Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan Draft v1.8.8...Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan: The Intercultural Promise| Working Draft v1.8.8 Page 2 Introduction: About this

UBC Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan: The Intercultural Promise Working Draft Prepared by Alden E. Habacon for Heads Up April 5, 2012 v1.8.8.1 | March 2012 Office of the Provost and Vice President Academic Walter C. Koerner Library 1958 Main Mall, Room 640 Vancouver, BC V6T1Z2

We are one humanity and each deeply different. We may find no better place in which to embrace this paradox than the university. Differences in values, circumstance, and intellectual viewpoint have incited humankind’s worst conflicts. Considered with respect, they afford great learning. Wholly embraced, they promise to be our greatest strength.

Place and Promise, The UBC Plan

Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan: The Intercultural Promise | Working Draft v1.8.8

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Introduction: About this Working Draft This document is a working draft, composed of three parts with distinct needs in mind. Part I is the UBC Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan, The Intercultural Promise. It is a living document and structured to reflect that goal. It provides the higher-level elements such as context, the strategic focus and forty-eight action items. The action items are a collection of ideas received during its early consultation. They do not represent an exhaustive list and are open to consultation. The Intercultural Promise is still evolving as we continue in the process of consultation. As the University’s commitment to intercultural understanding applies to both the Vancouver and Okanagan campuses, the principles and goals also apply to both campuses. At this time, however, this strategic plan is focused on the Vancouver campus. At the appropriate time, this strategic plan will be expanded to include UBC Okanagan. Part II of this document is the Supporting Framework for Operationalization. This part provides the components that sustain the life of this strategic plan. These sections include: the Early Implementation, the activity that helped to produce the strategic plan and stimulate the initial momentum; the Conceptual Framework behind the strategic plan, the terms of reference and guiding values and principles that produced the Early Implementation; and lastly, the description of this plan as an extension of the preceding mid-level plans of Place and Promise and the Equity and Diversity, Faculty of Graduate Studies and Library strategic plans. Part III includes a number of Appendices, wherein many of the ideas in this strategic plan are expanded upon and supportive material is provided. Depending on the reader, different sections will be more essential. The supporting sections are more relevant for those engaged in unit-level operationalization of this plan. As this draft is designed to facilitate consultation, sections are indexed (on the left) for ease of reference. Please refer to these numbers when providing feedback in regards to specific sections of the strategic plan and/or the supporting sections. A peer institutional review and review of related literature was also conducted for the development of this strategic plan. The literature review will be made available online as a central resource for students, faculty, staff and the public.


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Contents Index Page

PART I Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan: The Intercultural Promise

5 - 17

1.1 1.1 Building on the Strengths of the Vancouver Campus 5

1.2 1.2 Being a Diverse Community is No Longer Enough 6

1.3 1.3 Being Stickier 6

1.4 1.4 What does Intercultural Understanding actually mean? 6

2.0 1.5 STRATEGIC FOCUS 7

2.1 Strategic Goals 7

2.2 Strategic Targets: Aim for Where It Really Counts 7

2.4 The Road to Intercultural Fluency and Systemic Change 8

2.4.1 Contributing to The Big Picture: A Regenerative Campus 8

2.5 Foster Dynamic Social Relationships Across Different Cultures 9

2.6 Build UBC’s Capacity for Courageous Conversations 10

2.7 Establish Intercultural Understanding as Classroom Content 12

2.8 Establish UBC and International Thought-Leader in Intercultural Understanding 14

2.8.1 Centres of Related Research 15

2.8.2 Related Faculty Areas (Vancouver Campus) 16

2.8.3 Administrative Units and Departments Focused on Diversity, Equity and Intercultural Understanding

16

2.8.4 Cultural Centres 16

2.9 Interfaith Plan: Intersection of Strategic Goals 17

3.0

Measuring Progress: How do we know we’ve done it? 17

2.7.1 Diagram 1.1 - Overall Framework of Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan 13

PART II Supporting Framework for Implementation & Operationalizing Intercultural Understanding

18 - 24

4.1 Early Implementation: Identifying the Need 18

4.2 Intercultural Needs Assessment 18

4.3 Faculty Pain 18

4.3.1 Cultural gap between the academic expectations of faculty and students 18

4.3.2 Increasing demands of complex intercultural teaching environment 19

4.3.3 Insufficient rewards for excellence in Teaching and Service 19

4.3.4 Lack of connection between students and faculty 19

4.4 Identifying Cultural Tensions, Anxieties and Intercultural Barriers for Students 19

4.4.1 Growing gap between second-generation students and students that are new to Canada

20


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Index

Page

4.5 Classroom Climate 20

5.0

Conceptual Framework: Identifying the What

20

5.1 Not an End in Itself 20

5.2 Natural Evolution to Multiculturalism 21

5.3 Intercultural Fluency 21

6.0 Guiding Values and Approach: Identifying the How 22

6.1 People First 22

6.2 Build on Our Successes 23

6.3 Connecting the Dots 23

6.4 Going Viral 23

6.5 Emergent Solutions 23

7.0 Intercultural Understanding Matrix 23

8.0 Building on Place and Promise 24

8.1 UBC’s Promise 24

8.2 Preceding Mid-Level Strategic Plans 24

PART III APPENDICES

25 – 37

9.0 Appendix 1.0: How this draft was developed 25

10.0 Appendix 2.0: Conceptual Framework of Intercultural Fluency 26

10.1 Intercultural Awareness 26

10.2 Cultural Literacy 27

10.3 Intercultural Communication Skills 28

10.4 Intercultural Capital 28

11.0 Appendix 3.0: Building on Place and Promise 29

11.1 Aboriginal Engagement Strategic Plan 29

11.2 Sustainability 29

11.3 Focus on People 30

11.4 International Strategy 30

11.5 Research Excellence 31

11.6 Student Learning 31

11.7 Alumni Engagement Strategic Plan 32

11.8 Community Engagement 32

11.9 Valuing Difference: A Strategy for Advancing Equity and Diversity at UBC 33

11.10 UBCV’s Graduate Student Strategy and Operational Plan 33

11.11 UBC Library Strategic Directions, Goals and Actions 34

12.0 Appendix 4.0: Key Related Administrative Units and Departments 35

13.0 Bibliography 36


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PART I Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan: The Intercultural Promise Slowly but surely, it is becoming apparent that no matter where we come from, what we look like, what religion we practice or what language we speak, we are in this together.

Milton K. Wong, 2007

Index 1.0 UBC aspires to provide students a learning experience and learning environment that equips and prepares

them with intercultural fluency—the intercultural aptitudes of self-awareness, cross-cultural communication skills and relationship building, cultural literacy and an appreciation of diversity—so as to function more effectively, be bigger thinkers, exercise more empathy and contribute more in the increasingly complex societies of today and the future. Success will require genuinely intercultural faculty and campus cultures; students, faculty and staff who are equipped and supported to provide this experience; and enriched curriculum that, combined with teaching excellence, make learning intercultural understanding possible. UBC wants to offer the learning, research and work environment that students, faculty and staff desire and need to foster vibrant human interaction and community cohesion on campus. Failure at this would be to fail society. The goal is far more than achieving cultural diplomacy, but a depth of understanding across cultural difference that produces more dynamic and meaningful social relationships, increased capacity for difficult or courageous conversations and greater intercultural learning on campus. Fostering vibrant human interaction and community cohesion is the design question for the most complexly diverse civil societies of the 21st Century. Our graduates, faculty and staff must have intercultural understanding, beginning with a depth of understanding in aboriginal issues, as well as self-awareness of one’s bias and openness to difference, to contribute to this cohesion and participate in future solutions. Learning intercultural understanding on campus, to the point of fluency, is UBC’s promise.

1.1 Building on the Strengths of the Vancouver Campus The Intercultural Promise comes out of an opportunity that has emerged from the complex diversity of the students and alumni, geographic location, and academic and administrative expertise of the Vancouver campus (below).

The Vancouver campus has all the elements to make intercultural understanding a core aspect of life, work and study. Moreover, the preceding mid-level plans that advance the other eight commitments of Place and Promise already forward many aspects of intercultural understanding. The intercultural understanding mid-level plan, therefore, aims to provide a framework that ties all the related activity together, builds on the strengths and opportunity in Vancouver, suggests some common terms of

Students and Alumni

The rich and complex diversity of its student body and alumni; Student and alumni expectations and readiness for a greater intercultural experience.

Location The UBC Vancouver campus is located on the traditional territory of the Musqueam People; The rich diversity of UBC’s immediate and surrounding communities (see Appendix X); Its orientation on and deep connection with the Pacific Rim;

Expertise and Experience

The University’s unrivaled success in recruiting students and faculty from all over the world; UBC’s many internationally recognized centres of expertise in intercultural understanding and related fields; UBC’s proven leadership in creating intercultural learning experiences in Vancouver and abroad.


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reference, and encourages adjustments to organisational habits, rules and systems that help to normalize intercultural understanding as an integrated aspect of UBC’s many administrative, faculty and student environments. Leveraging intercultural assets to create an educational environment that equips graduates to foster socially sustainable civil societies, here and around the world, is more than a promise—it is UBC’s responsibility.

1.2 Being a Diverse Community is No Longer Enough

The benefit of being a highly diverse university, as stated in Place and Promise, is the potential for intellectual diversity and enriched learning. According to an analysis of research about the benefit of diversity to campuses conducted by Daryl G. Smith and Natalie B. Schonfeld in 2000, “Studies on cognitive development show that critical thinking, problem-solving capacities, and cognitive complexity increase for all students exposed to diversity on the campus and in the classroom.” The assumption has been that contact with different forms of diversity produces a depth of understanding across cultures, what is being referred to as “intercultural understanding.” Unfortunately, contact with or proximity to diversity has not proven to be enough to produce intercultural understanding for students, faculty, staff or alumni (Pettigrew and Tropp, 2008). Research has shown that experience on its own does not necessarily lead to learning (Kolb, 1984), just as experiences with people different than oneself does not necessarily produce learning or an understanding about difference. As simply stated in Valuing Difference: A Strategy for Advancing Equity and Diversity at UBC, “Being a diverse community is not enough.”1 Similarly, being a multicultural campus does not necessarily produce intercultural understanding. Intercultural understanding does happen at UBC Vancouver; however, it does not happen on its own. It requires clear intent, purposeful self-reflection, a supportive cultural context and the integration into the systems.

1.3 Being Stickier This strategic plan is an extension of the preceding mid-level plans of Place and Promise, building upon the existing initiatives and activity that already contribute to intercultural understanding. The strategic focus around intercultural understanding functions as organisational glue, making stickier the range of mid-level strategic plans (See Part III, Appendix 3.0) and UBC’s community of practice.

