By Liam Reilly
@liampreilly852
The Communication/Sports Journalism program held its first ever “Town Hall” on Monday afternoon in the Stitzer Presentation Room of Judd Gymnasium. Dr. Leo L. Hwang, the assistant academic dean in the College of Natural Sciences at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, led a workshop with COSJ students.
Hwang’s presentation was centered around the importance of belonging and how it relates to diversity, equity and inclusion. The workshop provided students with knowledge about expanding skills that would help them succeed as a communications and journalism professional in the modern world.
According to Hwang, there are four degrees of belonging: essential, relational, emotional and ideal.
The essential degree is where basic needs are met and where one is given the access to accomplish the job. The relational degree is where a person’s contributions are valued, accepted and a relationship is prioritized. The emotional degree is where the identity of a person is understood and their “unique attributes are assets that are utilized,” according to Hwang. The highest degree of belonging is the ideal of a person having an internal and external sense of belonging in balance.
One key component of Hwang’s presentation was his ability to involve the audience and have it become an interactive conversation. Hwang had students list areas where they can create a sense of belonging.
To Hwang, having students be active participants is crucial to a good presentation.
“I always think interaction helps you learn better,” Hwang said. “It helps you think beyond just being a passive absorber of information and I always think that’s really important.”
Students were then asked to think about a time in their lives when they felt like they belonged.
For junior Reese Merritt, that moment happened before the start of his sophomore year.
“The story I told was when I became a pre-camp leader last year,” Merritt said. “I was a brand new leader and didn’t know the lay of the land, but the old leaders treated my ideas, my thoughts and who I was as though they were valued as much as everyone else’s.”
The workshop was orchestrated by Dr. Anne Wheeler, Chair of the Department of Literature, Writing, and Journalism, and Dr. Fadia Nordtveit, Assistant Professor of Communications. They wanted to host an inclusion workshop for the COSJ department.
“We felt that our department has many different growth points,” Nordveit said. “If you look at the professional development workplace, everywhere that is progressive and wants to grow prioritizes inclusion, diversity and equity workshops.”
Nordveit met Hwang when they were both graduate students at the University of Massachusetts 15 years ago and took a geosciences class together with a joint mentor. Their connection and the focus of Hwang’s work made him an easy choice for the workshop.
“We wanted his approach for our students to make the culture in our department and campus friendlier so we can all feel we can contribute to creating belonging for others,” said Nordveit. “The big takeaway was learning how to produce inclusion and belonging for not only ourselves but for others.”
Hwang has been in the field of diversity, equity and inclusion for several years and has had many of his works published. In 2020 he wrote, “Focusing on Assets: Action Research for an Inclusive and Diverse Workplace,” a handbook about diverse communities. The workshop has been a long-term project for Hwang.
To Merritt, the workshop was an important event for Springfield College.
“We emphasize belonging, diversity, equity and inclusion a lot here so to be able to be in a space where you get to learn about more, especially from outside minds, is always an opportunity we want to take,” Merritt said.
Photo by Liam Reilly