[597] in Discussion of MIT-community interests
Monday's Forum
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Zhelinrentice L Scott)
Wed May 9 18:33:14 2001
Message-Id: <200105092231.SAA06114@m4-167-2.mit.edu>
To: mit-talk@MIT.EDU, nh-post@MIT.EDU, ifc-talk@MIT.EDU, peace-list@MIT.EDU,
random@MIT.EDU, ec-discuss@MIT.EDU, senior-haus@MIT.EDU
Date: Wed, 09 May 2001 18:31:57 -0400
From: Zhelinrentice L Scott <zlscott@MIT.EDU>
An Invitation to a Campus-Wide Forum
Devoted to
Building a Better MIT Community:
Looking Beyond the ATO Incident
Monday, May 14, 2001
1:30-3:00 p.m.
Wong Auditorium E51
The recent incident that occurred at ATO hurt our community. It is a sign,
maybe a wake-up call, to all of us, that we need to learn how to better
live, work, and learn together as a richly endowed diverse community.
When something like this happens, the test of our community is measured in
how we respond, not just in anger and frustration-these are appropriate
feelings when one or more of us is disrespected-but in what we learn from
the incident and in the actions we take to recommit to making MIT a place
where we learn from our differences.
That's why we will come together next Monday, to both reflect and to look
beyond the specific incident.
We will do so because society expects more from us and we should expect
more from ourselves. As leaders, today and tomorrow, we must be skilled in
working, learning, and leading in diverse settings or we will not be
successful. It is part of our collective responsibility to ensure that all
who come through MIT-students, staff, administrators, and faculty-build the
skills required to be productive leaders and citizens in our diverse world.
But we know that this takes work. Living, learning , and working together
in diverse settings requires we each understand the dynamics of diversity
and work at building the personal and group process skills needed to
translate diversity into positive personal and group, team, and
organizational results.
And, finally, it requires that we build a culture that views our different
backgrounds, orientations, and experiences as learning opportunities and
provide adequate resources and opportunities to develop and practice these
skills.
This forum is one of those opportunities-to use an unacceptable incident as
a teachable moment-to learn from it, reflect on what it says about what we
need to do to look beyond, and to ask what we need to do to make MIT a
better community for all of us.