1.4 What does Intercultural Understanding actually mean? There are numerous definitions for intercultural understanding. For the purposes of this strategic plan:

Intercultural understanding refers to the breadth and depth of understanding across profound cultural difference wherein an individual or a group understands a variety of significant cultural experiences tied to: (1) ethnicity, race, religion, gender, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation, socio-economic class, immigration and in many cases academic, employment or professional status; (2) the cultural histories of various social groups within a society; (3) the interrelations between dominant and non-dominant cultures; and (4) the dynamics of difference. 2

Having intercultural understanding implies having the appropriate aptitudes needed to appreciate, and be open and flexible to difference and various forms of cultural diversity. This includes an acute sense of self-awareness, or “the ability to be aware of those values, attitudes, and assumptions”3 that inform one’s perspectives and behaviours; some degree of cultural knowledge in a variety of cultural environments; the capacity to communicate across cultural difference; and the ability to cultivate meaningful social relationships across culturally different groups. As academic cultures remain the most dominant form of culture in a university, intercultural understanding also refers to the personal and group aptitude for interdisciplinarity. 1 Valuing Difference: A Strategy for Advancing Equity and Diversity at UBC (2010). p. 2. 2 Based on the definition of Penn State, University Faculty Senate Curriculum Resources, Glossary: http://www.psu.edu/ufs/curriculum_resources/guide/glossary.html (Dec 2011). 3 Pope, R. L., Reynolds, A. L., & Mueller, J. A. (2004). Multicultural competence in student affairs. In Multicultural competence in student affairs (pp. 3-28). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.


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2.0 STRATEGIC FOCUS

Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.

Albert Einstein

2.1 Strategic Goals In consultation with faculty, staff and students, three core challenges surfaced as the source of UBC’s intercultural struggles. The framework of this strategic plan subsequently targets these as three key outcomes, that combined provide the foundation of an intercultural campus. The objectives of this strategic plan include:

• Fostering social relationships across differences and disciplines;

• Building the capacity for students, faculty, staff and alumni to engage in potentially difficult or highly contentious conversations; and

• Establishing intercultural understanding as classroom content, through curriculum, pedagogy and/or student intervention.

Meeting these targeted objectives establishes the prerequisites for a fourth desired outcome:

• The affirmation by community and peer institutions of UBC as a hotbed for intercultural engagement amongst students, faculty, staff and alumni, and pioneering interdisciplinary research in related areas.

2.2 Strategic Targets: Aim for Where It Really Counts

This strategic plan also focuses on three target areas that have been identified as where the rubber hits the road; namely, UBC’s Leadership and Leadership Competencies; Faculty and Curriculum; and the Student Experience, both inside and outside the classroom. Indicators of success in each of the four strategic objectives, including the development of related metrics, are described against these three target areas. As these three areas also have the biggest potential for impact, this plan aims to embed intercultural aptitudes into UBC’s leadership expectations and core leadership competencies, and faculty cultures and curriculum. It also aims to equip students with intercultural understanding in ways that prepare them to be more engaged, empathetic, resilient and less anxious in complexly diverse environments.

2.3 Intercultural understanding as a leadership competency is essential for decision-making at all levels.

In 2007 the senior management of CBC Sports decided to launch Hockey Night in Canada (HNIC) in Punjabi. Up until 2007, senior management at CBC Sports presumed the audience of HNIC reflected the popular perception. Out of curiosity, the management commissioned a two-year consumer study, which in 2007 revealed that almost all ethnic groups surveyed had a higher propensity to watch HNIC than white audiences. Completely opposite from public belief and stereotypes, the study showed that South Asian and Filipino TV audiences were the most likely to watch HNIC. Shortly after, CBC Sports found Punjabi-speaking sportscasters with a passion and knowledge of hockey, and began broadcasting select hockey games in Punjabi. Within weeks of the broadcasts, CBC received letters from members of the public, saying that when watching hockey in their mother language (or their grandparent's language), they had never felt more Canadian.


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2.3.1 Similarly, small adjustments in approach and curriculum, can take the classroom experience to new heights, having a dramatic affect on the intercultural experience for students and overall classroom climate.

Through a simple and innovative adjustment to the content in Approaches to Literature (ENGL110), a 100-level course that reaches hundreds of undergraduate students, Dr. Chris Lee, Assistant Professor in the English Department, found a way to improve the engagement of Chinese-speaking students. Noticing the imbalance of classroom participation, Dr. Lee incorporated short stories by Eileen Chang in translation into the course, hoping to make the course content more relevant to the growing numbers of Chinese-speaking students. Students able to read the original text easily found them and came to class challenging the English translation. Lee enabled these students to contribute to the class discussion in ways not previously possible, enriching the learning experience of all the students in the class.4

2.3.2 In challenging their instructors, students also have great potential for driving intercultural understanding.

Since the beginning of the semester, undergraduate student Joy Richu, came to assume that her childhood would never be reflected in CRWR 403, a children’s creative writing course. She had become accustomed to unfamiliar book titles and the “blank and confused stare” she often received when she mentioned books from her own childhood. She made a request, and thought nothing of it. During one class later in the semester, her professor laid out a selection of books and asked the students to discuss the literary elements from one of the books. As Joy approached the table, she was unexpectedly surprised: “Lying amongst the other novels and fairy tales, a book with a girl on the cover that looked like me! I felt my heart skip a beat. Without a second thought (or glance at the other books), I quickly grabbed the book. For a while I just stood there, marvelling at the cover.”

2.4 The Road to Intercultural Fluency and Systemic Change

Despite the extensive working definition for intercultural understanding, it can remain vague as an objective for personal and/or group development. To make this more concrete, intercultural fluency is being introduced to describe what this strategic plan aims to cultivate in UBC’s students, faculty, staff and alumni. The term “intercultural fluency” is the derivative of two familiar ideas: academic fluency and “cultural fluency” (Tatsushi Arai, 2006), and describes the development of intercultural awareness and interpersonal capacity in students, faculty, staff and alumni. Fluency across cultures begins with an openness to difference, followed by some degree of knowledge about cultures, including one’s own (what this plan is referring to as cultural literacy); some capacity to communicate across cultures; and establishing social connections in various communities (what this plan is introducing as intercultural capital). Personal development on its own is also not enough. The following actions address both the interpersonal capacity needed for intercultural fluency and the adjustments to the organisational habits, rules and systems that help to normalize intercultural understanding into the organisational culture.

2.4.1 Contributing to The Big Picture: A Regenerative Campus The challenges of a being highly diverse campus are not unique to UBC Vancouver, but shared with many urban centres across Canada that are similarly challenged with increasingly culturally diverse populations. The intercultural solutions that emerge at UBC have the potential to benefit the social sustainability of cities much larger in scale, as the aspiration for sustainable and regenerative communities requires intercultural understanding in highly diverse environments. The goals of this strategic plan might also be framed as moving towards being a “net positive” or regenerative campus, in the same way that the Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability (CIRS) is a net positive building. To be a campus that yields more “social good” in the form of constructive dialogue, intellectual diversity, social inclusion and openness to complexity, than the opposite in the form of xenophobia, prejudice and conflict, is not unlike the challenges that cities like Vancouver are facing as a result of being highly diverse. 4 Place and Promise Annual Report, 2010/2011.


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2.5 Foster Dynamic Social Relationships Across Different Cultures GOAL: To meet our student, faculty, staff and alumni expectations around making friends more easily

and across more groups. Cultivating meaningful social relationships, in general and especially across different cultures and disciplines, is at the heart of growing the capacity for empathy and sense of belonging for students, faculty, staff and alumni. It is at the core of the dominant discourse around peacemaking and cross-cultural conflict resolution, and necessary for building intercultural capital, or the social capital across different cultural groups. The barriers at UBC around friend-making for students, faculty and staff are the result of some obvious factors—UBC’s size, topography, disciplinary silos, and an intense level of competitiveness amongst students and faculty—each contributing to an environment often characterized as “cold” and “impersonal.” This plan does not propose to provide the solutions to this complex situation, but establishes the framework for solutions to emerge.

Target Area Actions Measurement

Leadership & Leadership Competencies

1. Provide structural supports for mid-level leadership to grow intercultural capital and develop the capacity to manage a complexly diverse workplace and student environment.

2. Develop intercultural friend-making skills module for ADLP (CTLT,

CIC, Provost).

3. Establish intercultural capital and the ability to manage complexly diverse workplace as leadership competencies (Provost, HR).

4. Develop “faculty leadership development and preparedness

program” (leadership opportunities) with embedded intercultural friend-making skills development, and aimed at potential leadership with high degrees of intercultural capital (CTLT, CIC, Provost).

Incorporation of intercultural capital and managing complexly diverse workplace in performance reviews and job descriptions for new leadership. Enrollment of leadership in training. Development of intercultural capital measurement (PAIR). Launch of pilot and development of leadership development program.

Faculty & Curriculum

5. Develop online training and resources for faculty that support intercultural supervision, intercultural teaching, improving classroom participation, and fostering friend-making in the classroom (this action builds on a simultaneous push for greater recognition of supervision and teaching excellence in tenure and promotion).

6. Establish taskforce for creating community-partnered low-to-no-cost

structural opportunities for faculty to cultivate high-quality peer relationships across disciplines (for example, a dedicated UBC faculty and staff family day in partnership with the Powell Street Festival). This may include the consideration of physical space and repeated opportunities to share, exchange and build relationships over time.

7. Develop a program to encourage interdisciplinarity in curriculum,

aimed at stimulating interaction across disciplines.

Use of online training and supports. Faculty report having more friendships across disciplines. Students report that faculty model intercultural relationships.

Student Experience

8. In partnership with AMS and PPEC, establishing undergrad student consultancy group; in partnership with the GSS and FOGS establishing a graduate student subject matter expert working and advisory group (G1).

9. Support students to develop and lead student-focused solutions

(might include friend-making workshops and campaigns and creating commonly shared intercultural experiences on campus). Similar to Action 6, this may require more dedicated physical spaces and time designed to foster relationship building. May also include social and cultural programming.

Development and use of intercultural friend-making measurement. Incorporation of intercultural capital in New to UBC and subsequent surveys (PAIR).


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2.6 Build UBC’s Capacity for Courageous Conversations GOAL: Establish university-wide standards for declaring safe spaces for difficult or courageous

conversations, establishing a network of recognized safe spaces, and growing the individual capacity for highly tenuous conversation in students, faculty and staff.

As all conflict is “cultural” in some measure, the capacity to engage in potentially difficult or highly contentious conversations is almost always an intercultural skill. Building UBC’s capacity to have conversations that are difficult to have because they are highly sensitive in nature or have high potential for conflict, what this strategic plan is calling high-risk or better described as courageous conversations, is relatively straightforward and draws on UBC’s many experts and expert groups specializing in cross-cultural dialogue, conflict resolution and highly-sensitive topics.

2.6.1 CTLT’s “Living Lab” theatre-based workshops that equip participants to talk about racism, prejudice and oppression; ADLP’s Conflict Resolution training program; and FNHL’s dialogue around the historic mistreatment of Aboriginal Peoples through the Indian Residential School System are strong examples. The cultural centres of the Vancouver campus (see page 16) also have great potential for fostering these kinds of discussions, using artistic expression as an entry point for discussion or as a medium to address complex issues. Similarly, the BA Visual Arts graduation show is a regular showcase of students’ engagement in complex issues of social identity and belonging.

