2024-2025 Faculty Fellow, Dr. Naaborle Sackeyfio, whose project will be focused on faculty wellness and empowerment, engaging in restorative practices to re-imagine work life synergies at Miami.
Following-up on the success of our award-winning DEI in Leadership Certificate, we have expanded and re-structured the offering. This year we had 154 external enrollments. The series is designed for mid- and senior-level leaders in corporate, nonprofit, and education sectors. The concise, 45-minute modules focus on knowledge and strategies and are facilitated by Miami faculty and staff content experts. We have added four modules, so that our 14 modules now include:
These topics reflect our inclusive and broad approach to diversity and inclusion. Modules have been organized into three tracks to better serve specific sectors. The tracks are Inclusive Workplaces, Coalition-Building, and Health Equity.
The DEI in Leadership Certificate has appeared in Insight into Diversity, the Cincinnati Magazine, and through LinkedIn ads and is a great way to engage in professional development for leaders across sectors.
We are honored to uplift and recognize the award recipients of the 2023-2024 University Inclusive Excellence Awards with a total of 8 recipients in five award categories.
The first award, Ray of Light, recognizes members of the Miami University community who have demonstrated, advanced, or promoted activities, programs, or actions that have supported campus efforts to help enrich the experiences for faculty, staff, and students. The recipients of this award were Keisha Norris (CEC) and Seth Seward (Alumni Relations).
The second award is the Inclusive Excellence Distinguished Service Award which recognizes the creative/academic contributions of a unit steeped in a consistent record of service that has highlighted or supported diversity and inclusion or directly shaped and positively affected the meaning and understanding of diversity and inclusion on campus. The recipients of this award was the LSAMP Advisory Board.
The third award category was Diversity Event of the Year Award which recognizes an individual or group who hosted an event or series that engaged the campus community in a meaningful diversity and inclusion experience. The recipient of this award was the Electric Root Festival.
The fourth award category was Diversity and Inclusion Student Advocate Award which recognizes a current undergraduate or graduate student who has worked tirelessly on campus and/or the local community to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion. The recipients of these awards were Payton Smith (Undergraduate) and Wilnelly Ventura Valentin (Graduate).
Lastly, the final category was Institutional Inclusive Excellence Award which recognizes trailblazers on campus who have led or impacted a policy shift, innovative programming, or demonstrated scholarly opportunities for the Miami community to engage in diversity and inclusion activities directly on campus. The recipients of this award were Patti Liberatore (CCA) and Ande Durojaiye (CLAAS).
Each of these individuals and units have been instrumental in moving forward inclusive excellence initiatives at Miami University, and we look forward to recognizing all the great work taking place here by recognizing individuals, groups, and/or units every year.
The 2023-2024 year saw a large increase in engagement on the Office of Transformational and Inclusive Excellence’s (OTIE) main social media account compared to last year’s engagement. The OTIE Instagram account saw a 16% increase in followers from October 2023 to April 2024, or an increase of 307 followers. The OTIE Instagram saw a total of 231,134 accounts engaging with our content, at 220% increase of accounts engaged. The account reach, or number of individuals seeing OTIE’s content, reached a high of 126,146, an increase of 950% in reach. Account impressions, or the number of times OTIE content was displayed to our audience, reached 267,542, or an increase of 29%.
The OTIE Instagram account also saw an increase of 7,739 new content interactions, an increase of 125%. Total content interactions can be broken down into 7,447 post interactions, 250 reels or video interactions, and 42 story interactions.
Content reach included four (4) top cities, with audience engagement from Oxford, OH at 53.6%, Columbus, OH at 3.6%, Cincinnati, OH at 3%, and Hamilton, OH at 2.4%. OTIE’s account audience is primarily women with 72.1% of accounts engaged identifying as women, and 27.8% of accounts engaged identifying as men. Top age ranges for this group can be broken down as follows:
This engagement included 4,048 profile visits, and 253 LinkTree visits directly from the Instagram account bio information. The LinkTree provided users with related resources across campus, supporting materials for heritage month programming, workshops, and the Reimagining the Academy Conference in one convenient location.
