Management Students Work on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Assignment

Caroline Butler ‘22

Every time I leave the gates of Providence College, I am reminded of the “PC bubble” we all live in. While we are extremely lucky to go to such a beautiful school, as soon as you leave campus you are confronted with harsh reality–ungroomed grass, rundown projects, and homeless men and women. I find it so uncomfortable that so much wealth can lie in the middle of poverty. I truly am reminded everyday about how lucky I am to be able to attend this college and continue to grow. Nonetheless, it makes me feel guilty that our society does not give everyone an equal chance, and the majority of the time it is due to race and/or socioeconomic status. In conclusion, I just felt that this picture, which was taken right outside of our utopian campus, represents a world that stems from poverty and a lack of diversity and inclusion.

Patrick Christie ’23

I stumbled onto this picture late last night following the conclusion of the Giants Eagles Thursday Night Football Game and it spoke to me. I have thought about the number of implications of putting this photo in here for this portion of the assignment, and what I may be suggesting. Through Michelle Obama, Ibram X. Kendi, and The New York Times, my biggest and broadest conclusion on this topic right now is a misunderstanding outside of African Americans on just how bad this situation is. There are many people who believe they have a complete understanding of how awful this situation is, and how far back it really goes. There are four elements of this photo I will examine: the football, Carson Wentz, Jabrill Peppers, and the Eagles all black uniform. First, the football is the actual power and ability to make progress. Carson Wentz represents White America, as he runs away with the football, and subsequently the ability to make the proper change in this country. Third, Jabrill Peppers represents Black America, as they try to get the attention of White America as well as the football, so they can try and move closer to the necessary amount of progress. Finally, the Eagles all black uniforms being worn by White America, represents the belief of White America that they completely understand the plight of Black America. But it is just a uniform, and it will come off at the end of the day, when it gets dirty you will clean it to tell yourself there is nothing wrong and every proper step to make progress has been taken. I will say, the uniform also represents White America’s pursuit to understand the plight of Black America, they want to help, but they need to go beyond wearing a uniform and saying they care, they must show it too. 

Beah Cyrus ’22

This is a painting I created that represents the ability I believe that everyone has to transcend. Throughout history people of color have always been put down and told they they cannot do certain things and today we have been able to overcoming this and do those exact things. I have also been told that it would be difficult to achieve my goals as a woman in this society but I transcend by looking beyond those criticisms and going after my dreams regardless just like many successful women I see and read about today. There have also been false sayings that every white person is racist and I know that there are many white people who transcend those judgements and prove that they are allies in the movement for equality. I am not the best artist but to me this painting represents that we are all in this together.

Kerrigan DiPippo ’22

I started this poem as a way to just jot down my thoughts in the summer after the death of George Floyd. I was inspired by the marches that persisted all around the country. After viewing and listening to the various stories I felt the same sense of inspiration. I added more to the poem to express how I was feeling. In this poem, I am angry and also confused. When looking at the state of the world, it is alarming and disheartening. Many aspects of it don’t make sense to me which makes me frustrated. At the end of this poem, I try to ignite a change. This represents my true belief that there must be enormous changes in the way we treat one another and the way our systems function in order to see a difference. 

Kayli Fagan ’23

For my creative portion of the assignment I decided to do a drawing. The drawing is very simple, but I feel like it captures some of the prominent lessons that I learned from the readings and the talks. The man sitting in the tree is representative of America. The apples are opportunity. Clearly, the man takes his opportunity for granted, just dangling it off the side of the tree. He also has another opportunity waiting over his head for whenever he feels like grabbing it. However, below the man in the tree is another man reaching for the apple but falling just short of grabbing it. This man represents minorities in America. Minorites are told that America is full of opportunity, yet whenever they try to grab it, they never seem to be able to get the chance 

Caroline Franks ’22

This picture was taken by me this past summer, and it shows a vigil to remember the life of George Floyd. When the video released of George Floyd getting murdered, I was frustrated and sad. I felt extremely helpless. The second I found out that my town was hosting a ceremony for him, I was certain that I’d go. While being there, I heard many different people talk and voice their similar frustration. It was such a memorable time for me because I knew just by being there, I was contributing to the fight for justice. After this vigil, there were 5 more, and I attended all of them. It was heartening to see the community come together for such an importance cause. 

