The Provost’s Office is proud to announce our Third Annual Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Awareness
Week (DEI Week), scheduled for January 14-19, 2019. Our theme this year is Critical Conversations:
Advancing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at USC. This year’s theme challenges us to recommit to one of
USC’s key educational goals – to foster an environment that invites, engages, integrates and leverages
contributions from all quarters of our diverse community. To this end we will host a range of seminars,
training sessions, and roundtables addressing a variety of topics that will help us understand and truly
maximize the potential created by our different perspectives. We will also create opportunities for our
community to hear about the exciting scholarship and research our fellow USC colleagues have produced to
advance national conversations on diversity, inclusion, and equity. We invite interested parties to submit
session proposals to our dedicated interactive website, here. Proposals for specific sessions are being
accepted through November 14, 2018. We also ask that you save the date for the Third Annual Diversity,
Equity and Inclusion Awareness Reception, scheduled for Monday, January 14 from 4:00 PM to 6:30 PM.
As in previous years, DEI events will again cover a wide array of diversity topics, including gender, race,
disability status, first-generation status, sexual orientation, immigration status, nationality, veterans’ status
and gender identity. Programming will take a variety of forms including sponsored sessions and
professional development exercises. Our focus will be on providing sessions that assist the USC
community in negotiating, orchestrating and reflecting on difficult conversations about contentious DEI
issues. We will offer specific sessions featuring exercises designed to help faculty, staff, and students find
the skills and resources they need to better recognize, celebrate, and advocate for DEI in various contexts.
These contexts include managing classroom discussions, structuring DEI innovations in recruitment and
hiring efforts, constructing transparent and inclusive governance processes, as well as cultivating
meaningful dialogue about equity in all of the various spaces that play an important role in USC’s education
mission.
This year’s DEI Coordination team is expanding to ensure that we can provide offerings specifically
directed to the distinct and different needs of faculty, staff, alumni, and students. Our team welcomes Tanya
Adolph-Moran from Alumni Relations, who will assist with questions regarding alumni-focused proposals.
Our team also welcomes Jonathan Wang and Naddia Palacios in Student Services, who will assist with
questions regarding student-focused proposals. Professors Camille Gear Rich and Renee Smith-Maddox
will continue to field faculty, administrator and staff-focused proposals. All proposal questions should
sent to DEIweek@usc.edu and will be routed to the appropriate party.
Faculty, administrators, alumni and student leaders especially likely to benefit from DEI Week
programming include:
● Persons that have served or are currently serving on search and hiring committees;
● Persons that have served or are currently serving on interview and selection panels for student
admissions, awards and scholarships;
● Persons that have served or would like to serve as a USC Diversity Liaison, or persons that would
like to serve on student, alumni or faculty development committees;
● Persons teaching classes or serving as teaching assistants in courses where diversity, equity, and
inclusion are subject matter topics;
● Persons that would like to update or enhance course offerings to better address and explore DEI
issues as they arise in the classroom and/or office environment;
● Persons that provide services to highly diverse student populations;
● Persons interested in exploring new strategies and best practices to increase diversity in enrollment
and hiring;
● Persons that have received criticism about potential bias or insensitivity to others;
● Persons planning new educational initiatives, business innovations, or research projects and want to
explore whether these new ventures are properly responsive to potential DEI issues.
Proposals for specific sessions are being accepted through November 14, 2018. Interested parties
should access the DEI web link provided here, via our interactive platform. The submission form will also
be available via our website, here. Please have the following information ready for your submission:
1. Session title and fifty-word abstract outlining the subject matter and objectives of your session.
2. Session type: live vs. online session, and expected number of participants
3. Technology requirements
4. Release permitting USC to record the event and post to our on-line training library
5. Presenters’ exact titles and institutional affiliations, and a summary specifying any relevant special
qualifications of the presenters.
Financial support is available on a limited basis for artistic performances, installations, and other special
programming. Lunch funding will be provided upon request for sessions with 10 participants or more and
hosted during the lunchtime hour.
Preference in the selection process will be given to sessions that offer the following:
1. Adopt a how-to approach outlining a specific practice, strategy, or model
2. Engage participants with evidence of “what works”
3. Facilitate reflection and foster engagement that helps translate abstract ideas into practice
4. Advance the DEI initiatives in a particular school, unit or course
5. Foster discovery and problem solving through idea sharing and community building, and encourage
immediate short term as well as long term dialogue
For further questions, feel free to email the organizers at DEIweek@usc.edu.