2.6.2 There is an abundance of ideas for dialogues around culture, race and other potentially volatile subjects. Having more dialogues, however, does not necessarily produce greater capacity for having meaningful high-risk conversations. It requires an understanding and modelling of what is required to have these kinds of conversations. It also needs trained facilitation, group preparedness and structural supports for safe spaces. Most importantly, it requires building upon (less risky) foundational conversations, relationship building and resilience amongst participants. This strategic plan breaks this strategic goal into five general (university-wide) action items, followed by actions specific to each target area.


University-Wide

9. Identify and acknowledge the existing centres of excellence and community of practice.

10. Develop and establish guidelines for high-risk

conversations, based on UBC’s expertise; 11. Develop training for facilitating and supporting

high-risk conversation (Ombudsperson for Students, CTLT, HR).

12. Using these practices and standards, establish

more safe spaces for high-risk conversation, and ensure students, faculty and staff are aware of and have access to these spaces.

13. Better coordinate a calendar of high-risk

conversations.

Establishment of training and spatial standards around hosting high-risk conversation and recognition as safe spaces; Establishment of 5-7 more spaces on campus, using set guidelines and acknowledged by the community as safe spaces for high-risk conversations. Addition of safe spaces to Wayfinding maps; Central coordination of related “intercultural dialogues” and related conversations on (or the intersectionality of) cultural experiences tied to ethnicity, race, religion, gender, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation, socio-economic class, migration, and in many cases academic, employment or professional status; the cultural histories of various social groups within a society; the interrelations between dominant and non-dominant cultures, and the dynamics of difference, etc.


14. Establish capacity to manage high-risk conversations as a leadership competency (Provost, HR).

15. Develop intercultural dialogue facilitation skills

module for leadership training, such as ADLP (CTLT, CIC, Provost).

Incorporation of exercised capacity to manage high-risk conversations in performance reviews and job descriptions for new leadership. Enrollment of leadership in training. Development of competency measurement (PAIR).


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16. Equip leadership to participate in and manage high-risk conversations; and create structured opportunities for leadership to participate in and manage high-risk conversations.


17. Equip and provide structured opportunities for faculty to participate in and/or facilitate high-risk conversations.

Faculty report having knowledge and ability to model and manage high-risk conversations, especially between faculty and students. Faculty report having more productive and more meaningful high-risk conversations.

Student Experience

18. In partnership with existing student development programs (Peer Programs, Student Leadership Conference, for example) support student development of training and student-driven initiatives the provide students opportunities to participate in and facilitate high-risk conversations, while tackling some of the most pressing student issues at UBC that arise from being a complexly diverse campus.

19. Establish an Undergraduate Student Advisory

(PPEC) and a Graduate Student Subject Matter Expert Group (G1) who coordinate schedule of related university-wide student dialogues.

Calendar of high-risk conversations; Students report having more productive and more meaningful high-risk conversations while at UBC.

2.6.3 For difficult or “courageous conversations” and dialogues to be truly intercultural, they need to include a

multilingual dimension. With 79 percent of students at the Vancouver campus speaking two or more languages, there is an opportunity to explore innovative ways of engaging UBC students who are not native-English speakers. Similar to Dr. Lee’s use of non-English text to heighten student engagement, so must these dialogues seek non-English and non-Western conversation starters. The guidelines and standards must also be appropriately accessible in languages other than English, and recognize that not all cultures train their youth to speak openly about sensitive issues. The aspiration for more productive hard-to-have conversations is also supported by the implementation of the Respectful Environment Statement. The principles of the Respectful Environment Statement require students, faculty and staff to be able to engage in topics with a high potential for conflict in as respectful means as possible. Often the difference between a courageous conversation and a conflict is respect. This is especially critical when managing difficult conversations across cultural differences.


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2.7 Establish Intercultural Understanding as Classroom Content

GOAL: Through curriculum, course content, pedagogy and/or student intervention, facilitate the acquisition of intercultural fluency.

Intercultural understanding must be learned, demonstrated and supported in the classroom. The classroom is also the most prominent site of intercultural tension and misunderstanding.



20. Establish a Dean’s task force for the development of guidelines, recommendations and targets for the integration of intercultural understanding into curriculum (Provost).

21. Develop a related intercultural professional

development program for senior university administrators and faculty targeted at the integration of intercultural understanding into curriculum (CIC, Organisational Development & Learning, CTLT).

A living online inventory of how various courses have integrated intercultural understanding into the curriculum, course content and pedagogy. Students report on the degree to which intercultural understanding is integrated into their learning material (course evaluation). Academic leadership report bi-annually on the integration of intercultural understanding into curriculum.


22. Establish a faculty task force that will look at the alleviation of “intercultural pains” (see Part II, Intercultural Needs Assessment) experienced and/or observed by faculty, and produce a 2-3 year action plan.

23. Establish a network of Intercultural Understanding

Resource People within departments and units (modelled after the Positive Space Resource program).

24. Establish an intercultural understanding course

coding system and audit modelled after Sustainability and Aboriginal Studies.

25. Potentially make intercultural understanding courses

a mandatory requirement in undergraduate and graduate course requirements, modelled after UBC’s Sustainability course requirements.

26. Potentially make the taking of a recognized course

with an integrated community service learning project, interdisciplinary research, intercultural community research or an intercultural artistic project a mandatory undergraduate course requirement, as part of fulfilling intercultural understanding course requirements.

27. Create a community service learning fund to reward

and support faculty/professional development of robust community service projects as integrated into courses.

28. Develop a for-credit Certificate and/or Minor in Intercultural Communications, based on the existing program offered by the Centre for Intercultural Communication at Continuing Studies.

29. Create an Asian Canadian Studies (ACS) Community

Engagement Task Force, as a pilot on how faculties might foster ties with and take direction from community in regards to intercultural content in curriculum.

Individual faculty report a noticeable decrease of intercultural challenges or difficulties in their experiences at UBC. Students report having learned intercultural understanding in the classroom experience, through either content and/or experiential learning. A measured increase in the number of courses using community service learning as a means to reach intercultural goals for departments and faculties. A dramatic increase in the number of students who have taken courses using integrated community service learning, interdisciplinary research, intercultural community research, and/or intercultural artistic projects. Evidence of community engagement in the development of the Asian Canadian Studies program curriculum (additional measures to be developed by Community Engagement strategic plan).


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Student Experience

30. Develop a classroom climate training module for students and TAs, in partnership with the Equity Office and Aboriginal Engagement, modelled after parallel work around Aboriginal Engagement.

31. Create a system-wide intercultural training program

for all incoming TAs (with a prerequisite training program for international TAs), designed to be customized and delivered by faculties with the longer-term goal of growing the capacity and meeting the unique intercultural needs of different faculties. Developed in partnership between CIC, FOGS, CTLT and Human Resources.

32. Expand the on-campus impact of Go Global and

community service learning through an on-going campus-wide media campaign, student presentations and/or an annual symposium focused on the transformational process experienced by students engaged in intercultural activity.

Students report dramatic improvement to classroom climate, as pertaining to intercultural understanding in the classroom. TAs report improved teaching ability and preparedness. Reported increase in awareness of the impact and value of study exchange and community service learning programs.

There are numerous departments whose mandate and subject matter advances intercultural understanding for both graduate and undergraduate students, including the Department of Asian Studies; Specialization in International Forestry; Institute of Asian Research; Conflict Resolution, Arts and iNtercultural Experience (CRANE); Cultural Psychology, Language and Literacy Education, Liu Institute of Global Issues; Immigrant Vancouver Ethnographic Field School (IVEFS) and Educational and Counselling Psychology. This plan will build upon these and other existing academic programs and the expertise they present the University (a more complete list can be found on pages 15-16).

2.7.1 Figure 1 - Overall Framework of Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan This strategic plan is focused on four strategic goals (fostering social relationships, difficult of “courageous” conversations, classroom content, and international though-leadership). These objectives are then shaped by the conceptual framework (orange ring) to produce actions targeting intercultural understanding in three strategic areas: management and management competencies, faculty and curriculum, and student experience.


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2.8 Establish UBC as an International Thought-Leader in Intercultural Understanding

GOAL: To be recognized by community and peer institutions as a global leader in pioneering scholarly work and research in the area of race, culture and identity, and related areas of study, as aspects of creating socially sustainable communities.

As an academic community, it is essential that UBC strive to be recognized internationally as a centre of excellence in intercultural understanding, not only for operational practices that make intercultural understanding a tangible reality, but for driving new scholarly knowledge in related fields—ideally pioneering a field of inter- and cross-disciplinary research and scholarly work that builds upon UBC’s existing academic centres and experts.



33. Establish the ability to recruit for intercultural competencies as a core leadership competency. Possibly tied to the development of a program that supports Deans in accessing diverse leadership pools (Provost, HR).

34. Establish “leadership incubator” program targeting faculty and staff with high degrees of intercultural fluency.

35. Establish regular schedule of opportunities for Deans to share their thought-leadership in the area of diversity, equity and intercultural understanding (such as on-campus speaking engagements, feature articles in university publications, scheduled commentary).

36. Building upon the recently launched Equity Research Awards, create a parallel award that supports outstanding research in the area of intercultural understanding, including research in social sustainability, cross-cultural relations, intercultural conflict resolution, workplace sustainability, religious pluralism, and the intersection of bio- and socio-cultural diversity.

37. Establish more structured connection and synergy between related departments or units whose focus is diversity, equity and intercultural understanding, and similarly between Academic Centres and Faculty Departments (see page 15) that are already driving the University’s thought-leadership in related areas. Beginning with the creation of an Intercultural Staff Council (S1), a staff network representing UBC’s community of practice (see page 15). Possibly leading towards the establishment of an Interdisciplinary Centre for Social Sustainability.

Graduate student survey reports perception of faculty leadership as having demonstrated competency and thought-leadership in the area of intercultural understanding. Intercultural Staff Council (S1) report on leadership performance in intercultural matters. Intercultural Staff Council (S1) report improved awareness and connectivity of interdepartmental activity.

Faculty and Curriculum

38. Formalize the creation of a Faculty Subject Matter Expert Advisory Group (F1) for providing input, direction and fostering scholarly work, which functions in parallel with the Graduate Student Subject Matter Expert Working Group (G1) and the Undergraduate Student Consultancy Group (PPEC). Possibly connected to existing interdisciplinary structures being developed at UBC.

39. Pioneering scholarly work in the area of race, culture and identity (such as, the development of critical mixed-race studies program), as ties to social sustainability.

40. Establish reward system for research collaboration between faculties. This might include targeted approaches that encourage interdisciplinary research collaboration between specific areas (Provost).

