The ADA Coordinator is seeking passionate undergrduate and graduate students dedicated to advancing the university’s 75-year legacy of accessibility. Use your voice to support change!
The Student Advisory Committee
Helps identify the needs of students with disabilitise
Provides feedback about university policies, procedures, and resources
Shares news and resources with the campus community
Members serve on the committee for one academic year and meet for one hour, at least three times a semester.
If you are interested in joining the ADA Coordinator’s Student Advisory Committee for the 2026-2027 academic year, please submit a membership request by May 6, 2026.
Please email the ADA Coordinator at adacoordinator@illinois.edu if you have any questions about the Student Advisory Committee or need a reasonable accommodation to submit your membership request.
Students walk on the Main Quad at the University of Illinois.
Join us on Saturday, March 28, 2026 for Illinois Bound Admitted Students Day, a campus-wide event designed to help you explore Illinois to the fullest and see yourself as part of it!
While you’re on campus, explore historical and cultural sites around campus during the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Access, Civil Rights & Community scavenger hunt. Participate by visiting and taking pictures at places that represent and celebrate the diversity of Illinois. When completed, visit our office for a University of Illinois souvenir at 614 E. Daniel St. from 12:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. We are located directly west of the Illini Union Bookstore toward 6th Street.
The Heart of a Stranger: An Unlikely Story of Faith, Identity, and Belonging
Rabbi Angela Buchdahl Central Synagogue, New York City
Thursday, November 13, 2025 7:30 p.m. Foellinger Great Hall Krannert Center for the Performing Arts 500 S. Goodwin Ave, Urbana, IL
Free and Open to All. Registration Required.
Pre-registration is now closed; guests are welcome to register on-site at the event. If you have any questions, please email specialevents@illinois.edu.
Rabbi Angela Buchdahl is the first Asian American to be ordained as a rabbi and is now senior rabbi of Central Synagogue in New York, one of the largest synagogues in the world. The daughter of a Korean Buddhist mother and Jewish American father, Rabbi Buchdahl is a prominent voice in national conversations about antisemitism, interfaith dialogue, and the evolving role of faith communities in public life.
Conversation hosted by: The Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion
Thank you to our community partners: The Chabad Jewish Center; Champaign-Urbana Jewish Federation; Illini Hillel; Sinai Temple of Champaign-Urbana
If you will need disability-related accommodations in order to participate, please email access@illinois.edu. Early requests are strongly encouraged to allow sufficient time to meet your access needs.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, the Chancellor, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, or The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois.
January 2024 – The Illinois DEI Campus Climate Survey is now closed. Thank you to our campus community for participating. Results of the survey and assessment will be shared in Fall 2024.
****
November 7, 2023
Students, faculty and staff can now take the Illinois DEI Campus Climate Survey. All campus members are encouraged to take the survey to examine whether the university’s values of diversity, equity and inclusion are reflected in the daily experiences of students, faculty and staff. Every response can improve the experience at Illinois for themselves and friends, students and colleagues.
The survey is the first step of a longer assessment. The responses to the diversity, equity and inclusion climate survey will allow the university to better understand what is going well and the current challenges to creating a campus climate that is respectful and inclusive for all.
Email invitations were sent from Joshua Patterson at surveys@srsrv.com. Joshua Patterson is the Research Director, Higher Education Studies at SoundRocket. SoundRocket is the approved third party survey administrator for the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
“The purpose of this survey is to take the temperature of our campus climate at this moment in time, so we can better understand the perspectives, attitudes and individual experiences that affect a sense of belonging and inclusion at Illinois,” Chancellor Jones said in his November 1 Massmail.
The survey responses are confidential. Names and email addresses are not attached to survey responses and no one in the respondents’ college, department or unit will have access to individual data.
“Confidentiality was a key priority when developing this initiative,” said Gioconda Guerra Pérez, Executive Associate Vice Chancellor for Diversity, “to build trust across the campus after many years of not engaging the campus on a DEI campus climate survey.”
Employees who do not have access to a computer during the work day can take a paper survey starting in late November. The survey can be completed during work hours, and more information will be provided by staff in your unit.
“As we begin to implement our new strategic planning framework, understanding your experience at Illinois is critical,” Jones said. “Your experiences matter.”
