Inclusive Excellence

In keeping with the Office of Diversity & Inclusion's mission statement "to foster an institutional culture where there is no dichotomy between our values of diversity and inclusion, and our goals of educational quality and excellence," Information Technology Services has formed an Inclusive Excellence. This volunteer team meets weekly and is open to all staff members of IT Services including student employees. Meeting topics cover a variety of issues and have included the following:

The ITS Inclusive Excellence partners with the Offices of Diversity & Inclusion and Multicultural Affairs to provide training for all IT Services staff members, suggest books and other educational materials, and sponsor periodic social and shared learning events for the team.

An open letter from Chris Van Liew, VP for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer at Seattle University, to our community: 

In March of 2018, the IT Services organization began a concerted effort to understand Inclusive Excellence and to take steps to improve our behavior and results. We have much more to learn and much further to go, but we are nonetheless making steady progress. Inclusive Excellence is the recognition that our institution's success is dependent on how well it values, engages and includes the rich diversity of its students, staff, faculty, administrators, and alumni constituents. This is non-negotiable for us, because:

1. Our SU mission requires it. "Seattle University is dedicated to educating the whole person, to professional formation, and to empowering leaders for a just and humane world." Whole people educating whole people. Robust professionalism. Leaders for justice and a humane world. Inclusive excellence is the "golden thread" that joins these seemingly dissimilar ideas together into a robust whole.
2. Our values demand it.  Diversity is a core value of Seattle University. Our diversity value reads, "We celebrate educational excellence achieved through diversity." Inclusive excellence is how we put our diversity value into action.
3. We need everyone’s whole, best self to succeed. What we do together each day is difficult - too difficult to accomplish as a loose collection of partial people. To thrive we must engage each other's whole, best self. And in so doing, we will generate better ideas, experience improved collaboration, build greater trust, and deliver truly excellent outcomes for those we serve.
4. It's the right thing to do. Inclusive excellence honors each person for their marvelous uniqueness in a robust community. While not always easy, there is simply no better way to live. In IT Services, we will strive to set an example for others to follow.

 Critical our success in achieving inclusive excellence is the IT Services Inclusive Excellence, whose work energizes our efforts to mature in this area. This team provides sponsorship and assistance for specific inclusive excellence tasks and programs, but most importantly provides a safe place to explore inclusive excellence topics. I am grateful for all this team does for IT Services as we strive to serve our university community.

To serve our community it takes a community – the whole community. We are committed to becoming a model of inclusive excellence in IT Services, and we welcome your comments, questions and suggestions. 

Chris