Engagement of consultancy groups in the articulation of UBC’s vision for an intercultural campus experience. Inventory of new research being produced by academic centres around intercultural understanding and related topics. Reported evidence of greater collaboration and partnership between academic centres, paying particular attention to interdisciplinary research collaboration. Development of an interdisciplinary and pioneering field of scholarly work in the area of intercultural understanding as an aspect of social sustainability.


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Student Experience

41. Create a central academic resource on intercultural understanding in the main library, (in partnership with the Library Diversity Caucus and SLAIS), to support Student Directed Seminars on topics related to intercultural understanding.

42. Create resources and programming that help students and alumni acquire the cultural competencies needed for career or business success in China, India and Europe;

43. Establish programming that prepares young alumni to identify and overcome equity-related barriers in the workplace that might prevent them from reaching leadership and decision-making positions in their respective fields. For example, addressing the underrepresentation of Asian Canadian graduates at the executive levels.

44. Creation of a President’s Award on Social Sustainability (or

similar allocation in existing award or fund) for student clubs or organisations that demonstrate excellence in contributing to intercultural understanding on campus.

45. Establish a calendar of cultural events, performances, and exhibitions, discussions targeted at raising the intercultural fluency of and/or facilitating high-risk conversations for staff, faculty, staff and alumni (UBC’s cultural centres and artistic and cultural departments).

46. Creation of 1-2 annual cultural events at the Vancouver campus, aimed at providing commonly shared opportunities for students, faculty, staff alumni and the immediate community to develop intercultural awareness and a grow a sense of social cohesion through creative expression. (Chan Centre for Performing Arts, VP Students, Faculty of Arts, HR).

Reported increase in the number of Student Directed Seminars in the area of intercultural understanding and related topics. Reported use of the central academic resources. Students and alumni report having adequate China, India and/or Europe competencies for future endeavours. Alumni report having adequate equity-related workplace preparedness. Greater recognition of student activity in the area of fostering social sustainability. Students, faculty, staff and alumni report as having been part of or watched first-hand a shared cultural experience at UBC Vancouver.

Thought-leadership at UBC will require being at least the sum of our parts in the area of intercultural understanding. This means greater coordinated support of and structural connection, synergy and collaboration between the following academic and cultural centres, faculty departments and administrative units that are currently producing related research, cultural programming, scholarly work and community engagement (the following lists are in alphabetical order and not exhaustive):

2.8.1 Centres of Related Research (Vancouver Campus) The Centre for Culture, Identity and Education (CCIE) The Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability (CIRS) The Centre for Intercultural Language Studies (CILS) The Centre for Human Evolution, Cognition, and Culture (HECC) The Centre for Race, Autobiography, Gender and Age (RAGA) Critical Research in Health and Healthcare Inequities (CRiHHI) Conflict Resolution, Arts and intercultural Experience (CRANE) The Institute of Asian Research The Liu Institute of Global Issues The University Sustainability Initiative (USI)


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2.8.2 Related Faculty Areas (Vancouver Campus) The Centre for Intercultural Communication (CIC) The Department of Asian Studies The Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology The Department of Psychology (Cultural Psychology) The Department of Language and Literacy Education The Department of Sociology The English Language Institute (ELI) First Nations Studies Program The Immigrant Vancouver Ethnographic Field School (IVEFS) The Specialization in International Forestry The UBC School of Complex Governance

Similarly, there is a need for greater structural connection between the following related administrative units and departments, beginning with the creating an active interdepartmental staff network aimed fostering interconnectedness, information sharing and sharing of resources.

2.8.3 Administrative Units and Departments Focused on Diversity, Equity and Intercultural Understanding Access & Diversity Community Learning Initiative (CLI) Equity Office Faculty of Graduate Studies Faculty Relations Human Resources

International Office International House Korea House Office of the Ombudsperson for Students St. John’s College UBC-Ritsumeikan House UBC Housing

To be at least the sum of our parts, as much as possible it is essential to name the parts. The overall spirit of partnership and collaboration also extends to the mandates and work of the Centre for Teaching, Learning and Technology (CTLT); the Iona Pacific Inter-Religious Centre; UBC Multi-Faith Chaplains Association and many other units that might be considered part of the community of practice. Concurrent initiatives contributing to intercultural understanding also include: UBC’s Dispute Resolution Program (training for faculty, staff and students); the International Graduate Student Task Force; the Integrated Conflict Resolution System; the Service Excellence Conference, the Library Diversity Caucus; Coaching@UBC; and Organisational Development & Learning; etc.

2.8.4 Cultural Centres (Centres of Cultural Production, Vancouver Campus)

One of the most effective ways to fostering the desired shift towards a more inclusive and culturally knowledgeable campus culture is through the production of culture on campus. Moreover, difficult conversations are often best approached through artistic expression. This strategic plan hopes to emphasize the importance of UBC’s cultural centres and departments involved in cultural production as an underutilized asset to fostering the kind of campus experiences that encourage or facilitate the development of intercultural fluency. Cultural production and experiences on campus are as essential to being a socially sustainable community as basic infrastructure and clean water. With that in mind, it is critical that UBC’s cultural centres be included, engaged, contribute to Place and Promise, thereby maximizing their contribution towards intercultural awareness on campus and the interpersonal capacity of students, faculty, students and alumni. UBC’s centres of cultural production include at least the following: The Chan Centre for the Performing Arts The Morris and Helen Belkin Gallery The Museum of Anthropology

UBC School of Music (Ethnomusicology) UBC Art History and Visual Art Department Department of Theatre and Film


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2.9 Interfaith Plan: Intersection of Strategic Goals A critical area requiring greater development is the interconnectedness between faith groups on campus, and the overall campus climate for students, staff, faculty and alumni for whom faith is a major part of their identity. Forty percent of students report to be actively involved in a faith, whereas the perceived participation is generally five to ten percent. How safe students feel about having a faith-identity proportionately affects the capacity for interfaith relationships to occur. The more anxiety students feel about their faith-identity, the less likely interfaith connectivity occurs. Future activity fostering interfaith connections between students, faculty, staff and alumni should be integrated into the preceding four strategic goals. For purposes of clarity, the following action items have been separated out.

Actions Measurement

Student Experience

47. Establish a UBC Interfaith Task Force. In partnership with the Multi-Faith Chaplains Association and the Iona Pacific Inter-religious Centre, develop a framework for a UBC Interfaith Plan.

48. Develop an interfaith action plan outlining the fostering of high-quality peer relationships, high-risk conversation and classroom guidelines around the expression and fostering of an interfaith campus culture.

Successful adoption of a UBC Interfaith Plan by Fall 2012/2013. Students report UBC experience as being more “faith friendly.”

3.0 Measuring Progress: How do we know we’ve done it?

Many of the actions proposed in this strategic plan have been started and some will have been completed by the time this plan is finalized and adopted. For this reason, this strategic plan will require on-going updates and must continue to evolve. As a truly living document, the strategic plan moves UBC closer to an emergent vision of what an intercultural campus looks and sounds like, how it is experienced by students, staff, faculty and alumni on a daily basis. Inherent to the plan is the development of new metrics to better measure progress. This strategic plan refers to changes that are difficult to empirically measure, such as campus culture and classroom climate. At the heart of answering the on-going question around measuring progress is the creation and use of the following advisory and consultancy groups: a Faculty Subject Matter Expert Advisory Group (F1), a Graduate Student Subject Matter Expert Working Group (G1), an Undergraduate Student Consultancy Group (through PPEC), an Alumni Advisory Group, an Intercultural Staff Council (S1), and most importantly, an External Advisory Group composed of local community organisations with real expertise and experience in fostering intercultural understanding at the community level. We continue to work with these groups to formalize these measures of success, and integrating them into the University’s annual reporting.


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PART II Supporting Framework for Implementation & Operationalizing Intercultural Understanding

4.0 The preceding strategic plan helps the University to move towards alignment by providing a framework from which activity and initiatives can be developed. The following three supporting sections—Early Implementation, Conceptual Framework and Guiding Values and Approach—provide the supporting framework used in identifying the need, the what, and the how, respectively. They function as a toolbox of ideas, language and approach necessary for the development of unit-level activity, including an Intercultural Understanding Matrix. Greater detail is provided in Part III, the Appendices. The final section of Part II describes the connection of this strategic plan with the preceding eight strategic plans flowing from Place and Promise, and also provides direction in integrating intercultural understanding into the existing strategic efforts.

4.1 Early Implementation: Identifying the Need The Early Implementation, or short-to-medium-term activity related to the development of the intercultural understanding strategic plan has been focused on three areas: the development of the strategic plan; corresponding foundational initiatives, including a literature review in partnership with SLAIS5, an institutional survey6, and an intercultural understanding audit7; and most importantly, catalyzing a culture shift. The preceding strategic plan draws from this activity.

4.2 Intercultural Needs Assessment Although the strategic plan comes out of UBC’s intercultural assets (page 5), a needs assessment or “naming the pain” was critical to ensuring the related activity was not just strategic but as meaningful as possible to faculty and students. In being very specific about the barriers to intercultural understanding, there is an opportunity to envision a campus without them. The needs assessment phase involved interviewing over 200 individual staff and faculty, conducting six (continuing) student focus groups, presentations to various units, presentations to the Board of Governors and the Alumni Association Board, the Peer Program Executive (PPEC) and meetings with various student clubs.

4.3 Faculty Pain Early consultation with faculty produced the following list of top intercultural pains—the difficulties or negative experiences faculty have observed as a result of working at a complexly diverse campus: • A growing cultural gap between the academic expectations of faculty and students; • The increasing demands of complex intercultural teaching environment; • Insufficient rewards for excellence in Teaching and Service; and • The lack of connection between students and faculty.

4.3.1 Cultural gap between the academic expectations of faculty and students Students and faculty often do not share a common understanding of expectations of each other. This includes domestic and international students whose cultural background may have contributed to a different set of academic expectations and standards, particularly around classroom participation, dialogue with faculty, classroom etiquette, accessing academic supports, and participation and activity outside the classroom. 5 Location online to be provided. 6 Location online to be provided. 7 Currently under construction at http://wiki.ubc.ca/Intercultural_Understanding_Inventory_at_UBC_2010-2011


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4.3.2 Increasing demands of complex intercultural teaching environment

Faculty expressed a lack of capacity and/or support to meet the growing demands of the increasingly complex teaching environments, which include managing a greater range of students’ learning and communications styles.

4.3.3 Insufficient rewards for excellence in Teaching and Service

Tied to tenure and promotion, faculty expressed a lack of sufficient incentive, recognition and reward for teaching excellence and service in general, but especially in the pursuit of intercultural content and pedagogy.