The survey is part of a multi-university initiative with the University of Minnesota and Rutgers University. The project brings together expertise from ten campuses and is organized by members of the Chief Diversity Officers group of the Big Ten Academic Alliance. This collaboration will allow the three universities to share thematic concerns as well as identify data-informed approaches to build a more inclusive, dynamic, and welcoming environment for all, Jones said.
Results of the survey and assessment will be shared in Fall 2024.
Four University of Illinois faculty and staff members and the Department of Education, Policy, Organization & Inclusion will be recognized for their exceptional dedication to diversity, equity, and inclusion as the 2023 recipients of the Larine Y. Cowan Make a Difference Awards.
The Larine Y. Cowan Awards are presented annually to University of Illinois faculty and staff by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion in four categories: Advocacy for LGBTQ Affairs, Excellence in Access & Accommodations, Leadership in Diversity, and Teaching and Mentoring in Diversity.
Named in honor of the past Assistant Chancellor and Director of what is now the Office for Access & Equity, these annual awards reflect the commitment to human rights advocacy and diversity that defined the leadership of Larine Y. Cowan for nearly 20 years at Illinois.
This year’s award recipients will be honored at the 38th Annual Celebration of Diversity on Friday, November 10, 2023, at the I Hotel and Conference Center.
A special thank you to the 2023 Make a Difference Award Review Committee Members, which include previous Cowan Award Winners Anne Fredricksen (20), Alejandro Gomez Jr.(14), Avital Livny (21), Sharde Smith (21), Monika Stodolska (19).
Teaching and Mentoring in Diversity: Trina J. Wright-Dixon, Ph.D.
Trina J. Wright-Dixon is the Interim Assistant Dean of Inclusive Excellence in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences in the Office of the Dean. In addition, she is a Teaching Assistant Professor of Communication at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Professor Wright-Dixon is a diversity consultant on workforce diversity, best practices, programs, and policies. Wright-Dixon is an organizational communication scholar and consultant dedicated to the study of organizational socialization and intersectional differences within the workplace. She specializes in studying the unique workplace experiences of Black women, race and identity, diversity and racial social justice, mentoring, and racial reconciliation. In addition to the University of Illinois, Wright-Dixon has held faculty positions at The Pennsylvania State University and the University of California, Los Angeles. Over the past two decades, Professor Wright-Dixon has created diversity curriculum and workshops to increase excellence in the academe and organizations.
Excellence in Access and Accommodations: Liam Moran
Liam Moran has supported the University of Illinois’ teaching, learning, research, and public service missions since arriving on campus in 2000, primarily through efforts in video production, video infrastructure, and software development. He began his partnership with DRES in 2005 when the first accommodation request was made by a student for streaming media hosted on campus servers. Since then, he’s made it a mission to ensure that video captioning was available on educational and promotional videos at Illinois. He’s also developed novel techniques to audio describe videos produced on campus and built accessible user interfaces for student-facing software platforms used in courses.
Advocacy for LGBTQ Affairs: Toby Beauchamp and Mimi Thi Nguyen
Toby Beauchamp is an Associate Professor and Associate Chair of Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He is the author of the book Going Stealth: Transgender Politics and U.S. Surveillance Practices (Duke University Press, 2019), and his research on trans studies, surveillance, and policing has appeared in journals including GLQ, Feminist Formations, Radical History Review, and Surveillance & Society, among others. He co-directed the Center for Advanced Studies initiative on Abolition during 2019-2021.
Mimi Thi Nguyen is an Associate Professor and Chair of Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Her first book is The Gift of Freedom: War, Debt, and Other Refugee Passages, and her second is The Promise of Beauty. She is part of an editorial collective for Bangtan Remixed, a critical reader on Korean pop band BTS, and she has also published in Signs, Camera Obscura, Women & Performance, positions: asia critique, Radical History Review, and ArtForum, among others. Nguyen has made zines since 1991, including Slander and the compilation zine Race Riot. She is a former Punk Planet columnist and Maximum rocknroll volunteer.
Leadership in Diversity: The Department of Education Policy, Organization & Leadership, College of Education
The Education Policy, Organization & Leadership department is training a new generation of researchers to better address issues in educational policy and practice.
Drawing upon traditional strengths in social foundations, education leadership, higher education and human resource development, the department enables graduate students and faculty to support and collaborate with each other in coordinated new synergies to address the most critical issues in education.
