The SWE Graduate Community would like to recognize GradSWE UC Berkeley with a GradSWE Established Group Award for their continued commitment to the SWE Core Value of Mutual Support by supporting their members though the Covid-19. UC Berkeley fostered an inclusive environment through mentoring, socials and workshops.
In their words:
UC Berkeley aimed to create an inclusive environment starting each year when we greet new and returning students with an ice cream social and enroll members in our informal mentoring program called ‘GWE Buddies.’ This program pairs first year and returning graduate students, so they can support one another throughout the semester as friends. Throughout the year they continue to engage with new graduate students with a PhD 101 workshop series that teaches basics on grad school and life as an adult. They were able to engage members from all backgrounds, and work to support minorities by attending and hosting events that highlight and address the issues that minorities face in STEM and in the United States in general.
In their words:
UC Berkeley aimed to create an inclusive environment starting each year when we greet new and returning students with an ice cream social and enroll members in our informal mentoring program called ‘GWE Buddies.’ This program pairs first year and returning graduate students, so they can support one another throughout the semester as friends. Throughout the year they continue to engage with new graduate students with a PhD 101 workshop series that teaches basics on grad school and life as an adult. They were able to engage members from all backgrounds, and work to support minorities by attending and hosting events that highlight and address the issues that minorities face in STEM and in the United States in general.
UC Berkeley strives for integrity at all levels of our society, and supports our members on their personal journeys by offering events that allow them to confront their implicit biases and understand the roots of racism, while maintaining respect for everyone in the room. We also support the mental and physical health of our members by offering socials, CAPS (Counseling and Psychological Services) coffee chat, and yoga and meditation workshops. In addition to personal growth, we support our members on their professional journeys by allowing them to connect and learn from experts. Their Speaker Series gives members a chance to interact with successful engineers from multiple backgrounds in different career paths, allowing them to understand options for the next steps in their lives. Their events provide an open and safe space to come together as a group and look out for one other while we discuss and share experiences.
In the midst of the events of the past year and a fully online campus, their section operations were flipped on their head. And yet, they were able to persevere to not only continue serving their members with a variety of career oriented events, but also took the opportunity to better address the desires of members to be trained in issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion. In doing so, they did not ask their Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC) members to add several anti-racist trainings and community engagements. Instead, they wrote and published a statement on Black Lives Matter which included action items for our section. This included founding the Big IDEAs Book & Media Club as well as a member-led webinar series on topics like the challenges of being a feminist today, unconscious bias, and the power of role models who look like you.
With conferences going virtual, UC Berkeley was able to sponsor more students' professional development. In total, they sent 5 students to WE20, 9 attendees to weSTEM, and 10 attendees to the Silicon Valley Women In Engineering Conference.
This year, they founded the GWE Buddies program with 25 first year and 25 established graduate students. This program requires pairs to meet once monthly and attend at least one of our PhD 101 workshops or other professional or personal development events per semester.
They also found Zoom fatigue to be real among members. Therefore, they grouped monthly organizational meetings with social events like trivia to make meetings more engaging. They also transitioned to an incentive program that allowed virtual event attendees
to purchase their own food and snacks from local restaurants. After this policy was enacted, they quickly saw a return to pre-covid member engagement levels and received feedback full of relief and gratitude.
In the midst of the events of the past year and a fully online campus, their section operations were flipped on their head. And yet, they were able to persevere to not only continue serving their members with a variety of career oriented events, but also took the opportunity to better address the desires of members to be trained in issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion. In doing so, they did not ask their Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC) members to add several anti-racist trainings and community engagements. Instead, they wrote and published a statement on Black Lives Matter which included action items for our section. This included founding the Big IDEAs Book & Media Club as well as a member-led webinar series on topics like the challenges of being a feminist today, unconscious bias, and the power of role models who look like you.
With conferences going virtual, UC Berkeley was able to sponsor more students' professional development. In total, they sent 5 students to WE20, 9 attendees to weSTEM, and 10 attendees to the Silicon Valley Women In Engineering Conference.
This year, they founded the GWE Buddies program with 25 first year and 25 established graduate students. This program requires pairs to meet once monthly and attend at least one of our PhD 101 workshops or other professional or personal development events per semester.
They also found Zoom fatigue to be real among members. Therefore, they grouped monthly organizational meetings with social events like trivia to make meetings more engaging. They also transitioned to an incentive program that allowed virtual event attendees
to purchase their own food and snacks from local restaurants. After this policy was enacted, they quickly saw a return to pre-covid member engagement levels and received feedback full of relief and gratitude.
