Diversity is a fact at UBC. By embracing it, we help build inclusive and welcoming communities.
You can be a part of creating a campus where everyone feels like they belong.
The Equity Enhancement Fund (EEF) supports community-based initiatives that enhance equity, diversity, and inclusion at UBC. Applications for this year’s fund are being accepted until February 28. Preference will be given to initiatives which:
- Build student, faculty, and staff competencies and understanding related to issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion through community-engaged activities.
- Promote a respectful environment at UBC through education, dialogue, and community engagement.
- Have observable and/or measureable benefits to the representation or experiences of historically disadvantaged groups within the UBC community.
- Support UBC’s equity and inclusion efforts, UBC’s strategic plan priorities, and Faculty or Unit equity and inclusion goals and decision-making.
The Faculty of Forestry’s Diversity Crew was a beneficiary of last year’s fund. They utilized the monies to support community engagement within their faculty around diversity, inclusion, and equity. We asked them about their experience and what advice they might have for those interested in applying for funding.
Can you tell us about your group?
Our vision is to help create a thriving, diverse community in both the Faculty of Forestry and UBC. We believe everyone benefits from a more cohesive, diversity-literate, and aware community—one in which diversity challenges are seen as opportunities to learn and connect, rather than sources of division and judgement.
How has the Equity Enhancement Fund helped the Forestry Diversity Crew achieve your goals?
Our faculty is comprised of diverse individuals from all parts of the world and all walks of life, so we wanted to celebrate that diversity and ensure everyone feels welcome. We found out about the Equity Enhancement Fund and thought it was a very timely resource that could help us realize many of our ideas to engage students, staff, and faculty in celebration and recognition of diversity—and bring some of our ideas about creating cultural and systemic changes overall to life.
Thanks in part to the funding we received, we’ve been able to host events diverse in both content and intent. In collaboration with campus partners, we hosted workshops that helped facilitate diversity, inclusion, and intercultural education. These included addressing unconscious biases, improving intercultural competencies, creating positive spaces for the LGBT2SQIA+ community, responding to hate speech, and speaking up in the face of injustice.
What tips would you pass on to others interested in applying to the Equity Enhancement Fund?
- Collaborate! Identify and reach out to potential partners. We were lucky to be able to work with Dr. Sarah Gergel, Associate Dean, Diversity & Inclusion, who provided mentorship and championed our work at the faculty level.
- Co-create! Bring together your friends, mentors, or colleagues in the brainstorming phase, and the application development and writing process.
- Just apply! The deadline is February 28 so get started. It’s a great resource that helps bring your ideas to life.