During the 2023-2024 academic year, four editions of the newsletter, The Miami Pulse, were published, featuring content spotlight interviews of faculty, staff, student, and campus initiatives or individuals who are conducting inclusive excellence work for the community. Newsletter editions also highlighted research publications of community members who have recent publications connected to inclusive excellence topics, and information regarding OTIE’s initiatives, announcements, and leadership opportunities. We are also excited to spotlight initiatives, faculty, staff, and students across Miami in every issue, and welcome submissions for announcements through a submission form on the OTIE website.
OTIE continued our internal Marketing and Communications Plan to outline the policies and procedures surrounding inclusive excellence communications across campus and with the community. This plan featured the integration of utilizing university-wide digital screen advertisements, both at Oxford and at the Regionals campuses, along with more streamlined communications with Regionals campuses as a whole. This plan also included the creation and distribution of monthly event calendars shared with both Oxford and Regionals campuses on A-frame posters featuring each month’s programming and event information, and the addition of 11x17 posters to place in academic buildings and residence halls to increase student reach. OTIE’s Marketing and Communications Plan also included the continued building and solidification of partnerships across campus with key stakeholders. These partnerships have allowed for a wider-reach of educational content and a larger share of programmatic materials for a higher quality of continued engagement with our office programs and initiatives.
During the 2023-2024 academic cycle, OTIE placed a variety of external advertisements with both print and digital media outlets to share messaging surrounding varied initiatives. These outlets included The Dayton Jewish Observer (April 2024, September 2024, December 2024), National Civil Rights Conference (June 2023), Faculty Women of Color in the Academy Conference (April 2024), Insight Into Diversity (January 2024, March 2024), and Oxford NAACP Chapter (April 2024). In an effort to increase its visibility, OTIE continues to seek new avenues of communications with the community to have a wider reach and continued intentionality behind advertisements.
In Spring 2023, the Office of Transformational and Inclusive Excellence (OTIE) launched “Your Voice, Your Miami.” Campus Climate Survey 2023. The purpose of this survey was to more fully understand the perceptions and experiences of students, faculty and staff, evaluate progress on climate issues, and identify next steps for Miami. We partnered with INSIGHT Into Diversity Viewfinder® as our vendor for the survey. The survey was open over a 5-week timespan (January 25 - March 1) and prizes were connected to these five weeks to incentivize faculty, staff, and student participation. The result was a total of 4423 respondents, 1785 faculty and 2638 students.
Over the past academic year, we have worked closely with INSIGHT Into Diversity Viewfinder® to develop a report of the data collected. Based on the analysis OTIE hosted three campus-wide presentations to share the findings with faculty, staff, and students. The presentations were held on Tuesday, April 30th and Wednesday, May 1st, on Oxford Campus and Thursday, May 2nd at Hamilton Campus. After each presentation done by the Vice President, Office of Transformational and Inclusive Excellence, attendees were able to participate in a data walk where they engaged with the data and provided constructive feedback and suggestions for next steps. OTIE also added the presentation to the website, so faculty, staff, and students who were unable to attend could still review the data and provide feedback and recommendations.
The feedback and recommendations submitted through this process will be used to help identify next steps moving forward.
As part of OTIE’s comprehensive and multi-method climate approach we launched two task forces: (1) LGBTQ+ Task Force launched Spring 2023 and (2) Accessibility Task Force launched in Fall 2023. The LGBTQ+ Task Force over the past year and a half did an institutional audit of offerings, services, policies, and historical moments at Miami and researched national best practices to inform a final report with recommendations for Miami University. The report was submitted June 2024 to OTIE. The task force was composed of 15 task force members: 5 staff, 5 faculty, 4 students, and 1 alumni.
Similarly, the Accessibility Task Force convened and determined that an Accessibility-Informed Programming Toolkit for all faculty, staff, and students to support accessibility on a large-scale at the institution. The group assessed current inclusive programming resources on campus, evaluated gaps in resources, and compiled resources and supportive networks to create an Accessibility-Informed Programming Toolkit for use by the Miami community. The task force was composed of 21 task force members: 14 staff, 2 faculty, and 5 students. The tool kit will be available on OTIE’s website and partners in the fall. The report with recommendations was submitted July 2024.
Our mission is to empower each student, staff, and faculty member to promote and become engaged citizens who use their acquired knowledge and skills with integrity and compassion to improve the future of the community and the world.
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