The department fosters an interdisciplinary understanding of education policy and practice across traditional divides among philosophers, historians, social scientists, organizational theorists, policy analysts & education administrators.
The Larine Y. Cowan Make a Difference Award is open for nominations until May 23. The awards celebrate the achievements of faculty, academic professionals, and civic service employees who made significant contributions in creating and sustaining an inclusive living, learning, and working community at Illinois.
There are four categories open for nominations.
Advocacy for LGBTQ Affairs, honoring students, staff, or faculty who have demonstrated their commitment to supporting and promoting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and Queer (LGBTQ) affairs at Illinois. LGBTQ Affairs Nomination Form.
Excellence in Access and Accommodations, honoring individuals or campus units for their efforts to expand and improve the utilization of programs and structures by persons with disabilities. Access and Accommodations Nomination Form.
Leadership in Diversity, honoring nominees who demonstrate exceptional dedication to and success in promoting diversity and inclusion via research, hiring practices, courses, programs, and events. Leadership in Diversity Nomination Form.
Teaching and Mentoring in Diversity, honoring faculty, instructors, or lecturers who have consistently contributed to the promotion of understanding critical issues related to diversity and equity in teaching and/or the mentoring of diverse students. Teaching and Mentoring in Diversity Nomination Form.
The Larine Y. Cowan Awards are presented annually to University of Illinois faculty and staff by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion in four categories: Advocacy for LGBTQ Affairs, Excellence in Access & Accommodations, Leadership in Diversity, and Teaching and Mentoring in Diversity. The 2022 recipients were honored at the 37th Annual Celebration of Diversity in November 2022.
Named in honor of the past Assistant Chancellor and Director of what is now the Office for Access & Equity, the Larine Y. Cowan Awards were created to reflect the commitment to human rights advocacy, social justice, and diversity that defined her leadership for nearly 20 years at Illinois.
The Cowan Awards are presented each year during the annual Celebration of Diversity hosted by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion.
CHAMPAIGN, ILL — Experts from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the national organization Braver Angels will make up a panel at an upcoming event as part of efforts to address the political polarization of recent years.
The event, “Building a House United: A Local Conversation in the Land of Lincoln,” will reflect on how the country got to this point of divisiveness and what steps are available to move forward.
It is free and open to the public and is scheduled for February 15 from 7:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at the I Hotel and Conference Center in the Heritage Hall. Doors open and refreshments begin at 6:30 p.m.
Registration is requested by February 8, at go.illinois.edu/BraverAngels, and attendees will have the opportunity to submit questions upon registration and the night of the event. Late registration is possible as space permits.
Panelists will include Bill Doherty, Co-founder of Braver Angels and Professor in the Department of Family Social Science at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, and university faculty Scott Althaus, director of the Cline Center for Advanced Social Research and Merriam Professor in the Department of Political Science, Avital Livny, assistant professor in the department of political science, and Colleen Murphy director of the Women and Gender in Global Perspectives Program and the Roger and Stephany Joslin Professor of Law.
Members from the local chapter of Braver angels will be involved as well. Braver Angels of East Central Illinois is an alliance of conservatives and liberals based in Champaign County that meets for monthly discussions and to further their mission of depolarization. Braver Angels State Co-Coordinators Matt Hausman and Chuck Stone will moderate the event.
“Conversations like these are critical to a healthy democracy. Braver Angels is doing the work necessary such that we can reap the rewards of a diverse society,” said Vice Chancellor Garrick.
Co-Coordinator Hausman said there should be something at the event for everyone.
“Everyone realizes that our politics has become extremely toxic and divisive in recent years, but very few people have any idea what to do about it,” he said. “Braver Angels has been working on exactly that for the past six years.”
Part of the event will be sharing activities and efforts in the community that the local chapter of Braver Angels hosts throughout the year.
“We want every attendee to leave with some actionable solutions to this issue of polarization,” Hausman said. “It could be simply having a broader perspective of different viewpoints or strategies about how to better communicate with friends and family,” Hausman said.
The event is sponsored by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, the Humanities Research Institute, the Women & Gender in Global Perspectives Program, The News-Gazette, Braver Angels, and the Champaign County League of Women Voters.
For more information, please visit go.illinois.edu/BraverAngels.