4.3.4 Lack of connection between students and faculty

Faculty expressed they lacked reciprocal connection with their undergraduate students, perceiving degrees of student disinterest proportionate to the size of the class. This has affected the enjoyment of teaching large classes. There was a general sense that UBC has not done enough to establish basic classroom etiquette and clarity for students in how to maintain meaningful engagement with their teachers. These intercultural pains compound each other and foster misunderstanding and disconnect. Many of these difficulties are both produced by a lack of intercultural understanding and are in themselves the source of intercultural misunderstanding. It is the aim of the strategic plan to either address directly or support the elimination of the above list. Action 22 (see page 12) commits to the creation of a task force that will look at the alleviation of “intercultural pains” experienced by faculty and produce a 2-3 year action plan. Actions 30 and 31, and other concurrent University initiatives to address student and faculty connection will also contribute to the lessening of these issues.

4.4 Identifying Cultural Tensions, Anxieties and Intercultural Barriers for Students The current discourse around anti-racism on campus indicates a reduction of anxiety and increase of empathy on campus as having greater impact than cognitive information (or increased awareness) about racism and prejudice.8 With this in mind, for the development of this plan, it was essential to identify students’ anxieties as members of a highly diverse campus. The following list reflects the input from students and is in alphabetic order with exception to the first item, consistently identified as the most acute intercultural issue. • Growing gap between second-generation students and students that are new to Canada; • An unacknowledged sense of anti-Americanism on campus; • Discomfort in expressing or acknowledging one’s faith identity; • Cultural exclusion of students with children; • Culture shock of rural students to UBC; • Impact of commuter reality on social cohesion on campus; • Lack of competencies around indigenous identity (in students and faculty); • Noticeable lack of political diversity, leading to anxiety around political expression; • Parental expectations on students in regards to education and careers; • Racializaiton of students (particularly that of white, non-white, Aboriginal and East Asian students); • Pressures of political correctness; • Lack of recognition of the experience of being visibly white on campus; • Unaddressed complexity of Asian Canadian Identity on Campus (unaddressed in curriculum and

campus life). In partnership with PPEC and PAIR, the University is endeavouring to validate this list and determine what anxieties are of the highest importance to students. There was no expressed order of priority with exception to the first barrier on this list.

8 Bennet, J. Developing Intercultural Competence for International Education Faculty and Staff. 2011 Association of International Educators Association Conference, Westin St. Francis Hotel. San Francisco, CA, 2011.


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4.4.1 Growing gap between second-generation students and students that are new to Canada When asked, international and new-immigrant students predominantly identify second-generation students of the same ethnicity as the most hostile group towards them on campus. Conversely, second-generation students complained of first-generation students’ “ethnic cliques” as a major issue at UBC. As UBC aims to admit greater numbers of international students, this is likely to grow to be a bigger issue. The anti-newcomer/immigrant sentiment amongst non-white second-generation students is not unique to UBC; however, it is a divisive issue that must be addressed for social sustainability to be achieved on campus. To a great extent, ethno-cultural cliquing has many benefits for students, in establishing a safe space for minority identities. It is not the goal of the strategic plan to eliminate the many groups that self-identify through ethnocentric terms, but to encourage students to use these student groups as social incubators. It is the intent of the strategic plan to support activities that encourage the connectivity and partnership between ethnocultural groups, targeting the cultural and relational gap between students born in Canada and those who are new to Canada.

4.5 Classroom Climate In common with both the Equity and Diversity Strategic Plan and Aboriginal Engagement Strategic Plan, classroom climate is an area of concern. Students have identified the following classroom climate struggles pertaining to intercultural understanding: intercultural misunderstanding in the classroom (sometimes developing into conflict); difficulty meeting new people in class; ethno-racial self-segregation in class; inability to engage in high-risk conversations; and not knowing how to engage instructors and profoundly different students (lacking of student etiquette). Action 30 targets these specific issues.

5.0 Conceptual Framework: Identifying the What The creation of the strategic plan also required the development of core ideas or the “conceptual framework” around intercultural understanding. These points of reference are essential for establishing a common language around what the University aims to do, resulting in better coordination between efforts across campus. As stated on page 5, the strategic plan refers to intercultural understanding as “the breadth and depth of understanding across profound cultural difference wherein an individual or a group understands a variety of significant cultural experiences tied to: ethnicity, race, religion, gender, physical or mental disability, sexual orientation, socio-economic class, immigration and in many cases academic, employment or professional status; the cultural histories of various social groups within a society; the interrelations between dominant and non-dominant cultures; and the dynamics of difference.” 9

There are a number of foundational ideas that set the conceptual framework as defined by the strategic plan: firstly, that intercultural understanding is not an end to itself; secondly, that intercultural understanding is the natural evolution from multiculturalism; thirdly, that intercultural understanding involves the interpersonal development of intercultural fluency; and fourth, that a cultural shift towards intercultural understanding and the development of intercultural fluency requires adjustments to the norms and expectations, policies, protocols and processes.

5.1 Not an End in Itself The fostering of intercultural attributes is not an end unto itself, but the key ingredient to a more ambitious goal of more dynamic social relationships and a stronger sense of community cohesion at UBC. Advancing intercultural understanding at UBC ultimately points to the social sustainability and health and wellbeing of its student body, faculty, administration and workforce. It includes growing the interpersonal 9 Penn State, University Faculty Senate Curriculum Resources, Glossary: http://www.psu.edu/ufs/curriculum_resources/guide/glossary.html (Dec 2011)


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capacity needed to cultivate relationships across profound cultural difference, from working with culturally different students in class, to social connections outside the classroom and partnerships with international researchers. It also includes managing tenuous conversations and conflict across profound cultural differences, taking into consideration the inherent value and complications of diversity.

5.2 Natural Evolution of Multiculturalism It is important to note the distinction between a multicultural and intercultural academic experience. The principles of multiculturalism—towards peaceful coexistence and cultural pluralism—are an ideal foundation for intercultural understanding, which requires an even greater effort towards interconnectedness and exchange across cultures. As previously stated on page 6 of the strategic plan, a multicultural environment does not necessarily produce intercultural understanding.

5.3 Intercultural Fluency As previously noted on page 7 of the strategic plan, intercultural fluency is being introduced to describe what this strategic plan aims to cultivate in UBC’s students, faculty, staff and alumni. It is the derivative of two basic ideas—academic fluency and “cultural fluency”.10 Intercultural fluency requires the development of “intercultural awareness”, which includes self-awareness or self-knowledge, the openness to diversity and acceptance that one’s own approach is not universal. This is sometimes referred to as “multicultural competency” or “intercultural competency” in literature. Intercultural fluency also requires the development of “interpersonal capacity”—the interpersonal skills that equip one to be more fluent in a variety of cultures. This includes cultural knowledge (or cultural literacy), some capacity to communicate across cultures (intercultural communication skills) and growing one’s network of social connections in various communities (intercultural capital). Working definitions of these terms and more on the concept of intercultural fluency can be found in Part III, Appendix 2.0.

5.4 The chart below outlines the various aspects, including the conceptual framework, that were taken into consideration in the development of the strategic plan and the corresponding actions. Overall Vision (Place & Promise)

> Strategic Goals (From consultation)

> Conceptual Framework > Targeted Areas of Actions & Measurement

A learning, research and work environment that fosters vibrant human interaction and community cohesion on campus.

To foster Dynamic Social Relationships Across Different Cultures To Build UBC’s Capacity for Courageous Conversations To establish Intercultural Understanding as Classroom Content To establish UBC as an International Thought-‐Leader in Intercultural Understanding

INTERCULTURAL FLUENCY

Develop Intercultural Awareness: Self-‐knowledge; acceptance that “own” approach is not universal (Multicultural Competency). Develop Interpersonal Capacity: Cultural knowledge (Cultural Literacy); communication skills (Intercultural Communication Skills); cultural and social capital (Intercultural Capital).

Leadership & Leadership Competencies Faculty & Curriculum Student Experience

Understanding of Social and Organisational Systems: Knowledge of norms and expectations; policies, protocols and processes; ability to work within systems.

10 Arai, Tatsushi. Conflict Across Cultures (2006), p. 58.


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Adjustments to Social and Organizational Systems: Understanding of norms and expectations; policies, protocols and processes; creation of systems change

5.6 Also reflected in the actions are, firstly, the need to cultivate an understanding of the social and organisation systems that affect the potential for intercultural understanding; and secondly, the adjustments in of these systems through policies, protocols and processes that support systemic change. Intercultural fluency, like Tatsushi Arai’s notion of cultural fluency and Elizabeth Plum’s notion of “intercultural intelligence”, can be cultivated over time, and includes a range of ability. It fundamentally requires the acknowledgement that students, faculty, staff and alumni have varying levels of fluency, from unconscious incompetence (not knowing you don’t know), to conscious competence (knowing that you know), and therefore requires different points of access and forms of engagement.

5.7 The curve below illustrates the application of the conceptual framework, the varying degrees of intercultural competence, and various change milestones over time. The acquisition of intercultural fluency must be supported by the adoption, institutionalization and internalization of norms and institutional rules that reinforce intercultural fluency, thereby leading to the normalization of intercultural understanding into UBC. These adjustments can be made at the same time as the development of intercultural fluency, but requires a high degree of institutional support.

Adapted from ODR, Inc., and TWI, Inc.

6.0 Guiding Values and Approach: Identifying the How Guiding Values and Approach provide the framework around how the University aims to achieve intercultural understanding. A common sense of the how is as important as consensus on the what. Inherent in the development of this plan are the following values, identified as helping to cultivate and embed intercultural understanding into every aspect of life at UBC. As previously noted, the preceding strategic plan does not provide solutions, but a framework for structural solutions to emerge. As units consider the operationalization of The Intercultural Promise, the University encourages using the following values and approach to inform the development or implementation of specific actions:


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6.1 People First Advancing intercultural aptitudes and inclusion amongst students, alumni, faculty, staff and community is, first and foremost, about people—their relationships, perceptions and interaction. One might see intercultural understanding as just a subset of people competencies, sometimes referred to as the “people tech” component of social sustainability.

6.2 Build on our Successes

Operationally, The Intercultural Promise builds on the many examples of excellence at UBC and builds upon the success of previously rolled out strategic plans. As a tactic of cost-reduction and improved coordination, the strategic plan is also committed to using existing infrastructure where possible, and will actively resist creating new infrastructure when avoidable.

6.3 Connecting the Dots (to be at least the sum of our parts) There is no shortage of expertise, existing activities and emerging ideas at UBC around increasing the intercultural understanding of students, faculty, staff and alumni. The biggest challenge, however, is connecting the expertise, and coordinating activities and resources, thereby reducing duplication and affecting a critical mass on campus. The establishing of new, more coordinated, organisational habits are particularly essential for UBC because of its size and historical design within intellectual silos.

6.4 Going Viral

The approach employed by the University can be characterized as “viral”, designed to facilitate the organic advancement of the idea and ideals of intercultural understanding throughout UBC’s many system. There is an expectation that intercultural understanding manifests in different ways specific to the host unit, department and faculty. Rather than a more structured authoritative approach, this strategic plan instead provides a framework for thinking and a set of initiatives that establish a foundation for structural solutions to emerge from within units.