Catherine Romsey ’23

 The drawing depicts a zebra above two individuals shaking hands. The drawing is supposed to be a visual representation of what diversity is. Diversity as defined by the book, Organizational Behavior, represents the multitude of individual differences and similarities that exist among people. In addition, diversity is comprised of surface-level characteristics (visible qualities i.e. gender) and deep-level characteristics (“invisible” qualities i.e. beliefs). In the drawing, the purpose of the zebra is to show that even though every zebra appears the same there is always one thing, one stripe that sets one zebra apart from another. Subsequently, the purpose behind incorporating two shaking hands is to highlight that having diversity in the workplace is an excellent way to introduce different perspectives and ideas that everyone can benefit from. 

Adrina DeMarzo ’22

I wrote this poem based on the connection between my own reflection and Black Like Me. I did not have a very active couple of weeks, but I still noticed that my life is very different than how it would be if I were African-American. With all of the violence we have seen come to light in the past several months, I felt it necessary to acknowledge the stark contrast of how black and white people react to the police. Whenever I walk on a street, whether it is here in Providence or in my home town, I feel safe when spotting a police car. I never associated police officers with fear or potential danger. However, I now know from the emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement that mine is not the only view of the police. Police brutality and racism is a real issue, and it reflects the deep roots of systemic racism in this country. I know not all officers are racist or violent, but there still must be reform. What has happened to George Floyd along with many others is completely unacceptable; until we make a change, no one will be truly equal.

Kien Nguyen ’23

My goal when I first enrolled in this class is to have a better sense of the world surrounding me; and to study the behavior of people in an organization. Especially, everything is changing so much during the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, people in an individualistic culture, especially in the US, they often present themselves as self- promotion- it is the strategy in which people present themselves as competence. On the other hand, in collectivist culture, due to the value of social harmony, they often present themselves as ingratiation in which people try to get others to like us. However, as the pandemic is rapidly spreading, I think people has changed the way they present themselves as supplication, in which people appear helpless to seek help from others. Besides that, people are more likely to make attribution errors during this pandemic because they don’t have enough time to consider the situational attributions (environment, task, others, luck), but rather dispositional attributions (ability, personality, mood, and effort). 

During this pandemic, we certainly get online more than ever, especially on social media. As you have known that whenever we search for something, we often get ads related to what we have searched later. As a result, people will fall into the false consensus effect, in which people will think that everyone comments, posts, or news that think like us and act like us. Now, I will reveal the real reason why I was motivated to draw the image above. It was from my first semester in my freshman year, when I was walking across two European-American boys (about our ages) with my friend in Eaton Street, they said to her “What’s up Asian whore” because she wore a crop top, we didn’t respond to them and just walked away. As we walked away, they keep cat call her and use inappropriate words to her. I have seen that happen many times to people of color in the US and this is the first time I have seen it happen to me and my friend. In the COVID 19, it even worse when people show their explicit racism more than before. Besides that, as a minority in the US and an international in the US, I have seen many forms of modern racism. For example, during my advising workshop for Marketing major, when a professor has established moral credentialing. She asked me that if I am related to an upperclassman that have the same last name with me, I just awkwardly smile and ignore her question. Another story is happened to my friend during my time at high school when the teacher has established double standards racism. He is an international student from Malaysia, and he speaks really good English, then a teacher come to him and said he speaks really good English compared to other international students. 

Finally, while Asians and People of Color only contribute less than 30% of the population in the US, but we have contributed and be a part of the improvements in the US such as various of cultures, jobs, economy, etc. I just don’t understand why people just have to discriminate people that unlike them, instead of helping each other grow and learn from one another, I hope there is one day people can treat each other depend on who they are, not based on the color of their skin or where they from. 

Eva Whelan ’23

For my creation, I decided to paint a more abstract photo of everyone coming together. To me, this looked like the painting above. I chose to work with various colors that reminded me of a few of the many skin tones we have. I wanted to show how beautiful these colors looked together and how well they complemented one another, rather than being separated or having an area of the painting being primarily one color. I believe this painting shows my learning on diversity and inclusion as it shows that diversity is something we should and need to embrace as the world is better off together. I hope my painting is able to simply display how much better we are by embracing diversity and placing an emphasis on inclusion. I do not think the painting would have been nearly as nice with all the colors in their own corner or segregated. I also hope my painting represents how nobody should be alone in the stand for more diversity and inclusion. After hearing and reading other’s experiences, I hope that with more people advocating and standing together, we can eliminate anyone having to face hardships due to their race, where they are from, their English proficiency, immigration status, or anything else.