Spring 2021 Offerings
Browse and register for our list of current offerings.
The Center for Cultural Pluralism looks to provide opportunities for dvelopment through several avenues. The following programs and campus connections are uniquely designed to equip and encourage members of the UVM community.
Browse and register for our list of current offerings.
Session 1 May 26, 2021 link to the session
Session 2 May 27, 2021 link to the session
1:30 PM - 3:30 PM
Tatyana Fertelmeyster, LCPC, Connecting Differences, LLC Founder and Principal
Tatyana Fertelmeyster (she/her), a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, is the founder and principal of Connecting Differences, LLC - a boutique consulting company providing intercultural and DEI services. Tatyana is known for asking her colleagues, her clients, and herself lots of uncomfortable questions. She is also known for digging deep and being creative to find answers.
Tatyana became a part of American diversity when she came to the United States in January of 1989 as a refugee from the former Soviet Union. She found her passion in helping people and organizations to navigate the complexities of changes, differences, and identities. As an intercultural and diversity consultant, trainer, and coach, she has worked in almost every state of the United States and several countries in Europe, Central Asia, and the Middle East.
Dr. Amy Edmondson, a Harvard Business School Professor and a pioneer of a psychological safety research defines psychological safety as “a belief that one will not be punished or humiliated for speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns or mistakes." She also writes that “few goals could involve more emotionally challenging and uncertain paths to achievement than that of building equitable, engaged, inclusive workplaces, where people feel they belong regardless of their race, gender, sexual orientation, or cultural heritage. Thus, psychological safety is not only characteristic of such inclusive organizations, it is also needed to design and implement the necessary changes to get there.”
Psychological safety is not about being comfortable or avoiding difficult conversations. It is about creating conditions for challenging moments to take place and become learning moments and teachable moments.
As a consultant in the DEI space for over 20 years and as a mental health professional, I believe in importance of focusing on what is happening to us as individuals in our efforts to create psychological safety and on what are the systemic/organizational components of it. I see my contribution to the DEI work in defining tolerance as our ability to tolerate ourselves as we are engaging with others across differences. Whether one wants to be a better ally to an LGBTQ student or be an anti-racist, strives to develop skills for addressing cultural misunderstandings or move from empathetic attention to compassionate action, or simply being a decent human being amidst complexity of today’s diversity – the starting point is the same.
This 2-part highly interactive workshop will engage participants in exploring their own Diversity Hot Buttons and maximizing their interpersonal and intercultural effectiveness when DEI related challenges are involved. The first 2-hour session will predominantly focus on identifying and examining stressors and triggers, while the second will offer practical steps and skills for growing through discomfort. Participants will engage in small group activities and large group discussions as well as in individual structured reflection processes.
• Use a number of practical tools to examine their real-life DEI experiences;
• Identify individual, collective, and organizational steps for building psychological safety;
* Create action plans for their ongoing DEI learning journey with opportunity for follow-up.
June, 2021
10:00 AM - 12: 00 PM
Sherwood Smith
This session is designed to have participants explore issues of social class and classism in higher education. During this session, attendees will define and explain social class and classism. There will be time dedicated to explore where classism might show up on campus and in workplaces. By the end of the session, participants will start to create a toolkit to allow them to do a classism audit of their communications, policies, and systems.
Level of Instruction: Introductory
This is a virtual event held via Teams. Registrants will be invited to the Teams meeting at least a few hours prior to the session time.
April 6, 2021
10:00-11:30 AM
Paul Suk-Hyun Yoon
So much of diversity and justice work is in not only the recognition of opportunities of inclusion but also in the disruption of injustice. This course will utilize the COURAGEOUS CONVERSATION™ protocol to assist participants in learning how to lean into these conversations, disrupt bias, and move forward. The CCAR™ Protocol is an “award-winning protocol for effectively engaging, sustaining and deepening interracial dialogue” and other identities. Through this course, participants will: define each component of the CCAR™ Protocol, understand the personal and interpersonal purpose of each part of the CCAR™ Protocol, and apply Protocol.
Level of Instruction: Introductory
This is a virtual event held via Teams. Registrants will be invited to the Teams meeting at least a few hours prior to the session time.
February 24, 2021
2:00-3:30 PM
Faculty and Staff
Christa Hagan-Howe & Sherwood Smith
This session provides an introduction to the concept and how it functions in day to day life or work. We will explore examples and a few types of responses. Attendees will gain an understanding of what implicit bias is and how it works. They will leave the session with an increased ability to identify implicit bias while also having expanded their vocabulary to discuss bias in general.
Level of Instruction: Introductory
This is a virtual event held via Teams. Registrants will be invited to the Teams meeting at least a few hours prior to the session time.