6.5 Emergent Solutions The process of developing The Intercultural Promise has been one of co-authorship, through extensive and on-going collaboration and input from throughout the University. The goal of the intercultural understanding strategic plan however is not to provide UBC “the solution” or vision of what an intercultural campus looks and sounds like. Rather, it is to move UBC to a common place of understanding from where meaningful and tangible solutions can emerge.

7.0 Intercultural Understanding Matrix The matrix to the right provides more a detailed framework of the key points in the strategic plan needed for the development of unit-level planning and implementation of The Intercultural Promise. When evaluating potential activity, the matrix can be used to determine alignment with this strategic plan’s inherent ideas, language and approach. Unit-level activity, whether targeted at Management Competencies, Faculty and Curriculum, or Student Experience requires a balance of building on UBC’s strengths and existing assets (often through partnership), varying levels of engagement, and an intentional effort to build empathy and reduce anxiety. The red ring can be considered the general categories of activity that either develop intercultural awareness, interpersonal capacity (cultural literacy, intercultural communication skills, and intercultural capital), or facilitate systemic change.


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8.0 Building on Place and Promise

8.1 UBC’s Promise Students and faculty come from across Canada and around the world to be part of UBC’s vision of “an exceptional learning environment that fosters global citizenship, advances a civil and sustainable society, and supports outstanding research ....” UBC’s vision is also its promise, to both students and the public. In this way, the intercultural understanding needed to achieve this promise also represents for the University a responsibility to deliver. Core to global citizenry and notions of civil and sustainable multicultural and pluralist societies is in fact intercultural understanding.

8.2 Preceding Mid-Level Strategic Plans The University’s commitment to intercultural understanding will not be met solely through this strategic plan, as the aspirations and challenges are as complex and layered as UBC itself. Rather, intercultural understanding will be achieved as an extension of the existing mid-level strategic plans, the building upon and supplementing existing work and activity.

The framing of this strategic plan in this way is certainly strategic but more so practical. With a range of concurrent mid-level plans at play, it is critical that the goals around intercultural understanding not add to the burden on faculties, deans, department heads and units already advancing aspects of Place and Promise. Rather, at this stage of Place and Promise, is it imperative that initiatives fulfill as many strategic objectives as possible, spanning across as many mid-level plans as possible. See Part III, Appendix 3.0 (page 29) for a list of the mid-level strategic plans and example areas that this commitment will support.


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PART III APPENDICES

9.0 Appendix 1.0: How this draft was developed

9.1 Individual Interviews Over 200 individual people were consulted on the early development of the strategic plan. The list of faculty, staff, administration and students and community experts can be found online at: (link to come).

9.2 Group Consultancy A number of groups were consulted in the early phases of this plans development, including the Association of Christian Clubs, the Matter Society, Graduate Student Society, Jewish Students Association, the UBC Board of Governors, the Alumni Affairs Board of Directors, the Peer Program Executive, the Library Diversity Caucus, Counselling Services ...

9.3 Student Focus Groups Six focus groups were conducted and additional focus groups continue to be held. Special consideration was made to ensure as broad of spectrum of students were consulted, producing the list of Cultural Tensions, Anxieties and Intercultural Barriers for Students found in Section 3.3. In no way is this considered an exhaustive or completed consultation, but meant only to provide a starting point for on-going consultation, direction, feedback and accountability with students.

9.4 Peer Institution Review Prior to the development of the strategic plan, a peer institution review was conducted. It included a review of related activity at Columbia University; Harvard University; Leeds Metropolitan University; Oxford Brookes University; University of California, Berkeley; University of Melbourne; University of New South Wales; University of Sydney; University of Washington, Department of Psychology; and the University of Warwick.

9.5 Mentor Group The working draft of the strategic plan was developed with the guidance and direction of a mentor group consisting of Anna Kindler, Darrin Lehman, Janet Teasdale, Linc Kesler and Lisa Castle.

9.6 Advisory & Consultancy Groups

A number of advisory and consultancy groups have been established as part of the on-going development of this strategic plan. They include: a Faculty Subject Matter Expert Advisory Group (F1), a Graduate Student Subject Matter Expert Working Group (G1), an Undergraduate Student Consultancy Group (through PPEC), an Alumni Advisory Group, an Intercultural Staff Council (S1), and most importantly, an External Advisory Group composed of local community organisations with real expertise and experience in fostering intercultural understanding at the community level.

9.7 Individual Contribution

In addition to the Mentor Group, countless faculty and staff contributed to the development of the strategic plan through their ideas, input, feedback and mentorship. In particular the following: Andrew Scales, Brian Sullivan, Chris Lee, Darran Fernandez, Henry Yu, Indy Batth, Janet Mee,

John Robinson, Kuan Foo, Julia Peak, Karen Rolston, Katherine Beaumont, Linda McKnight,

Michelle LeBaron, Michelle Suderman, Patty Hambler, Peter Wenyenya, Rachel Kuske, Sham Pendleton, Shirin Eshghi,

Shirley Nakata, Sunera Thobani, Susan Grossman, Suzanne Jolly, Tom Patch, Walter Sudmant.

It is also the product of the input from numerous individual students, including Azim Wazeer, Brett Sinclair, Ekaterina Dovjenko, James Lin, Joy Richu, Mohamed Algarf and especially Mehjabeen Ali.


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10.0 Appendix 2.0: Conceptual Framework of Intercultural Fluency One of the strengths and challenges of the work around intercultural understanding is an extensive body of literature around intercultural and cross-cultural understanding—spanning across disciplines and professional fields, that frames the terms “multicultural competency,” “cross-cultural competency,” “intercultural competency” and “cultural intelligence” (CQ) to describe the attributes needed to understand, communicate and work effectively across and within different cultures. “Multicultural competency”, for example, as coming from cultural psychology has been an aspect of student affairs for decades. Similarly, “Intercultural Competence”, is commonly described as ’’the ability to think and act in interculturally appropriate ways.”11 In Human Resources and health professions these attributes are often described as “cultural competency”, and in nursing called “cultural safety.” Further complicating this area of work, the constructs around multi-, cross-, and inter-cultural competency continue to evolve. This strategic plan does not propose one framework over another, but provides a synthesis of and builds upon the available literature and usage. The literature review can be found at (link to come). Intercultural fluency builds upon the ideas of both academic fluency and “cultural fluency” to describe two areas that can be developed to form the intercultural awareness and interpersonal capacity needed for intercultural understanding. Within intercultural awareness is the development of self-knowledge, an openness to difference and an acceptance of other world views. Interpersonal capacity includes cultural knowledge—cognitive or experiential knowledge of cultural nuance and protocol (Cultural Literacy), the skills needed to communicate across cultures (Intercultural Communications Skills), and the establishing of meaningful social connections in various cultures (Intercultural Social Capital). “Cultural fluency is our readiness to anticipate, internalize, express, and help shape the process of meaning-making.”12 The development of cultural fluency is described by Tatsushi Arai a parallel to “the way we acquire fluency in a non-native language”, a process wherein “unfamiliar cultural habits of being and doing learned consciously are gradually submerged into our subconscious.” This process of cultural learning (or culture shifting) is often described in change management as the progression through the various levels of competency in the “Conscious Competence Model” (these include unconscious incompetence, conscious incompetence, conscious competence and unconscious competence). It might also be framed as the normalizing of cultural norms. Like the construct of multicultural competency, “developing cultural fluency [requires] the ongoing cultivation of self-awareness.”13 However, distinct to notion of cultural fluency is the development of “navigational capacity”, “the process of becoming an active participant in forming and transforming the universe of meaning-making process.”14 This is similar to having reached an advanced level of language-acquisition enabling one to write a poem or reflect one’s sense of humour. Navigational capacity might extend to include the understanding of and ability to move through the systems one is subject to. For the purposes of the strategic plan, the following working definitions were developed to provide specificity in what the University aims to foster. As the terms themselves are under constant semantic debate, the working definitions are more valuable for this strategic plan.

10.1 Intercultural Awareness (or Multicultural Competency) The strategic plan uses an expanded working definition of intercultural awareness, based on “the awareness, knowledge, and skills necessary to work effectively and ethically across cultural difference” (Pope and Reynolds, 1997), synonymous to “cultural competence” as used in medicine, health professions and human resources. In addition to this basic definition, this plan focuses on intercultural 11 Hammer, Bennett and Wiseman. Measuring intercultural sensitivity: The intercultural development inventory. International Journal of Intercultural Relations 27 (2003), p. 422. 12 Arai, Tatsushi. Conflict Across Cultures (2006), p. 58. 13 Ibid. p. 60. 14 Ibid. p. 58.


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awareness including a depth of understanding and appreciation for cultural pluralism and the inclusive ideals of Multiculturalism in Canada. It highlights the existing use of the “Ability to appreciate racial and ethnic diversity” and the “Ability to appreciate cultural and global diversity”15 as a desired outcome in students and faculty, but includes all forms of diversity. The strategic plan also acknowledges that the constructs of multicultural and cultural competence as problematic in not sufficiently addressing the impact of power relations between dominant and non-dominant groups. A 2007 study of quantitative measures of cultural competence most commonly used in medicine and in the health professions found that many measurement tools “either assume that both dominant and marginalized groups have the same experiences of multiculturalism.”16

UBC’s students, staff, faculty and alumni not only come from all over the world but bring to campus varying levels of intercultural awareness—appreciation for diversity, self-awareness as and awareness of members of dominant and marginalized groups, and varying cultural perspectives on difference. With this in mind, an expanded definition is necessary to acknowledges the vast body of work in the area of cultural and multicultural competence; challenge existing assumption around cultural competence; and position culturally diverse students, faculty and staff not as a problem but as a knowledge asset.

10.2 Cultural Literacy

For the purposes of the strategic plan, cultural literacy expands on the basic definition of “cultural knowledge”, or one’s “familiarity with and ability to understand the idioms, allusions, and informal content that create and constitute a dominant culture”17, to include the ability to understand and use culturally-specific behaviour or etiquette appropriate for meaningful engagement with other people. This is often referred to in employment sectors as “soft skills.” The examples of knowing when to bow versus shaking a hand, or interpret the avoidance of eye contact as a sign of respect, are essential aspects of intercultural fluency. Similarly, most foreign-born students require Canadian cultural literacy, which might include a familiarity with Canadians’ preoccupation with ice hockey or the weather. In an academic setting, cultural literacy might refer to knowing when and how to question a supervisor, or how “things get done” differently from one faculty to another. This generally includes knowing the acceptable threshold for the expression of emotion in the workplace. These soft skills are essential for cultural integration and employment in Canada. Culture shock might be considered the product of not having cultural literacy.

In light of the International Strategic Plan’s focus on China and India, the development of both Chinese and Indian cultural literacy through students and alumni would be considered a priority. Likewise, developing community advisory groups are critical for providing the University cultural literacy.