About Braver Angels
At Braver Angels, our work is about building a house united. Our mission is to bring Americans together to bridge the partisan divide and strengthen our democratic republic. We’re guided by the Braver Angels Rule: At every level of organizational guidance, red and blue leaders are equally represented. Regarding race, ethnicity, and social and economic class, our constant striving is to be an organization that reflects the country we seek to serve.
About the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion
The mission of the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (OVCDEI) is to use the transformational power of our university to lead our campus toward an increasingly diverse and inclusive community that is open, just, and welcoming for all.
The units of OVCDEI include the Office for Access & Equity, the Title IX Office, Office of Academic Inclusive Excellence, and the Office for Business, Community & Economic Development.
The 2022 Larine Y. Cowan Award winners from left to right: Ky Merkley, Nick Hoyt, Kevin Jackson, and Deanna Hence.
Four University of Illinois faculty and staff members will be recognized for their exceptional dedication to diversity, equity, and inclusion as the 2022 recipients of the Larine Y. Cowan Make a Difference Awards.
The Larine Y. Cowan Awards are presented annually to University of Illinois faculty and staff by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion in four categories: Advocacy for LGBTQ Affairs, Excellence in Access & Accommodations, Leadership in Diversity, and Teaching and Mentoring in Diversity.
Named in honor of the past Assistant Chancellor and Director of what is now the Office for Access & Equity, these annual awards reflect the commitment to human rights advocacy and diversity that defined the leadership of Larine Y. Cowan for nearly 20 years at Illinois.
This year’s award recipients will be honored at the 37th Annual Celebration of Diversity on Friday, November 11, 2022, at the I Hotel and Conference Center.
The 2022 recipients, as described by their nominators.
Advocacy for LGBTQ Affairs: Ky Merkley, Ph.D. Candidate in Classical Philology
Ky Merkley is recognized for their remarkable talents as a teacher who both respects and engages with diversity and helps create community in ways that go far beyond the classroom. This award honors students, staff, or faculty who have demonstrated their commitment to supporting and promoting Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer affairs at Illinois.
Merkley’s dissertation sits at the intersection of transgender studies and classics and analyzes the ways in which modern conceptions of gender have erased the genderfluid and diverse gendered identities that existed in the Roman Empire and strives to uncover how gender is defined and functions within Roman society. Ky founded Trans in Classics in 2020, a working group and community for trans, nonbinary, and gender nonconforming classicists, that strives to create a community for trans classicists, develop resources and materials for the trans community and promote transgender readings and transgender histories of the ancient Mediterranean. In the past year, Ky has delivered invited talks, workshops, and roundtables on the importance of transgender history, the need for trans-inclusive feminism, and the importance of having a transgender caucus for classicists in such diverse places as King’s College, the University of Ghent, the University of Sheffield, Penn State University, and Wake Forest University.
What students single out in Ky’s classes is the warm sense of community they experience. Ky believes deeply in the creation of a class as “a family, a community, a team.” They strive for a pedagogy that engages students where they are and shows them how investing in course skills and content will serve them for the rest of their lives. Students express gratitude for a class atmosphere that places the process of learning over simply getting the answer right, and where everyone is willing to make the mistakes necessary to learn.
Leadership in Diversity: Kevin Jackson, Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education and Professor of Accountancy and PwC faculty fellow
Dr. Jackson is recognized for showing a real passion for students and being driven to provide them a meaningful, personal experience at the University of Illinois and for bringing that passion for student well-being to everything he does. This award honors nominees who demonstrate exceptional dedication to and success in promoting diversity and inclusion via research, hiring practices, courses, programs, and events.
Jackson holds a Ph.D. in accounting from the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to being named Vice Provost, Jackson served as Associate Dean of Undergraduate Affairs in the Gies College of Business. As Associate Dean, he created the Access and Multicultural Engagement unit that has led the college in programming designed to foster multicultural community. In addition, Dr. Jackson introduced a course designed to equip students to engage in civil discourse around controversial topics. He has received numerous awards and honors including the PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP Faculty Fellowship, the Lester H. McKeever Jr. Outstanding Leader in Advancing Diversity Award from the Illinois CPA Society, and in 2021 was named among the Top 50 Undergraduate Business Professors in the nation by Poets&Quants.
