InclusiveVT Week celebrates 'Where Everyone Belongs' theme

The Office for Inclusion and Diversity hosted InclusiveVT Week from Sept. 7-10. The theme for this year was “Where Everyone Belongs.”

“InclusiveVT is our institutional and individual commitment to Ut Prosim (That I May Serve) in the spirit of community, diversity, and excellence,” said Menah Pratt-Clarke, vice president for diversity, inclusion, and strategic affairs. “Ut Prosim is such a powerful guide for our shared responsibility to make the InclusiveVT difference and create a more just and inclusive world, starting at Virginia Tech."

InclusiveVT Week’s main events featured three distinguished speakers from across multiple disciplines: Lisa Nunn, Fred Bonner II, and Margaret Price.

According to Michelle Carter, director of diversity engagement at Virginia Tech, the presentations gave “faculty and staff effective strategies to increase student belonging. The result of intentional actions to increase belonging is a more inclusive environment and increased student success.”

Nunn presented on “Fostering College Belonging: Practical strategies for fostering student success by strengthening students’ sense of belonging, with a focus on first-generation college students.” Nunn currently serves as a professor in sociology and as director of the Center for Educational Excellence at University of California, San Diego. Watch Nunn’s full presentation.

Bonner, author of “Square Pegs and Round Holes: Alternative Approaches to Diverse College Student Development Theory,” presented on Sept. 9. Bonner is a professor and endowed chair in educational leadership and counseling and founding executive director of the Minority Achievement, Creativity and High-Ability (MACH-III) Center at Prairie View A&M University. Watch his full presentation.

Margaret Price, author of “Mad at School: Rhetorics of Mental Disability and Academic Life,” concluded the speaker series. Price is an associate professor of English at The Ohio State University, specializing in disability studies and rhetoric, composition, and literacy. Price’s presentation was titled “Creating an Inclusive and Accessible Campus.”

In addition to the speaker series, other campus-wide events included Trap Yoga, the Growth Mindset Initiative, Courageous Conversations, Pain Relocation, Welcome Roanoke, and Conversations on Inclusion and Diversity: The importance of language in the LGBTQ+ Community.

For more information on programs and events offered and/or supported by the Office for Inclusion & Diversity, please visit www.inclusive.vt.edu.