Introduction

The Office of Multicultural Affairs (OMA) of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-Chapel Hill) School of Nursing advocates for the incorporation of diversity, the many dimensions of human qualities that distinguish each and every person, and equity in curricula, admissions, educational outcomes, environment and practice. The School takes seriously its contract with society to prepare graduates for the cultural and clinical practice demands of nursing. This includes responding to the demand for professional nurses who understand and can deliver care that is compatible and in sync with patients' cultural health beliefs and practices throughout the world and particularly in North Carolina.

OMA serves as a School-wide resource for the proper understanding and judicious application of equity and multicultural concepts. This includes the facilitation of system-wide efforts for retaining students, faculty, and staff of underrepresented racial and ethnic populations and for enhancing their development as members of the nursing profession and the UNC community. This is in keeping with the University's commitment to diversity. In a report adopted by the UNC Board of Governors in January 2001, the Board stated that "the University will continue to devote special attention to improving college-going rates among previously underrepresented groups…University commitment to broad-based diversity in campus enrollments is essential in our increasingly multi-racial, multi-ethnic, and global economy. Without experiencing such diversity in educational settings, students would be ill prepared for the real world." In addition, the office serves as a forum for topics of common interest and as a vehicle for communication with the community for the goal of a just future.

Vision

To create a welcoming, accepting, and supportive environment for students, staff, and faculty to live, learn, grow, and pursue dreams.

Mission Statement

To develop and support the UNC-Chapel Hill SON agenda that addresses and impacts the most salient multicultural issues shaping the lives of people in a global society.

Diversity Facts

About SON Diversity
The School of Nursing at UNC-Chapel Hill promotes a School-wide environment that embraces racial, ethnic, and cultural differences. Through our Office of Multicultural Affairs, the School fosters cultural sensitivity in teaching, learning, practice, and research. Imbedded in the School's mission and culture is the commitment to design, implement, and evaluate recruitment and retention programs for faculty, staff, and students from groups underrepresented in nursing and/or from disadvantaged backgrounds.

In 2005-2006, persons of ethnic/racial diversity comprised
Persons of color comprise:

• 21% of BSN students
• 23% of MSN students
• 39% of PhD students
• 9% of faculty
• 27% of staff

Males comprise:

• 10% of BSN students
• 8% of MSN students
• 12% of PhD students
• 8% of the faculty
• 17% of staff

Recent Highlights:

• The OMA continued its book club to increase cultural awareness, sensitivity, and competency through the appreciation and acceptance of differences in students, faculty, staff, and the clients that it serves. The book club concept is based on critical literacy theory. Discussions provide an open, non-threatening forum for talking about issues of diversity that are relevant in today's society.
• 154 SON faculty and staff attended Courageous Dialogues, sessions dedicated to discussion about diversity. (2005)
• The OMA sponsored the Minority Visiting Scholar Lecture series. The MVS series was established to highlight the research and contributions of minority nurse scholars. This year, the OMA welcomed Dr. Barbara Jones Warren and Dr. SeonAe Yeo. Warren is an associate professor of nursing at The Ohio State University, and executive nurse of the Ohio Department of Health. Yeo is an associate professor of nursing and family medicine at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor and the president of the Asian American Pacific Islander Nurses Association.
• In 2006, the OMA awarded the second Kindred Spirit Award for Excellence in Multicultural Scholarship for student achievement to BSN student Laura Niday. The award recognizes an undergraduate or graduate student in the SON whose course work examines its subject using the lenses of race/ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality, and culture to analyze work in any discipline, or focuses on the contribution of women and men of all colors to society, history, culture, or thought in any area of study.
• The SON is home to 32 international students.
• The SON is home to the Center for Innovation in Health Disparities Research, a partnership between UNC CH and Historically Black Colleges and Universities—Winston-Salem State University, North Carolina Central University—aimed at increasing the capacity for culturally competent nursing research.

SON Diversity Plan

Center for Innovation in Health Disparities Research (CIHDR)

About UNC-Chapel Hill Diversity 2003
Excellence in academia is achieved through diversity.