Jackson has shown a real passion for our students and felt driven to provide them a meaningful, personal experience at the University of Illinois. He brings that passion for student well-being to everything he does. Jackson’s commitment to diversity and inclusion extends to his research. One of his papers, “Deploying ‘connectors’: A control to manage employee turnover intentions?”, examines how to tap into outgoing positive people in the workplace (connectors) to make others feel less isolated because of gender, race, ethnicity, or other distinguishing characteristics.
Teaching and Mentoring in Diversity: Deanna Hence, Assistant Professor of Atmospheric Sciences
Dr. Hence is recognized for her efforts in tackling outstanding issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion on several levels: from undergraduate to graduate students to faculty, from experiences in the classroom to experiences in the field. This award honors faculty, instructors, or lecturers who have consistently contributed to the promotion of understanding critical issues related to diversity and equity in teaching and/or the mentoring of diverse students.
Hence received her M.S. and Ph.D. in Atmospheric Science from the University of Washington, and her B.S. in Atmospheric, Oceanic and Space Sciences from the University of Michigan. She was a NASA Postdoctoral Fellow at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center prior to joining the U of I in 2014. She is currently a AY2022-2024 Lincoln Excellence for Assistant Professors Scholar. Her research program uses observations from field experiments combined with high-resolution numerical modeling to study the interactions of high-impact convective storm systems with their environments, and how the evolution of these storms influences their impacts on human systems. Alongside these efforts, she has worked to develop intensive holistic mentorship models into year-round research experiences for underrepresented and transfer undergraduate students in Atmospheric Sciences. In her teaching, she brings perspectives around the variations in how weather and climate hazards differentially impact communities and stakeholders into all of her teaching, alongside the importance of multi-directional science communication and engagement.
The risk communication course that Hence spearheaded is an example of her unique commitment to promoting topics of diversity and equity within the atmospheric science community. Each lesson was developed to focus on the impact of weather events on underrepresented communities, such as increased flooding impacts for lower income communities and the elderly. We utilized social science concepts and theories to identify barriers to communication that may have hindered individuals to take action. For example, a lack of internet accessibility in rural communities. Furthermore, we discussed the importance of overcoming communication barriers to provide equal access to weather risk information.
Excellence in Access & Accommodations: M. Nicholas Hoyt, Software Development and Interaction Design Specialist, Disability Resources and Educational Services (DRES)
M. Nicholas Hoyt is recognized for his dedicated professional activity to the development of tools that assist in the creation of accessible electronic information. This award honors individuals or campus units for their efforts to expand and improve the utilization of programs and structures by persons with disabilities
Hoyt has served in his current capacity for the past 17 years. He led the software development, user interface design and interaction design of the Functional Accessibility Evaluator (FAE) 1.0 and 1.1 and AInspector for Firefox 1.0. In addition to these projects, Nicholas was the lead designer and developer of the Accessibility Bookmarklets, the A11yFirst Plugins for CKEditor 4, the SkipTo Landmarks & Headings browser extension for Firefox and Chrome and the Page Structure extension for Firefox. Nicholas received his B.A. with Distinction in Computer Science from the University of Massachusetts Boston in 1991, after beginning his studies in computer science at Harvard Extension School in Cambridge, MA. He also studied music performance, arranging and composition at Berklee College of Music in Boston, and has had a lifelong interest in psychology and philosophy. Hoyt has developed several useful accessibility tools since the time that I’ve known him. Over the past few years, Hoyt was instrumental in the development of the AInspector WCAG for FireFox plugin, a valuable tool that aids in the creation of accessible websites that conform to current digital accessibility standards and guides developers to learn more about web accessibility in the process. The AInspector tool is utilized by many web developers across the Illinois system, and as a publicly downloadable add-on for the FireFox web browser, it’s reach extends far beyond the university. On the Illinois Campus, AInspector has become one of the primary tools of web accessibility for evaluators and developers.
Dr. Ibram X Kendi will serve as the first keynote speaker for the Chancellor’s Call to Action to Address Racism & Social Injustice. Photo by Stephen Voss.
As part of a university-wide efforts on systemic racial inequities and injustices, research groups will present their findings from the first year of funding from the Chancellor’s Call to Action to Address Racism and Social Injustice.
Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, director of the Boston University Center for Antiracist Research and author of five #1 New York Times bestsellers, including How to be an Anti-Racist, will participate in the keynote conversation by answering questions submitted by the public. Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion Sean C. Garrick will moderate the event, which will be held at the Spurlock Museum of World Cultures. Registration has reached capacity and is now closed.
