Page 3 - 2020 GGE Newsletter

Page 3

DIVERSITY, INCLUSION, AND ACCESS (DI&A)
COMMITTEE

WRITTEN BY: DONNA ANDERSON, MARY CARR, AND DANICA ROTH

What a whirlwind of a year in a time of pandemic and concern over racial equity. The Geology and Geological Engineering
department established our DI&A committee in January, and had just started formulating plans when campus shut down
in March. Over the next few months, as classes, administration and research groups made the emergency transition to
online learning and remote work, we focused on trying to make sure no one got lost or forgotten in the chaos. We estab-
lished a GE Slack workspace for all department members to keep in touch and reach out for help, launched a department
DI&A webpage managed by undergraduate Marisa Macias, and tried to provide support, encouragement and resources for
those in need. The committee jumped back in with both feet starting in June, when Danica Roth responded quickly to the
needs of students, helping them share their concerns and emotions following the death of George Floyd and the subse-
quent demonstrations across the country. Along with several students, Danica also spearheaded the development of DI&A
coffee hours that have met every other week since June, to discuss and act on issues impacting students and staff, as well
as broader conversations on inequality in America. Out of these conversations, it became clear that our own graduate pop-
ulation needed more support to integrate them into the department and to improve retention of graduate students, partic-
ularly women. In response, graduate students Anne Fulton and Kim Cone developed the new Graduate Student Seminar,
a monthly professional development workshop series to help graduate students navigate their time at Mines and beyond.
Fall semester included 4 seminars on student-advisor communication, wellness skills, time management and writing. In a
joint graduate student and faculty movement, we also joined the growing number of programs across the country that
have made graduate admissions more accessible by dropping the Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) requirement, that
has come to be seen as an inaccurate predictor of student success.

Danica Roth also organized two hour-long workshops: one by Dr. Cassandra McCall on Enhancing Inclusion and Improv-
ing Access in the Geosciences and Geological Engineering; the other delivered by Dr. Crystal Ng and Zhaashiigid Nooding
(aka, Robert Shimek) on Transforming Research and Relationships Through Collaborative Tribal-University Partnerships
on Manoomin (wild rice). The talks challenged us to change the ways we communicate and to examine our implicit as-
sumptions about conducting research with non-academic stakeholders.
Starting in mid-December, Geology and Geological Engineering will be joining forces with Mining Engineering to engage
in a series of 6 2-hour Collaborative Connections workshops tailored to the geologic and mining communities. Led by in-
structors with mining industry experience, the workshops are aimed at evaluating the current DI&A climate in the two
departments in order to build a more supportive, collaborative environment.

Committee Members: Mary Carr, Danica Roth, Yvette Kuiper, Bruce Trudgill, Donna Anderson, Anne Fulton, Kim Cone,
Chance Seckinger, Rami Abousleiman, Marisa Macias