Terms of Reference

 

The purpose of the committee is to advise the Head on:

  1. Evidence-based and peer-reviewed (if applicable) practices that can be adopted by the Dept to combat racism, discrimination, and marginalization in academia.
  2. Developing and maintaining a document of REDI resources and best practices to share across Dept faculty, staff and students. This document will amplify REDI efforts across campus with the goal of leveraging and expanding the committee’s work, and provide all Dept members with a resource to guide REDI efforts for individuals, teams, and Dept-level
  3. Resources required to implement the CPS REDI goals/mission statement, and how to use these funds to facilitate a dialogue about racism, discrimination, and marginalization within the Dept and more broadly at UBC.
  4. Biases (including racial, gender, identity, disability, and others) in current mentoring, hiring, research and teaching practices (within CPS, and UBC more broadly), and to suggest evidence-based solutions if bias is discovered.
  5. Best practices in creating a constructive environment where Dept members have the opportunity to share experiences, to report instances of discrimination, and to provide feedback on the Dept’s progress in combating systemic racism and discrimination.
  6. Strategies to ensure the workload expectations of racialized and marginalized individuals are equitable, particularly as it relates to service to the Department, Faculty, and University; and advising on ways to recognize and understand individual limitations on service based on personal factors (g. caregiving, disability).
  7. The Department’s demographics (as they relate to REDI issues) compared with the Faculty, University and Province, and best practices to address any inequalities found.
  8. Developing and implementing a Dept strategic plan on racism and discrimination in all its forms, and the frequency of self-reflection using the ISAT tool to monitor progress and areas for
  9. Dept REDI Committee See below.
  10. How to liaise and interact with other committees in CPS and more broadly at UBC (FoM, grad societies, postdoc office) to integrate REDI principles into all Dept operations.

 

Meeting Frequency and Transparency

The REDI committee will meet approximately once per month. Minutes from the meeting will be distributed to the Head and Faculty, and will be accessible to all Dept members. Committee membership should include one representative per rank for faculty (including at least one educational leadership stream and one research stream), one representative from each stage of early- career scientist (graduate student/postdoc/undergraduate), and one staff representative. The committee is formed of volunteers (self-identified from a general call), and those asked by the Head to serve. The service term is for three years for Faculty and staff, and one year for early career scientists, and can be renewed by mutual agreement with the Head.
 

Chair

There will be co-Chairs of the committee who represent diverse perspectives to ensure the work of the committee reflects the needs of underrepresented groups, while not overburdening underrepresented groups. Prior to each monthly meeting, the Chair will distribute an agenda, and send out minutes from the previous meeting. During meetings, the Chair will keep the meeting on time, on-topic, ensure respectful conduct of all committee members, encourage contributions from all committee members, and discuss action items. Between meetings, the Chair will review the meeting minutes.
 

Committee Members

Members will actively listen to each other with only one committee member speaking at a time.
 

Minutes

Minutes will be captured by a member of staff and distributed to the Chair for review prior to distribution to the committee.

 

Approved at the Faculty Meeting November 24, 2020

Terms of Reference: PDF