26 26 Strategic Priority 5 BELONGING, EQUITY, DIVERSITY, AND INCLUSION Introduction NSU’s students and faculty and staff members reflect the broad spectrum of diversity in race, ethnicity, religious affiliation, sex, veteran status, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, and age, in addition to diversity of thought and personal beliefs. Indeed, NSU enjoys longstanding recognition from the U.S. Department of Education as a Hispanic-serving institution. NSU is committing to being aspirational and intentional in developing its first institutional diversity strategic plan. The first step in this process was to solicit input from the members of our community through distribution of a diversity engagement survey (DES) to all students and faculty and staff members. The survey was conducted by D.L. Plummer and Associates, a leading consultant in the field. The survey results place NSU within the top tertile of the hundreds of universities, academic medical centers, and businesses comprising the DES benchmark data. This positive showing reflects the inclusive atmosphere of diversity that has been created over the years at NSU and the strong and meaningful diversity work being undertaken by students and faculty and staff members, primarily at the grassroots level. The next steps will be to engage a task force of university stakeholders in creating a belonging, equity, diversity, and inclusion (BEDI) statement and brand for NSU. The goal is to identify and support current diversity initiatives among student groups, colleges, and administrative units; promote those initiatives that may have university-wide application; and develop new BEDI initiatives that create an enhanced level of consciousness and positive impact across the NSU community. The collective results of these and other efforts will assist in forming NSU’s diversity strategic plan and its implementation. Vision 2025 Strategic Business Goals
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