15 UBC Community Learning Initiative, Fourth Annual Report to The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation (October 2011), p. 55 16 Zofia Kumas -Tan, MSc, Brenda Beagan, MA, PhD, Charlotte Loppie, MA, PhD, Anna MacLeod, MA, and Blye Frank, MA, PhD. “Measures of Cultural Competence: Examining Hidden Assumptions”. Academic Medicine, Vol. 82, No. 6 / June 2007. p. 548 17 Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_literacy


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10.3 Intercultural Communication Skills Intercultural communication skills, often considered a subset of intercultural competency and certainly tied to cultural literacy, refers to the awareness and skills needed to communicate effectively across profound cultural difference. This strategic plan sites the definition used by the UBC Centre for Intercultural Communication (CIC):

For communication to succeed, words are not enough. Communication requires knowing the cultural rules of what to say, when to say it, and how to deliver the message. Culture can be national, professional, generational, organizational, etc. Therefore, every message is sent and received through numerous filters; our own filters and those of others. Intercultural communication focuses on how to communicate with awareness of these filters.

10.4 Intercultural Capital This strategic plan introduces the idea of intercultural capital, as an extension of social capital across cultural differences using Pierre Bourdieu’s definition of social capital: “the aggregate of the actual or potential resources which are linked to possession of a durable network of more or less institutionalized relationships of mutual acquaintance or recognition.”18 In other words, intercultural capital describes the value of having meaningful social relationships across different cultures.

It is unrealistic to aim at acquiring all the intercultural awareness, cultural literacy and intercultural communication skills to give one a sufficient degree of fluency for the complex diversity of UBC. It is intercultural capital that makes up for, and gradually eliminates, any deficiency. Friend-making across cultural difference is one of the top reasons students join cultural clubs and also a key element to cross-cultural peace making. Social capital within one’s cultural group is insufficient for social and economic mobility in Canada. The University encourages units and individuals to determine what level of proficiency they possess in any one of these areas, and focusing on those areas that are either of greatest interest and/or most strategic to develop further.

18 Bourdieu P. 1985. The forms of capital. In Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, ed. JG Richard- son, p. 248. New York: Greenwood


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11.0 Appendix 3.0: Building on Place and Promise The following describes how the operationalization of the Intercultural Understanding Strategic Plan, The Intercultural Promise, will support and advance the preceding eight mid-level strategic plans of Place and Promise, in their order of implementation. The following also includes three related strategic plans requiring advances in intercultural understanding as an integral aspect of their success, including: Valuing Difference: A Strategy for Advancing Equity and Diversity at UBC; UBC Vancouver’s Graduate Student Strategy and Operational Plan (2010-2015); and UBC Library Strategic Directions, Goals and Actions (2010).

11.1 Aboriginal Engagement Strategic Plan As an extension of the Aboriginal Engagement Strategic Plan, the emergent vision for a more intercultural campus—one that fosters vibrant human interaction and community cohesion—must include a substantially greater sense of belonging for aboriginal students, staff and faculty. This is tied to the original imperative of the Aboriginal Engagement Strategic Plan, addressing the proportionately small numbers of aboriginal students.

For the commitment to intercultural understanding, this begins with acknowledging thousand-year old wisdom and thought around intercultural exchange and dialogue that is indigenous to B.C., and establishing these guidelines as UBC norms. Secondly, this involves actively pushing for greater awareness and empathetic understanding of aboriginal issues and history amongst UBC’s diverse student population. The establishing of intercultural understanding at UBC requires this knowledge be understood, across cultures, as fundamental to the UBC experience.

The FNHL has established guidelines for sustaining a safe place for high-risk conversation that will be used as a model and standard across campus. Moreover, the development and implementation of initiatives aimed at improving classroom climate will provide a template for similar activity around intercultural understanding, equity and diversity.

11.2 Sustainability

The strategic plan on intercultural understanding is the direct extension of the University’s aspirations around social sustainability. Since UBC’s Sustainability Strategy, Inspirations and Aspirations (2007), the University has defined “a truly livable campus environment” as one that is “vibrant, culturally rich, healthy, equitable, and diverse”, all part of being a “Model Sustainable Community.”19 This intersectionality between biodiversity and sociocultural diversity has carried through to the current goal for the University towards social sustainability:

“Foster social sustainability through teaching, research, and community engagement that promote vibrant human interaction and community cohesion.”

Similarly, the “net positive” philosophy of the Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability (CIRS) helps to set the emergent vision for intercultural understanding and social sustainability at UBC: to foster a social environment and institutional practices that produce a “net positive” in social terms; thereby producing a university that can take historic inequity, conflict and intercultural tension and convert them into “dynamic human interaction and social cohesion.”

There are also many aspects of this strategic plan that are modelled after the implementation of the Inspirations and Aspirations. This includes: a focus on “emergent vision and solutions” wherein students, faculty, staff, alumni and external community will determine the vision of a more intercultural UBC Vancouver campus; establishing an inventory and coding of courses wherein intercultural understanding is taught in curriculum or experiential learning; and the formation of an external advisory group.

19 Inspirations and Aspirations. UBC (2007), p. 19.


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11.3 Focus on People Becoming an interculturally fluent campus is, first and foremost, about people—their relationships, perceptions and interaction. In aiming to be workplace of “vibrant human interaction and community cohesion” taking into account profound cultural differences, the commitment to intercultural understanding advances all five of the strategic goals found in Focus on People, beginning with:

“A healthy workplace builds capacity within the organisation for social and financial sustainability, and cultivates resiliency within each member of that community.”20

This involves ensuring employees and managers have the necessary skills, competencies, cultural fluency and supports to thrive in a complexly diverse workplace. Tied to this is effectively recruiting and retaining talent who possess these prerequisites. It requires that employees and management have advanced levels of intercultural fluency, and that intercultural competencies be established as a basic requirement for management.

Fostering the sense of being listened to, respected and valued, requires leadership and management practices (and possibly standards) appropriate to UBC’s diversity. Likewise, the advancement of intercultural understanding at UBC, that does not also improve the recruitment and retention of employees of under-represented groups, particularly in management and senior management, would be considered a failure. With that in mind, the most interculturally sophisticated talent will demand an environment conducive for diversity of thought.

Most importantly, advancing intercultural understanding will involve modifying many of UBC’s path-dependent systems—making adjustments to the institutional rules that affect what people do everyday. This might include updates to job descriptions and capacity building around managing employee conflict. It may also include integration into performance management and employee branding. This work and expertise resides in Human Resources, and subsequently, no department of UBC can implement institutional change more effectively and more meaningfully as HR.

11.4 International Strategic Plan (March 2011)

Intercultural understanding is often synonymous with internationalization and international partnerships. In this way, this strategic plan is a very natural reinforcement and extension to the UBC International Strategic Plan:

There is a strong international presence at UBC: there are students from more than 140 countries pursuing degrees on the UBC Vancouver campus, and students from 65 countries pursuing degrees on the UBC Okanagan campus. This multicultural student population reflects UBC’s diverse local community; British Columbia is home to significant populations with roots elsewhere in the world. For more than twenty years, UBC has been building strong academic ties with universities around the world, beginning with our first formal partnership with Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Since then, we have broadened our global reach, building on a foundation of strong research collaboration, active student mobility and internationally relevant student learning.21

This context sets the stage for intercultural understanding at UBC. UBC’s diverse student population and connection to the Asia Pacific region is one of UBC’s strengths. It is the fostering of interconnectedness between this diversity that is also the University’s challenge.

Advancing intercultural understanding ultimately benefits internationalization at UBC, in both the student experience and research excellence. As the UBC International Strategic Plan focuses priority on China and India, particularly to “Raise UBC’s profile in India so that we become known as a destination of choice for study, research and international partnership.”22

20 Focus on People, p. 9. 21 UBC International Strategic Plan, p. 4. 22 Ibid. p. 20.


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Internationalization also includes stronger recruitment and strengthening alumni ties:

Recruitment of undergraduate and graduate students from India is an important element in our strategy for engagement; we aim to more than double the number of Indian students at UBC. Not only do Indian students represent a huge pool of talent, we need to build links through establishing an alumni base in India. There are about 200,000 Indian students going abroad to study in university.23

The University aims “to maintain our recruitment strengths” in China, and make stronger the connection with alumni in Hong Kong and mainland China.

Although our alumni links in Hong Kong are strong, more could be done to increase and strengthen alumni links by building a more systematic engagement of alumni in mainland China. Alumni should include those who have been visiting scholars and faculty as well as students. UBC’s Asia Pacific Regional Office in Hong Kong could play a leading role in this.24

In light of this, the strategic plan on intercultural understanding will concurrently focus on advancing students’ cultural competency and cultural fluency in regards to China and India (aka. China Competencies and India Competencies), taking advantage of expertise found in the Institute of Asian Research and Asian Studies, and drawing from the experience of UBC’s alumni throughout Asia and India. A more intercultural campus, that is better equipped to support international students from China and India ultimately improves the student experience, retention, word-of-mouth reputation and reduces the cost of recruitment.

11.5 Research Excellence (April 2011) Research excellence and intercultural understanding are self-perpetuating as explicit in the UBC Research Strategy:

UBC’s commitment to intercultural understanding in Place and Promise also has implications for a research strategy in that developing a better understanding is the goal of some of the research effort at UBC, and sharing that understanding through public debate and dialogue is an important means for our research to have impact on the broader society. Because of UBC’s emphasis on Asia, we have a particular obligation to increase intercultural understanding between Asian and North American cultures.25

Both community engagement and intercultural understanding are critical to making UBC’s research activity relevant, meaningful and impactful. As previously mentioned, the prioritizing of Asia in both the International and Research Strategic Plans requires fluency in Asian cultures and society.

11.6 Student Learning

Student Learning, Research Excellence and Community Engagement are in fact the goal of intercultural understanding within in an academic institution. In the context of UBC’s multicultural student population, the University’s commitment to providing a “transformative student learning through outstanding teaching and research, enriched educational experiences, and rewarding campus life” implies an advanced intercultural and international experience inside and outside of the classroom, throughout a student’s career. Moreover, the greatest hands-on experience, training support and intercultural expertise reside in units who service and support the complexly diverse population of students.

23 UBC International Strategic Plan, p. 22. 24 Ibid. p. 18. 25 UBC Research Strategy, p. 10.


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This especially includes at least the following units whose work in supporting students already actively advance the University’s objectives towards, diversity, equity, accessibility, social justice and social sustainability:

• Access and Diversity • The Community Service Initiative (aka. Community Service Learning) • Counselling Services • The Global Lounge • Jumpstart (International and Domestic Student Orientation) • The Peer Programs in general; and specifically Equity Ambassadors, Wellness Peers, and

International Peer Program • Student Leadership Conference

These are well-supported units and initiatives with substantial infrastructure and are in themselves a significant asset to all aspects of Place and Promise. With this in mind, the operationalization of the intercultural understanding strategy must be done in partnership with, and many cases through, the existing community of practice and student-focused programs, generally supported through Student Development and Services (SD&S), the Office of the Ombudsperson to Students and the Equity Office. Not only do their activity already advance intercultural understanding, but in many instances are seen as the world leader in fostering the intercultural experiences of students. This also includes establishing partnership and alignment with student-run organisations, such as the Alma Mater Society (especially in coordination with the AMS Equity Commissioner), the Graduate Student Society (GSS) and various clubs on campus committed to intercultural understanding and student constituency groups, whose activity addresses issues of social cohesion at UBC.

