As a part of the University of Wyoming's strategic plan, students, staff and faculty are being asked to participate in a survey on diversity and campus climate.
The goal is to understand where UW currently stands when it comes to creating an environment that's inclusive of all students, faculty, and staff. With that information, UW will develop programs to address areas in need of improvement.
Dr. Emily Monago, the Chief Diversity Officer, has been leading the effort. She said UW must take on diversity and inclusion issues in order to attract and retain students, faculty and community partnerships.
"It helps create a competitive edge if you can have talking points about what you're doing well," said Monago, "and also, about areas where you're not doing so well, what are you doing to improve those connections or strategies to help with the campus community."
Dr. Monago said that includes looking at the inclusion of veterans and people with disabilities.
Assistant Professor Evan Johnson has been working with Dr. Monago as the chair of the Diversity Campus Climate Survey. He said it will help UW ensure that resources to improve diversity and inclusion are available.
"The purpose of this questionnaire overall is for us to be able to say this is where we are at now," said Johnso. "After we implement some of these programs in the coming years we want to go back and revisit some of these same areas and be able to say, 'look we have quantifiably improved in these areas.'"
Johnson and Chief Diversity Officer Emily Monago developed the survey with input from students, staff, and faculty.
The survey will be emailed out to the UW community on Wednesday and will be open until April 19.
