Director of Faculty Development and Diversity Tuesda Roberts appeared before the Student Government Association on Tuesday to explain her new role at the college, telling members that she deals mostly with faculty.
“Essentially, my role is a support role for faculty as they consider, explore, and implement some of the goals that they have around diversity and equity,” she said to members of joint session. “That could mean taking a look at their syllabi [and] helping them to consider syllabus construction or course design as an act of power, and helping them to think through particular assignments or activities.”
Roberts, who was hired by Emerson over the summer, became the first to hold her current position.
“I am a part of a team of staff and administrators and faculty members who are committed to discussing and assessing these issues [diversity and equity] and figuring out what can we do as a community to address these so that people feel heard,” she said.
Roberts also noted that she develops and facilitates workshops related to diversity and equity for faculty members.
Two representatives from Emerson’s Public Art Think Tank, a group dedicated to promoting public art on campus, also spoke to joint session on Tuesday, asking for opinions on their new initiatives.
One initiative, activating the programming displays in the Little Building to showcase student work, garnered attention from SGA members.
“There’s probably a lot of people on campus who would love to have a little space to program and to display content of different natures,” Distinguished Curator-in-Residence Leonie Bradbury said.
Executive Vice President Will Palauskas said student art exhibits are uncommon on campus.
“There’s a lot of beautiful artwork, but it’s exhibited so rarely,” Palauskas said. “I mean that incredible student work is just kind of living in magazines. I feel like they [student artists] would probably love the chance for it to featured and celebrated somewhere for students.”
Before SGA hosted Tuesday’s guest speakers, members of the organization had a short conversation regarding their upcoming December elections. Conversation centered around increasing voter turnout following last week’s special elections that saw no candidates on the ballot.