11.7 Alumni Engagement Strategic Plan (2006; 2009) UBC’s 250,000 alumni are diverse, with young alumni as diverse as the current student population with extremely loyal and active alumni all over the world. As the Alumni Affairs Strategic Plan aims to “double active alumni engagement over the next seven years”26, the multicultural diversity of UBC’s alumni presents an unprecedented opportunity towards “building UBC’s presence in key communities” all over the world. Similarly, a “positive alumni and student feeling”, resulting in lifelong relationships with the University, requires the intercultural understanding to meaningfully connect with UBC’s diverse alumni. Likewise, UBC’s alumni in China and India are an invaluable asset for both young alumni and the University in providing the social capital and cultural fluency to be competitive in these markets, and effectively recruit and build partnerships, respectively. UBC’s social contribution to fostering inclusive and just societies is ultimately achieved through the active role and engagement of UBC’s alumni within their communities, and with UBC’s young and future alumni.

11.8 Community Engagement (2012) The University’s aspirations to raise the overall standards of excellence in community engagement within the diversity of the communities that surround UBC Vancouver necessitate high levels of intercultural understanding. This includes the interconnectedness with the ethno-culturally diverse communities where many of UBC’s commuter students and alumni live, the community organisations that service these communities and the communities closest in proximity to the University, such as Acadia, University Neighbourhood Association, etc. In this way, advances in intercultural understanding help to facilitate deeper and more meaningful community engagement for students, alumni, staff and faculty. 26 Alumni Affairs Strategic Plan, p. 2.


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In the same way that intercultural understanding and research excellence are reciprocal, such is the same with community engagement, as will be evident in the concurrent Community Engagement Strategic Plan. The learning, research and service-driven partnership of students, alumni, staff and faculty with communities in the Lower Mainland also facilitate the development of intercultural fluency. There are numerous examples of community engagement at UBC that are also examples of excellence at intercultural understanding. This includes: UBC’s Community Service Initiative (CSI), the Immigrant Vancouver Ethnographic Field School (IVEFS), Continuing Studies, the Chan Centre, the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre (IKBLC) and the Museum of Anthropology (MOA). This also includes community service learning in curriculum, as seen in HKIN 489D, Interculturalism, Health and Physical Activity, for example.

11.9 Valuing Difference: A Strategy for Advancing Equity and Diversity at UBC At the heart of UBC’s commitment to Intercultural Understanding is the further commitment towards respect and equity, as central values to Place and Promise: The UBC Plan. For this reason, the work and mandates of Access and Diversity, the Equity Office, the Office of the Ombudsperson for Students and Senior Advisor to the Provost on Women are interconnected. All of these areas share the common mandate of making the University a fairer, more equitable and accessible place to learn, teach and work. This interconnection lives in many places, including the University’s strategic plan on accessibility, diversity and equity, Valuing Difference: A Strategy for Advancing Equity and Diversity at UBC. Valuing Differences is essential to realizing the University’s commitment to building intercultural aptitudes and inclusion amongst students, alumni, faculty, staff and community. It also articulates the ethical imperatives for advancing intercultural understanding as contributing to concurrent goals around equity:

That some disadvantaged groups remain underrepresented in some sectors and at some levels of the University community; that some students, staff and faculty continue to feel excluded or marginalized; and that action is required to address these concerns.27

Advancing intercultural understanding therefore inherently addresses the related issue of exclusion, by aiming to foster an inclusive and empathetic environment, encouraging and supporting the actions required to eliminate exclusion, and fostering interconnectedness across cultural difference. More specifically, advancing intercultural understanding involves pushing forward the actions items of Valuing Difference around Curriculum and Scholarship28 and Classroom Climate.29 The intercultural understanding strategic plan aims to further strengthen the coordination and synergy between the activities of the community of practice, and in doing so, aims to foster greater clarity for students, faculty and staff. Each of these units has an educational and campus culture role and contribute to the operationalization of the UBC Statement on Respectful Environment for Students, Faculty and Staff30, therefore, there does exist some overlap. The core functions of each of these departments is however distinct. For more information on how Access and Diversity, the Equity Office, the Office of the Ombudsperson for Students and Senior Advisor to the Provost on Women are interconnected, please see Appendix 4.0.

11.10 UBCV’s Graduate Student Strategy and Operational Plan (July 2010) The strategic plan on intercultural understanding will look to support graduate students in a targeted way, so as to take advantage of the unique opportunity they present the University. In being a point of intersection and interconnectedness between undergraduate students (often as Teaching Assistants) and faculty, higher levels of intercultural fluency in UBC’s graduate students directly benefits undergraduate

27 Valuing Difference: A Strategy for Advancing Equity and Diversity at UBC (2010), p. 2. 28 Ibid. p. 13. 29 Ibid. p. 16. 30 See: http://www.hr.ubc.ca/respectful-environment/


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students, their peers, and their supervising faculty. In this way, graduate students, have great potential to drive a culture shift at UBC towards becoming a culture of intercultural understanding. Advancing intercultural understanding is an embedded aspect of UBCV’s Graduate Student Strategy and Operational Plan, especially as the extension of the general objective around recruiting, retaining and engaging a “diverse graduate student community of the highest caliber that welcomes and supports aboriginal and international students”31; in providing “an intellectual and social environment based on quality, equity and mutual respect;” and in “enabling students to become outstanding global citizens who contribute to a civil and sustainable society.” Fostering intercultural understanding in graduate students is essential for their future success and is therefore an inherent aspect of the Graduate Pathways to Success (GPS) Program.

Moreover, intercultural understanding is essential in addressing the difference in cultural expectations between graduate students and supervisors, as explicit in the existing workshops aimed at improving cross-cultural supervision. The ability for graduate students to make sense of and find a place in UBC’s complex diversity requires advancing intercultural understanding. Similarly, advancing the intercultural aptitudes of supervising faculty directly improves the graduate student experience.

11.11 UBC Library Strategic Directions, Goals and Actions (February 2010)

It is imperative that UBC’s libraries be seen as centres of excellence around intercultural understanding. On a practical level, the staff and faculty of UBC’s libraries interface with UBC’s diverse students and faculty, and are often a point of interdisciplinary contact, requiring the highest levels of intercultural aptitude. More importantly, the library is the symbolic heart of UBC’s campus culture: the values modelled at the library affect and influence all students and faculty. With this in mind, it is strategically important that UBC’s libraries exude an intercultural sensibility.

This is accomplished, firstly, in the materials and resources that support the advancement of intercultural understanding made available in the library; and secondly, through the strategic directions around community engagement:

Through local, national and international collaboration we exchange perspectives, expertise, and resources with diverse communities. Our community engagement encourages effective use of resources and contributes to the economic, cultural and social well being of the people of B.C. and beyond.32

Subsequently, in partnership with the Library Diversity Caucus and the School of Library, Archive and Information Services (SLAIS) a central repository of scholarly resources supporting student and faculty pursuits in intercultural understanding are being developed.

31 Ibid. p. 1 32 UBC Library Strategic Directions, Goals and Actions (2010). p. 5.


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12.0 Appendix 4.0: Key Related Administrative Units and Departments The work and mandates of Access and Diversity, the Equity Office, the Office of the Ombudsperson for Students and the Senior Advisor to the Provost on Women Faculty, are deeply interconnected and often easily confused. The following section provides a comparative description of the respective roles.

12.1 Access and Diversity is mandated to provide academic support, primarily servicing (but not exclusively) students with a variety of needs that affect their academic performance and quality of campus experience. Its core function is to “create an inclusive living and learning environment in which all students can thrive.” Access and Diversity’s unique strength is in ensuring students with disability are provided the necessary academic supports and accommodations. They can assist and/or facilitate in the diagnosis of learning disabilities, and work very closely with Counselling and Student Health Services. They are the student’s advocate to faculty in the regard to accommodations. Because of this department’s expertise, in rare cases it is also asked to provide supports to faculty and staff. The Equity Ambassadors, a student volunteer group is also staffed out of Access and Diversity. Access and Diversity is lead by Janet Mee and is an integrated part of Making a Difference, the Office of the VP Students Strategic Plan.

12.2 The Equity Office oversees the University’s compliance to and management of UBC’s equity policy and

manages the University’s legal obligations to Canada’s equity law as it pertains to the equity-seeking groups (which includes women, visible minority groups, Aboriginal Peoples, people with disability and sexual orientation). Its core function is to “prevent discrimination and harassment on campus, to provide procedures for handling complaints and to coordinate UBC’s employment and educational equity program.” This office’s strength is in its capacity to assess equity complaints and in that it is empowered to investigate all departments of the University and is responsible for managing equity related conflict and conflict resolution. In other words, is able to provide fair determination for units, departments and faculties when a complaint violates equity policy or law, investigate and resolve the issue. For this reason, it is structurally separate from all other diversity and equity related units. The Equity Office’s oversight includes all matters pertaining to employment equity, and also manages the University’s official statements on diversity and equity (see: http://diversity.ubc.ca/). It’s strategic plan Valuing Difference: A Strategy for Advancing Equity and Diversity at UBC, was adopted in February 2009. It reports to the Office of the Provost and VP Academic.

12.3 The Office of the Ombudsperson for Students “works with UBC community members to ensure

students are treated fairly and can learn, work and live in a fair, equitable and respectful environment. Reporting directly to the President, the office is an independent, impartial and confidential resource for students at UBC Vancouver, jointly funded by the AMS, GSS and UBC” (see http://ombudsoffice.ubc.ca/) The Office of the Ombudsperson for Students plays a major role in supporting students who are experiencing challenges navigating UBC’s systems, particularly when conflict between students and the University arise, such as academic appeals.

12.4 By contrast, the Senior Advisor to the Provost on Women Faculty is an integrated member of the

Office of the Provost and VP Academic, mandated to lead the institutional transformation towards an enhanced environment for women faculty at UBC. Working in collaboration with departments, Faculties, institutes and centres across UBC as well as peer institutions internationally, this position moves forward the initiatives outlined for the position—policy development, promoting advancement and leadership, ongoing research and assessment, and transformation of the environment. Rebuilding practices and structures for review, rewards, recognition, advancement, and involvement will be a major contribution to UBC’s visibility and recruitment objectives, establishing UBC as a leader in these initiatives.

12.5 The Director of Intercultural Understanding Strategy Development is also integrated into the Office of

the Provost and VP Academic, providing leadership, coordination, consultation and overseeing the most basic shared initiatives around intercultural understanding. This position is mandated to foster interconnectedness between all related units and advisory groups with a focus on fostering social sustainability on campus.


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