About the Office of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion
Established in Summer 2021, The Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion or Engineering DEI offers a variety of programs and services to engage and develop undergraduate and graduate students, faculty, staff, and future members of the Columbia community.
The mission of the Office is to promote a culture where members of the Columbia Engineering community feel empowered to exist as they are by cultivating an environment where all perspectives and identities are championed.
Through our involvement in both school-level and institutional-level conversations related to the work of DEI, we strive to serve as advocates for the needs of our SEAS community members across the university.
Our department is committed to fostering dialogue and collaboration on diversity, equity, and inclusion. To support these efforts, we hold DEI Office Hours on the 2nd and 4th Thursday of each month in Carleton Commons.
This is an open invitation to connect with our team, ask questions, and learn more about our ongoing initiatives. Whether you're seeking guidance, sharing ideas, or exploring ways to get involved, we encourage you to stop by and join the conversation.
Our Vision and Goals
Our vision at Columbia Engineering is to be a community welcoming to all, proactively extending access and opportunities and providing leadership that helps change the discipline far beyond campus.
We recognize that working toward this vision takes more than good intentions. That’s why we created the Commission on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion — to give focused attention to formulating and implementing specific, measurable goals to guide our process of change.
These goals focus on the strategic areas of recruiting and supporting diverse students and faculty, building a culture that embraces our vision, and instituting mechanisms to measure our results and keep us accountable.
DEI Commission Report
The commission is charged with engaging all constituents in the School of Engineering and Applied Science to identify challenges and opportunities in DEI and devise strategies and an action plan for advancing the SEAS DEI mission in research, education, and community impact.
Driven by our core mission, Engineering for Humanity, we believe that true innovation is only possible when the field of engineering draws on the talents, perspectives, creativity, and intellectual richness of a diverse community. As such, the School prioritizes creating avenues for equitable participation from all groups, especially those historically under-represented in our disciplines.
As a community, we developed critical areas for impact based on the strategic goals of recruiting and supporting diverse students and faculty, building a culture that embraces our vision, and instituting mechanisms to measure our results and keep us accountable.
Four Priority Areas
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Faculty Recruiting and Pipeline
The faculty pipeline, recruiting, and mentoring group is focused on cultivating inclusivity in three primary areas: the faculty pipeline, active search practices, and on-going support for recruitment and retention efforts. We seek to identify current resources as well as recommend new initiatives and areas for growth based on best practices at Columbia and peer institutions. Fostering a diverse and equitable faculty community is imperative to producing ground-breaking research, leading improvements in engineering and applied science teaching and learning, and modeling Columbia Engineering’s mission of Engineering for Humanity.
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Student Recruiting and Pipeline
Educating a diverse student population is critical to the mission of Columbia Engineering. To achieve academic excellence and cultivate a vibrant and welcoming environment on campus, our goal is to recruit, select, yield, and support students of underrepresented backgrounds to enable their long term success.
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Environment/Culture/Climate
Our group's mission is to identify needs and opportunities to create an inclusive environment and welcoming, supportive climate for diverse students, faculty, researchers and staff at Columbia Engineering. We believe that cultivating such a climate at Columbia Engineering, in addition to being consistent with our values, is essential for the retention and long-term success of members of the university community from underrepresented groups. We will identify resources currently available and accessible to the different constituencies, and develop recommendations for future actions based on this assessment, best practices across campus and at peer institutions, and additional feedback from cohorts.
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Integration into Education, Research, Innovation
This group aspires to intentionally introduce diversity, equity and inclusion issues into Columbia Engineering's education, research, innovation, and outreach activities. We propose to do this by:
- Creating explicit, tangible, and validated materials on training faculty, staff, and students on integration of DEI into practice.
- Conducting rigorous assessment and evaluation of diversity to demonstrate their efficacy and to promote continuous improvement.
- Creating incentive and accountability structures to promote active engagement, beyond just awareness, with DEI by students, faculty, and staff.
Engagement Beyond Engineering
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Institutional Working Groups
- Senior Diversity Officers Network
- Diversity Officers Network
- Columbia University Pathways Programs (CUPP)
- Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Council
- Columbia University Student Affairs Network
- Multicultural Affairs Resource Committees
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Ad Hoc Working Groups and Committees
- Anti-Bullying Taskforce
- University Committee to Address Bias
- Taskforce on Improving Alumni Relations
Meet the Team
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Danushi S. Fernando |
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Tiffany Moore |
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Helen H. Lu |
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Christine Hendon |