Equity, Racial Justice, Decolonization & Inclusive Excellence

2024        New BSW core course in Africentric social work

2024        Global Engagement Strategy approved

2024        Barriers to applying to the faculty addressec

2023        Research supports City of Calgary Anti-Racism Strategy 

2023        Canadian Muslim Youth national research project 

2022        Faculty embraces equality, racial justice, decolonization and inclusive excellence as first priority in new strategic plan

2022        Queer and Trans Action Committee formed

2022        New scholarships for Black students created

2020   Anti-Black Racism Committee formed

Our leadership and committees continued to make our faculty’s first strategic priority – to equity, racial justice, decolonization and inclusive excellence – central to the work we do. This included ensuring that future students applying to our programs were aware of our faculty’s commitment to equity and racial justice, supporting them through the application process and removing barriers that could prevent worthy students from applying. 

This work was supported by structural work that saw the inclusion of our equity and equity, diversity, inclusion and decolonization (EDID) commitments incorporated into the terms of reference for our undergraduate and graduate committees and a focus on ensuring that a diverse mix of students, faculty and staff were involved in each committee’s ongoing activities as well as the admissions process for all programs.

Our new curriculum and courses (see Student Experience, Learning and Success priority) are designed to support our priority to further decolonization, address racism, including anti-Black racism, and all forms of oppression, social injustice and their intersections. To ensure that a diverse range of lived experience was reflected in our teaching the faculty continues to ensure that we continue to address equity in the teachers hired for sessional instruction, and supporting them to bring their diverse lived experiences and perspectives into classroom learning.

Our innovative Reciprocity Project is also focused on equal and reciprocal partnerships with all the communities we partner with and serve.

We have advanced our priority of creating diverse and inclusive pathways and spaces for equity deserving groups through the ongoing creation and support of multiple new scholarships, including several in 2023-24, to ease economic barriers for worthy students.

Our fundamental work in actualizing EDID within the faculty and community is ongoing, advanced this year by the continued development of our Equity Action Plan, hiring an Indigenous academic to lead our Indigenous Strategy and our continued support of Kiipitakyoyis, supporting the faculty’s move to incorporate and embrace Indigenous ways of being and knowing and create a safe, relational space for Indigenous students. 

Addressing barriers 

A key objective within our first faculty priority is the creation of diverse and inclusive pathways and spaces for equity-deserving groups, and to remove the barriers that could stop worthy applicants from applying. 

To address these issues over the last year, the Bachelor of Social Work (BSW) Committee and associate dean of undergraduate programs, Dr. Gail Zuk, PhD, recruited a diverse group of students from across the province to the BSW Policy Committee and consulted with them in drafting new “program-specific questions” that future students must answer when applying to the BSW program. The new questions provide students from equity-deserving populations the opportunity to address relevant EDID issues and context in their applications. 

The committee also formed an admissions team to reflect faculty diversity, EDID knowledge and inclusive perspective. Finally, the committee moved to allow more weight to be given to multiple factors in a student’s application that put less emphasis on just G.P.A.

To better support students in the application process, Dr. Zuk continued her practice of regular, biweekly “ask the associate dean” sessions that provided an opportunity for people to have one-on-one conversations. 

Similarly, the Master of Social Work (MSW) Policy Committee and the acting associate dean of graduate programs, Dr. Dorothy Badry, PhD, updated and approved the committee’s terms of reference to include a clear statement reinforcing the faculty’s EDID strategy and commitment to it.

A key objective within our first faculty priority is the creation of diverse and inclusive pathways and spaces for equity-deserving groups, and to remove the barriers that could stop worthy applicants from applying. 

To address these issues over the last year, the Bachelor of Social Work (BSW) Committee and associate dean of undergraduate programs, Dr. Gail Zuk, PhD, recruited a diverse group of students from across the province to the BSW Policy Committee and consulted with them in drafting new “program-specific questions” that future students must answer when applying to the BSW program. The new questions provide students from equity-deserving populations the opportunity to address relevant EDID issues and context in their applications.

The committee also formed an admissions team to reflect faculty diversity, EDID knowledge and inclusive perspective. Finally, the committee moved to allow more weight to be given to multiple factors in a student’s application that put less emphasis on just G.P.A.

To better support students in the application process, Dr. Zuk continued her practice of regular, biweekly “ask the associate dean” sessions that provided an opportunity for people to have one-on-one conversations. 

Similarly, the Master of Social Work (MSW) Policy Committee and the acting associate dean of graduate programs, Dr. Dorothy Badry, PhD, updated and approved the committee’s terms of reference to include a clear statement reinforcing the faculty’s EDID strategy and commitment to it.