Georgia Institute of Technology is now an institutional partner in the Equity in Graduate Education Consortium. Partners of this Consortium work with other academic leaders and graduate programs to build a more equitable and inclusive graduate experience for students from marginalized backgrounds.   Led by faculty directors at the University of Southern California and Rochester Institute of Technology, the Consortium consists of a network of faculty and administrators from more than 60 institutions across the U.S.   “We are happy to partner with many of our peer institutions by helping our faculty and staff to learn strategies for improving the climate in research groups with the goal of being more inclusive and equitable," said Bonnie Ferri, the vice provost for Graduate and Postdoctoral Education at Tech, “This is an important step in our work toward our strategic plan.”   The Consortium offers training opportunities geared towards equity-minded admissions, recruitment, and mentoring practices; coaching and learning opportunities for graduate programs to bring about institutional change; infrastructure for faculty development in graduate schools and other organizations.   An external evaluation found that after participating in Consortium workshops, graduate programs: 

• Experienced an increase in the number and fraction of racially minoritized applicants, admittees, and enrolled students 
• Experienced an increase in the number and fraction of women admitted and enrolled 
• Increased use of inclusive recruitment and holistic admission practices 

• Changes have been sustained for over three years 

As a partner of the Consortium, six of Georgia Tech’s graduate programs will be participating in activities related to graduate student mentoring & well-being over the next two years. Those programs are chemistry, chemical and biomolecular engineering, economics, interactive computing, material science engineering, and physics.    Activities sponsored by the Equity in Graduate Education Consortium include a three-part workshop series that begins this fall. The first workshop, Introduction to Equity-Minded Mentoring, takes place on Oct. 25, 2022, from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. and will be facilitated by Annie Woffard, assistant professor of higher education in the Department of Educational Leadership & Policy Studies at Florida State University, and Steve Desir, a doctoral student in the educational leadership program at the University of Southern California Rossier School of Education.    In this workshop, faculty will reflect on their current advising and mentoring practices and learn how to develop equity-minded mentoring relationships. Activities in this workshop will develop competencies in these areas and will help faculty develop equity-minded mentoring agreements as a tool that establishes shared expectations between mentors and mentees.   You may register for the Introduction to Equity-Minded Mentoring Workshop here: https://usc.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJAkf-qopjMiHNUbDEpYEHPrMK63kwZvOeY3    The first workshop is open to all faculty who are interested in attending. However, the following workshops are reserved for participants of the graduate programs included in the consortium.   The second series workshop, “Fostering Wellbeing in Racialized Mentoring Environments,” is on December 1 from 1-3 p.m.    For more information, please contact EGE liaisons, Bonnie Ferri at bonnie.ferri@gatech.edu, or Steve Ruffin at stephen.ruffin@pe.gatech.edu.