All students at Tufts are required to take foundation requirements: the writing requirement, language requirement, and world civilization requirement. The world civilizations requirement has in the past focused on an “in-depth study of a non-Western civilization or the interaction of non-Western and Western civilizations with equal attention given to both -- including Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Latin America, and selected indigenous cultures of Oceania and North America” but has failed to address those cultures according to current undergraduate students at Tufts. It has not been re-evaluated since 1986. Times have since changed -- thus, the project goal is to re-vamp the World Civilization requirement into the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion requirement. While ignorance is not the sole cause of racially targeted incidents on campus, it is more important now than ever that Tufts students are aware and educated on the injustices marginalized communities face. This requirement will be the first step to a global and inclusive education.

My original goal was for a committee or task force to be created by October to evaluate the curriculum as it stands, but as of late July, a committee has been created! It will oversee the restructuring of the world civilization requirement. Thus, by the end of October, there should be a plan to host a town hall related to diversity equity, and inclusion in the classroom, and work together with the committee to evaluate what a new requirement would look like, what classes would count for the requirement, what faculty could teach, etc. By the end of December, we will have hopefully finalized plans to include a requirement related to diversity, equity, and inclusion or cultural competency.