LibGuides: We Need To Talk : The Fight for DEI

What exactly is DEI anyway?

DEI Stands for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.

Diversity is ensuring all identifiers across races, gender identities, sexual orientations, religions, political beliefs, socioeconomic statuses, levels of ability and many more characteristics.

Equity is the fair treatment of all previously stated identifiers, making sure every person in a shared environment has the same opportunities, resources, and support.

Inclusion is making sure a space is comfortable for every type of person present.

Everybody should feel included respected and valued. #Periodt

Integration of these concepts into educational environments SHOULD be the standard, however, there are many challengers that don't believe this should be an intentional area of focus.

They has complained that DEI divides people and categorizes them, even decrying reverse racism and/or indoctrination by the "Woke" agenda.

DEI should be seen as essential at higher education institutions.

A diverse faculty and student body, along with an environment that promotes equity and inclusion of all voices, is the heart of education. Enhancing DEI can help get us closer to education’s overarching goal: improving student learning and outcomes.

Despite political challenges to DEI initiatives in many states across the U.S., college students maintain their support for campus DEI efforts, particularly in relation to fostering student belonging. Students continue to expect institutions to support students from diverse backgrounds and safeguard all students’ academic and personal success.

Sources: The Root/People Admin

DEI Community Champions

ACLU of Nevada
We work to defend and advance the civil liberties and civil rights of all Nevadans via an integrated advocacy model that uses public engagement, public policy, and strategic litigation for the betterment of our community.
NAACP Las Vegas Branch
The NAACP Las Vegas Branch is a non-profit organization dedicated to combating racial discrimination and promoting equality. We believe in justice and equal rights for all citizens. Our branch is committed to empowering communities through advocacy, community engagement, and legal action.
United Way of Southern Nevada
United Way of Southern Nevada lifts our community by engaging with all residents and community leaders, and we seek to include the voices of people who are traditionally and systemically marginalized. Together, we share the leadership role to ensure our community vigorously fortifies racial/ethnic equity, economic justice, and individual empowerment.

News You Can Use

These States’ Anti-DEI Legislation Are Impacting Higher Education
There are currently more than 30 bills across the country targeting DEI funding, practices, and promotion at schools. As of May 2024, 10 bills have been signed into law by a governor: two in Florida, one in each of the Dakotas, one in Tennessee, one in Texas, one in Utah, one in Alabama, one in Idaho, and one in Iowa, which experts say is now the most extreme law in the country restricting DEI on college campuses. Only a few other bills have reached the final stages of approval, including one in Kansas that was allowed to become law without the governor’s signature. The majority of bills are still moving through their state legislatures.
The Supreme Court's Affirmative Action Ruling
In June 2023, The Supreme Court held that race-conscious admissions programs at Harvard and the University of North Carolina violate the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection, a historic ruling that rolls back decades of precedent and has forced a dramatic change in how the nation’s private and public universities select their students. Has this ruling changed DEI, for everyone?
What’s the difference between affirmative action, DEI – diversity, equity, & inclusion, and EEO– equal employment opportunity? Aren’t they all the same?
As organizations focus on the implementation of diversity, equity & inclusion (DEI) programs they sometimes, mistakenly, assume that there is no longer a need for EEO or affirmative action/affirmative employment efforts. This can be a serious error as each program contributes to the organization’s success in different ways. They are interrelated and interactive but they are not interchangeable. Read this artice to understand the differences.
North Carolina, Utah Systems Implement Significant DEI Reductions
“There are many misconceptions about diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts, including that it is only about race,” added YW Boston’s Interim President and CEO, Kathryn Henderson. “These misconceptions make it all the easier for people acting in bad faith to co-opt DEI as a slur to describe someone, typically a Black leader, as unqualified and undeserving of their role. It is a cruel shorthand that harms the individual who has earned their role.”

Student Views on Anti-DEI legislation in a state where it is no more.

Research about DEI & its Challenging Mission

Preventing the Demise of DEI
as the increased presence of leaders in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) since the murder of George Floyd led to a demonstrable change in academic medical institutions? Elsewhere in JAMA Network Open, Esparza and colleagues1 surveyed 32 DEI leaders across the United States to learn more about their experiences. Their findings confirm what many people who work in this area also know: their work, while challenging and gratifying, comes with challenges their counterparts in other leadership roles do not encounter.

Centering Students to Achieve Textured, Equity-Focused Teaching
Teaching for
social justice is more than an afterthought, a supplement, or an
isolated experience. To address
nebulous conceptions of what it
means to teach for social justice,
Lorena Escoto Germán, in Textured Teaching: A Framework for
Culturally Sustaining Practices, offers salient illustrations of teaching
rooted in social justice that serve
as paradigms for others to follow.
Did the U.S. Supreme Court Put All DEI Programs at Risk?
In this article, the author examines the implications for employers
of the decision by the U.S. Supreme Court striking down affirmative
action programs at Harvard and the University of North Carolina.

Understanding Equity

Selections from the Stacks

Student retention and success in higher education : institutional change for the 21st century
ISBN: 3030800458
This book draws together international research to assess the quality of successful efforts to retain students. The editors and contributors unite diverse global research from countries who have led student retention and success projects at national, institutional, faculty or program level with positive outcomes. The book is underpinned by the philosophy that a more diverse student population requires higher education institutions to fundamentally change, in order to facilitate the success of all students.
Belonging, Gender and Identity in the Doctoral Years by Rachel Handforth
ISBN: 9783031119491
Publication Date: 2022-12-02
This book uses belonging as a lens through which to understand women students' experiences of studying for a doctorate, exploring the impact of academic cultures on career aspirations. Drawing on discourses of neoliberalism and academic identities, it makes a valuable contribution to ongoing discussions of gender inequality in the academy.this book offers a contemporary, research-informed understanding of the doctorate as an inherently gendered experience, which has implications for individuals, academic institutions, and for the future of the academic sector.
Handbook of College Reading and Study Strategy Research by Rona F. Flippo (Editor); Thomas W. Bean (Editor)
ISBN: 9781138642683
Publication Date: 2018-05-31
One of the most promising approaches to literacy education and diversity classrooms is the framework Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy (CSP). This chapter provides an overview of information pertinent to understanding diversity issues related to age, disability, first-time and first-generation students, gender, language, race, sexual orientation, and spirituality. Because age and part-time status typically go together, older college students are often categorized as "nontraditional." Future research and practices that would best support diverse students in higher education include facilitating cognitive justice, understanding diglossia, that is, the function of colonialization in language education, and helping to support underserved students through empowering information including financial literacy classes.

We Need To Talk : The Fight for DEI

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