Updates from the Office of Inclusive Excellence and Belonging

The Office of Inclusive Excellence and Belonging welcomes the UHart community back to campus for Spring 2025 semester. As we continue our commitment to fostering an inclusive, vibrant living, learning, and working community that embraces students, faculty, and staff of all identities and enables everyone to achieve success. Below is an update of the glossary and upcoming programs. 

Glossary 

We are committed to continuing to foster an inclusive community, where everyone experiences belonging and thrives. To achieve this goal, the Office of Inclusive Excellence and Belonging has developed a glossary of foundational terms and affirming language. We believe that common language is crucial for creating greater understanding and inclusivity. This glossary is meant to serve as a starting point for communication, learning, and understanding, and it is a tool meant to build a shared language of understanding. 

This glossary will: 

• Serve as a resource for all members of the UHart campus community 

• Promote dialogue through exchange of ideas and debate 

• Ground our discourse in mutual understanding 

• Aid in facilitating difficult conversations and encourage constructive dialogue 

• Hinder the spread of misinformation and outdated terminology 

• Foster a campus culture where all members of the community feel safe, welcome, and that they belong 

Glossary of Foundational Terms and Affirming Language 

Glossary Highlight Definitions 

Culture: A social system of meaning and custom that is developed by a group of people to assure its adaptation and thriving. These groups are distinguished by a set of unspoken rules that shape values, beliefs, habits, patterns of thinking, behaviors, and styles of communication. 

Inclusive Excellence: Inclusive excellence is the recognition that an organization or community’s success is dependent on how well it values, engages and includes the rich diversity of its community members, including its students, faculty, staff, alumni, friends and affiliates. 

Climate: The way an organization is perceived and experienced by its individual members. Climate influences whether individuals feel valued, listened to, personally safe, treated with fairness and dignity and experiences belonging within an organization.

Upcoming Programs

2025 Annual MLK Observance Program 

UHart will commemorate the life and legacy of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on Wednesday, Feb. 5, 2025, at 12:45 p.m., in Lincoln Theater. The 2025 theme is “I Am My Ancestors' Wildest Dreams.” This observance program will feature a panel of distinguished leaders from the Connecticut region, sharing their accomplishments while inspiring pride, purpose, and hope for future generations and performances from the Hart School and UHart Magnet School. The four panelists are Josie Brown, Ronnell Higgins, Yolande Nicholas Spears, and Eboni Nelson. The program will be moderated by David Thompson ’89, M ’91, U.S. Vice President for Boston Scientific and Vice Chair for the University's Board of Regents. The observance will include the presentation of the 2025 MLK Beloved Community Awards. 

Experiencing Belonging: Share Your Story Black History Month Panel

Join us on Feb. 19, 2025, for our continued panel discussion on belonging from 12:45 p.m.– 2 p.m. in Shaw Center. This panel will feature campus and community leaders who will share their stories and perspectives by reflecting on a time when they did or did not feel like they belonged. The goal is to better understand the perceptions of the community and to find out what factors impact a sense of belonging as we continue to foster a campus community of inclusion. 

Please join us for the month of February for additional Black History Month programs: University of Hartford Celebrates Martin Luther King Jr. 

Indigenous Dance Performance 

Enjoy an Indigenous dance performance with the PlainBull family, including Mayiki, HAS ’27. Music and education provided by Chris Newell (Passamaquoddy). University of Hartford President Lawrence P. Ward will make introductory remarks, on Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, 5 p.m.–6 p.m., in Gengras Student Union (cafetaria).