Equity, Diversity & Inclusion - Utah System of Higher Education

Equity, Diversity, & Inclusion

The Utah Board of Higher Education is committed to working alongside all 16 public colleges and universities to intervene in widening opportunity gaps for underserved and underrepresented students. As we move forward in this important work, we will continue reviewing and revising all institutional policies and procedures that create structural barriers to student, faculty, and staff success.

The Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Workgroup is a standing workgroup to the Board of Higher Education. Its purpose is to foster collaboration and coordination among Board and System leadership and to cultivate and integrate equity, diversity, and inclusion awareness, transparency, and progress throughout the Utah System of Higher Education.

Utah Board of Higher Education LGBTQ+ Resolution

Resolution to Affirm and Support USHE’s LGBTQ+ Community

Whereas, the Utah Board of Higher Education and all 16 Utah System of Higher Education (USHE) institutions welcome, affirm, and actively seek to support current and prospective students, faculty, and staff of all gender identities, sexual orientations, and expressions of identity and/or orientation; and

Whereas, the Board celebrates all efforts, past and present, undertaken by each of the individual 16 USHE institutions to support LGBTQ+ students, including creating resource centers, collaborating with community groups, providing mental health support, supporting student-run LGBTQ+ clubs and organizations, creating inclusive restrooms, improving correct/preferred/chosen name and pronoun processes, collecting data,
organizing a USHE LGBTQ+ Program Coordinator Coalition, and more; and

Utah Board of Higher Education Juneteenth Resolution

Resolution to support and celebrate Juneteenth within the Utah System of Higher Education

WHEREAS, Juneteenth, also known as Freedom Day, Jubilee Day, Liberation Day, and Emancipation Day, celebrates the emancipation of those who had been enslaved in the United States; and

WHEREAS, the nineteenth day of June is officially recognized as the day when enslaved peoples in Texas learned of the 1863 Emancipation Proclamation that had been issued by President Lincoln more than two years earlier; and

WHEREAS, during this time, the nation celebrates the accomplishments, inventions, triumphs, and resiliency of African American, African, and Black peoples in this country; and

Utah Board of Higher Education Equity Resolution

Resolution to advance equitable systemic change within the Utah System of Higher Education.

WHEREAS, Utah continues to see significant gaps in postsecondary enrollment and completion by race, ethnicity, gender, and socioeconomic status; and

WHEREAS, the Utah Board of Higher Education is committed to joining with all 16 public higher education institutions across the state to intervene in widening higher education enrollment and completion disparities for underrepresented students; and

Utah Board of Higher Education Positive Impact of Dreamers Resolution

Resolution to Recognize the Positive Impact of Dreamers in the Utah System of Higher Education

WHEREAS, the Utah Board of Higher Education recognizes that underrepresented students face intractable structural barriers as they work to access, persist, and complete higher education and that the Board must take bolder steps to serve underrepresented students in higher education; and

USHE Statement on Racial and Social Injustice

“As the Utah System of Higher Education, we stand behind education as the greatest tool for dismantling the racism, oppression, and marginalization that plagues our country today. While we acknowledge the power of education to transform lives and communities, in Utah and abroad, we recognize, as W. Edwards Deming so eloquently stated, that “every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets.”

Statement from the Utah System of Higher Education on Racial & Social Injustice (June 11, 2020)

Utah Board of Higher Education Opportunity Gap Issue Brief

Opportunity Gap Issue Brief

USHE Equity Lens Framework

Simplified USHE Equity Lens Handout