L&AD: Community & Belonging

Goal

F&M will center community, belonging and inclusivity as institutional values, transforming its culture to create a safe, welcoming, and equitable community in which all students, employees, and alumni will feel a sense of belonging and be heard.

Objectives

  1. Establish ongoing education and training focused on fostering respectful dialogue, inclusive excellence and a welcoming campus environment for all members of the F&M community.

  2. Establish expectations for and infuse equitable and inclusive  principles and practices into the recruitment, hiring, professional development,assessment, and retention of employees.

  3. Support a commitment to curricular interdisciplinarity and increased breadth in the academic experience that fosters holistic inclusive excellence.

  4. Ensure that the College’s methods of teaching and learning become progressively more inclusive of and responsive to the full diversity of students, and broaden our definition of academic success.

  5. Increase resources, spaces, and support services, and implement equitable policies and practices that welcome, affirm, celebrate, and support all members of the F&M community.

  6. Welcome and harness the talent and expertise of professional staff in fulfilling the College’s mission and goals.

  7. Advance and support institutional opportunities for empathetic discourse, civic engagement, mediation and conflict resolution.