"In recent years the administration of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has made a concerted effort to increase the level of black students and black faculty on campus. The university is particularly strong in the categories dealing with student diversity. The university is ranked second in the percentage of total black enrollments and first in the percentage of black freshmen. Chapel Hill also fares well in most measures of black faculty. The university has nine African-American faculty members who hold endowed chairs. This is the highest number in the United States."
-Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, 2002

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

• Ranks 1st in the percentage of black freshman enrolled in the nation's top ranked universities (Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, 2002)
• Ranks 6th among leading universities on their success in integrating African-Americans (Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, 2002)
• Has the most tenured African-American faculty members, 51, among the 26 top-ranked US universities (Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, 2002)
• Ranks 14th among the best 50 campuses for African-Americans (students and faculty) as listed by Black Enterprise Magazine, the highest ranking for a major public university

Diversity in North Carolina:

• 11.9% of the RN workforce comes from underrepresented groups
• 6.3% of nurses are male
• African Americans represent 21.6% of the state's population and 8% of the nursing workforce
• Hispanics are 4.7% of the population and .06% of the nursing workforce
• The Hispanic population growth over the last decade in NC (393%) is the largest rate of growth of any state in the nation

Core Values

• CURIOSITY and COURAGE …personal responsibility for getting to know one another and to be understood
• OPENESS and OTHERNESS…holding multiple perspectives simultaneously and valuing them all
• RECIPROCITY and RESPECT… recognition of personal diversity and a willingness to admit that all peoples have equal value and merit
• EQUITY and EMPATHY… dispersion of power and equality of opportunity

OMA Objectives

• Striving to create healthy communities, especially by eliminating
  health disparities.
• Advocating for issues of relevance to student, faculty, and staff life
• Utilizing research to provide an evidence-based direction
• Mentoring students, faculty, and staff in the UNC-Chapel Hill School
  of Nursing
• Organizing and collaborating to provide events that promote mutual understandings
• Nurturing the spirit of every individual
• Yielding to the needs of the community

Rules of Engagement

• Achievement, acceptance, fairness, and merit are pursued aggressively.
• Zero tolerance for assaults on another's self esteem
• All encounters are filled with candor, truth, intentionality, sensitivity,
  and humor.
• Data is used to address excellence, equity, effort, efficiency, and effectiveness.
• We encourage story telling from which comes true understanding.
• A bias towards action
• We will follow the facts wherever they lead us.

OMA Staff

Dr. G. Rumay Alexander, Director
Jill C. Summers, Administrative Assistant

G. Rumay Alexander, EdD, RN, is the director of the Office of Multicultural Affairs in the School of Nursing. Her nursing career spans over 21 years in the areas of public policy, advocacy, teaching, and health careers development with an emphasis on cultural diversity issues. At a national level, she has served on the American Hospital Association's (AHA) Workforce Commission, the board of The American Organization of Nurse Executives, The National Quality Forum Nursing Care Performance Measures' Steering Committee, the AHA's Leadership Circle of Eliminating Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care. She frequently speaks to groups across the country on the issues of the healthcare workforce, diversity, and strategic planning.

Office of Multicultural Affairs Advisory Board

Dr. Rumay Alexander, Director, UNC-Chapel Hill School of Nursing Office of Multicultural Affairs
Ms. Angeline Baker, Nurse Manager, UNC Hospitals
Ms. Ruby Borden, Secretary, Central Carolina Nurses Council
Ms. Elizabeth Burkett, MSN ’75
Mr. Moses Carey, Jr., Executive Director, Piedmont Health Services
Dr. Linda Cronenwett, Dean, UNC-Chapel Hill School of Nursing
Ms. Dianne Evans, Career Counselor, Cedar Ridge High School
Ms. Brandi Hamlin, MSN Student, UNC-Chapel Hill School of Nursing
Ms. Edith Hubbard, Associate Director, UNC-Chapel Hill Office of
Sponsored Research
Dr. Larry Keith, Associate Director, UNC School of Medicine Office of Educational Development and Director, UNC School of Medicine Special Programs
Dr. Vicki Kowlowitz, Director, UNC-Chapel Hill School of Nursing Center for Instructional Technology and Educational Support
Mr. Darryl Lester, Principal, Hindsight Consulting
Dr. Chris McQuiston, Associate Professor, UNC-Chapel Hill School of Nursing and Director, Center for Innovation in Health Disparities Research
Ms. Kathy Moore, Director, UNC-Chapel Hill School of Nursing Office of Admissions & Student Services
Dr. M. Cookie Newsom, Director for Diversity Education and Research, UNC-Chapel Hill Office of Minority Affairs
Dr. Theresa Raphael-Grimm, Clinical Assistant Professor, UNC-Chapel Hill School of Nursing
Ms. Anh Tran, PhD Student, UNC School of Public Health
Mr. Charles Watts, Chief Legal Counsel, North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance
Ms. Amie Wong, BSN Student, UNC-Chapel Hill School of Nursing
Mr. Harold Woodard, Associate Dean, UNC-Chapel Hill Office for Student Academic Counseling