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CDEI May 2021 Update from the Chair

CDEI supports and gives tribute to Asian American and Pacific Islanders in engineering during this Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage month and always. We also denounce the many verbal and physical attacks that have been happening against AAPI people (among many others). White supremacy removes our humanity from all of us.  We have to actively fight to restore that humanity and we also remember every day that none of us are free if even one of us is still in chains.

Photo by Martha Wilding | The Cavalier Daily

 

 

I’m a list maker, and so this month, I thought I would create a list of to-do’s for you all.

 

To Do List:

  1. We want to make sure our CDEI constituents are represented in this ASEE headquarters effort. Survey on Under-Served Communities
    ASEE wishes to identify under-served communities and potential ways to address needs of those communities. Please take this survey to aid in this research, which will be shared with ASEE’s Commission on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, relevant committees, and the ASEE Board. The survey is open through through June 4, 2021 and is anonymous. Email questions to Joe Roy.
  2. If you want to help make the Year of Impact on Racial Equity happen, please sign up to get involved:  The ASEE Year of Impact on Racial Equity starts at the end of the 2021 Annual Conference and will go through the 2022 Annual Conference.  We will discuss during our June 10th All hands Business meeting how the CDEI membership and committees can help make the Year of Impact amazing!
  3. We believe it is important for ASEE and ASEE members to acknowledge and take steps to address justice issues in the communities in which we gather for our annual conferences.  We believe that ASEE and ASEE members should be in partnership with the communities in which we have our conferences. We believe that ASEE conference attendees could have important impacts in the Long Beach community through supporting some local non-profit organizations with their actions and/or with their money. There are four social justice areas we feel have been particularly hard-hit this year with the COVID-19 pandemic.  Housing/houselessness, food insecurity, immigration, and LGBTQ populations. We have compiled some recommended non-profits that are trying to address these issues. Please consider donating money or time to one or all of these non-profits.  Imagine the impact if each of us donated even just $5 to one or two of these!  We also encourage you to think creatively in your divisions and sections about how you might fundraise or partner with these organizations or others to advance justice. List of recommended non-profits
  1. Delegates: If Susan Walden (CDEI past chair) has been in contact with you or your division chairs about your appointment (only some appointments are ending this year), please ask your division chair to respond to her request for delegate appointments.

 

Our Awards committee is busy with final review of the ASEE DEI Constituent Award and is beginning review of Best DEI Papers.

 

Our Communications committee has posted a new guest blog post from Katey Shirey  about integrating socially just engineering into high school science.  Check it and our other guest blogs out!

 

Our Conference Planning committee is pivoting once again to a new format this year; there won’t be any division mixers or exhibit hall booth.  CDEI is brainstorming ideas for how we can still find spaces to connect with each other during the Annual Conference. We have a great line up of workshops for you this year.

 

Our Professional Development committee is always busy!  Check out the upcoming and archived Virtual Workshops, and the last Work in Progress Feedback Workshop Series happens on May 27th. The Cultivating Inclusive Communities group is wrapping up.

 

Our Strategic Planning & Assessment committee has been compiling information from all the committees and has put together a draft of the annual report that we provide to the ASEE Board of Directors each year. We are working on editing and finalizing it now.

 

 

ALL are welcome at these upcoming CDEI meetings.

  1. All Hands CDEI Business Meeting before the Annual Conference: Thursday 6/10/2021 10am-11:30am Pacific/1pm-2:30pm Eastern
  2. ASEE CDEI Social before the Annual Conference: Thursday 7/22/2021 3pm-4:30pm Pacific/ 6pm-7:30pm Eastern.

 

Other Announcements:

 

  1. The 2021 ETLI conference will be taking place 9/29/2021-10/1/2021.  Topics to include: 1.) A Matter of Equity and Access 2.) Future of Teaching in ET 3.) Advocating for ET 4.) Effective Management of ET Programs
  2. We encourage everyone to read this article about how Black engineers disproportionately face barriers in 18 states that was published by the Investigative Reporting Workshop out of American University in Washington, DC.

 

In Solidarity,

Liz Litzler

CDEI Chair 2020-2021