Dr. Kendi is the Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Boston University, and the founding director of the BU Center for Antiracist Research. He is a contributing writer at The Atlantic and a CBS News racial justice contributor.
Dr. Kendi is the author of many highly acclaimed books including Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America, which won the National Book Award for Nonfiction, making him the youngest ever winner of that award. He had also produced five straight #1 New York Times bestsellers, including How to Be an Antiracist, Antiracist Baby, and Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You, co-authored by Jason Reynolds. In 2020, Time magazine named Dr. Kendi one of the 100 most influential people in the world. He was awarded a 2021 MacArthur Fellowship, popularly known as the Genius Grant. His two most recent books came out in summer 2022. They are How to Raise an Antiracist and the picture book, Goodnight Racism.
The first year of research projects will be presented during the first research symposium. Researchers from the 22 2021-2022 funded projects will present their findings through presentations and poster sessions.
The symposium will be held at Levis Faculty Center from 9:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on October 7. For more information and a full schedule, please visit the website. Registration is available for Friday, October 7 as well. To attend both days of the event, please complete both registration forms.
In July 2020, Chancellor Jones announced a $2 million annual commitment by the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign to focus the intellectual and scholarly talent of our university to examine two of the greatest challenges facing our society and seek new solutions. Recognizing the critical need for universities across our nation to prioritize research focused on systemic racial inequities and injustices that exist not only in our communities but in higher education itself, the Call to Action to Address Racism & Social Injustice Research Program provides support for academic research and the expansion of community-based knowledge that advances the understanding of systemic racism and generationally embedded racial disparity.
The program focuses on three critical research areas that are currently the most important and complex challenges facing local communities, states, and our nation. The first two years are focused on systemic racism and social injustice, law enforcement and criminal justice reform, and disparities in health and health care.
The projects explored topics from research that can lead to the removal of barriers that inhibit access to education, opportunity, support, and resources, strategies for increasing perspective taking and understanding, and the interrogation of structural and institutionalized systems of disparity and disenfranchisement. The researchers also focus on the reduction of violence and harm that can increase racial equity, well-being, safety, and belonging.
The Call to Action includes 179 individuals from the campus and the local community including faculty, staff, community members, graduate & undergraduate students. 45% of Principal Investigators represent people of color. And 82% of Principal Investigators are women.
The Chancellor’s Call to Action to Address Racism & Social Injustice Research Program is administratively supported by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion.
I am pleased to announce the recipients of the 2022-23 Call to Action to Address Racism & Social Injustice Research Program, a $2 million annual commitment by our university to respond to the critical need for universities across our nation to prioritize research focused on systemic racial inequities. During this second year of the program, 25 projects were funded in three research focus areas: systemic racism and social justice; law enforcement and criminal justice reform; and disparities in health and health care.
The breadth of this year’s funded projects reflects a commitment to research that centers the needs of the communities we serve throughout our state and nation, from more equitable outcomes through the juvenile justice system, to the impact of social infrastructures and the built environment on mental health and wellbeing, to support for foster care providers.
These projects represent 17 departments and reporting units in seven colleges and administrative units. Awards this year range from $25,000 to $75,000. In total, $1.49 million in research funds will be distributed during this second year of funding. A full list of projects and descriptions is available at go.illinois.edu/CallToActionProjects.
Each Call to Action research funding year concludes with a symposium to share project results and recognize the extraordinary accomplishments of the project leaders. The impact of the first year of funding will be presented during the inaugural Research Symposium, October 6 and 7, 2022. Opening this symposium will be a keynote conversation with Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, Director of the Center for Antiracist Research at Boston University, and one of America’s foremost historians and leading antiracist scholars.
Dr. Kendi will be in conversation with Vice Chancellor Sean Garrick on Thursday, October 6 at 5:30 pm in Knight Auditorium at the Spurlock Museum. Friday, October 7, will feature research presentations and poster sessions at the Levis Faculty Center, showcasing the work of the 22 funded projects during the first year of the Call to Action Research Program. More details about how to register for the symposium will be available soon.
Please join me in recognizing each project leader and community partner, and their deep commitment to research that addresses the pervasive barriers to justice and equity in our nation. I encourage you to explore these second-year projects of the Call to Action Research Program and to attend the research symposium in October.
