BUILD Thriving Certificate

​​​​​​The Office of Institutional Diversity and Equity is pleased to announce an important update to one of our cornerstone professional development opportunities. The BUILD Diversity Certificate Program is now the BUILD Thriving Certificate Program.

This name change reflects our ongoing commitment to fostering not only diversity, but also building a sense of belonging and thriving across our campus community that upholds the human dignity of all. The updated name better captures the program's broader goals, empowering faculty and staff with the tools to create environments where everyone can flourish and aligns with our Thriving Framework.

BUILD provides participants with the "building blocks to an inclusive campus" by:

Building multicultural competencies
Understanding differences and how they impact the workplace
Integrating thriving and belonging
Leveraging diversity and building leadership capacity
Developing measures of success

The BUILD Thriving Certificate program reflects DePaul University's commitment to creating a learning culture that values equity and inclusion. The certificate program helps participants develop cultural competencies and connect the university's Vincentian mission of dignity and respect for all individuals to our core operating business principles. 

Length​

This program may be completed anywhere from 9- 18+ months, and offers a full range of required and elective courses.

Curriculum

The Level 1 Thriving Certificate requires completion of three required courses, five electives, and a written 3- 5 page reflection paper.

• Best Practices in Recruitment of a Diverse Workplace
  
• Microaggressions and Implicit Bias
• Legal Foundation of Diversity
  

The Level 2 Thriving Certificate requires the above three required courses, six electives, and completion of a Capstone project.

• Undocumented Student Allyship
  
• How to be an Antiracist
  
• Religious Diversity in the Workplace
  

Testimonials

"The BUILD program deepened my awareness of the painful experience of exclusion and racism around me. BUILD offers an opportunity to learn, reflect, and focus on inclusion of everyone without exception after the example of Vincent de Paul whose respect and kindness for others was universal." -Sr. Betty Ann

"Given DePaul's Vincentian mission, I recognize that I am part of a rich and diverse community. My BUILD experience broadened my awareness of both myself and others. Besides meeting other like-minded colleagues from all across DePaul, our active engagement with relevant and current topics helped me realize the importance of treating people respectfully, fairly, and non-judgmentally- that we have the utmost responsibility for creating a place )and a society) where ideas can thrive. Long after my graduation from BUILD, I still reflect on ideas of implicit bias, gender and identity issues, education access, and so much more that positively influence my teaching and understanding of the world. 

Especially in today's vocal, polarized, and changing climate, the BUILD program is critically relevant, informative, and educational-and a must for anyone who is dreaming of peace." -Judy

"Like many white people, I mistakenly thought that most civil rights issues had been legally addresses in the 1960s and that racism was on the wane. I thought the incidents that I saw were aberrations, not the tip of an enormous iceberg. I did not feel comfortable trying to talk about these issues with coworkers and acquaintances of color. So, when the BUILD program was established, I leapt at the chance to educate myself without putting any individuals on the spot.

I am so glad that I did. I learned so much history that never was taught in my schools. I learned microaggressions and began purging them from my speech. I learned about how systems are constructed to preserve white supremacy and began supporting efforts to rewrite those systems. I learned techniques to interrupting someone saying something racist that creates conversation and a learning moment rather than putting the speaker on the defensive, techniques for offering support to a person who was marginalized. I am so much better prepared to have conversations, support efforts, and thinking through my feelings about recent spate of recording killings of Black people, police violence, BLM, race-related vulnerability to COVID and other ailments, and everything else that is happening in this tornado of a year.

I strongly encourage you to complete the BUILD program. You won't regret it."-Kris

"The commitment DePaul has made to the BUILD program is amazing. It was nice to be able to attend such a broad range of quality sessions on campus. The BUILD program brings together so many university experts who offer sessions on a wide variety of topics. The sessions I attended were as good, if not better, than sessions I have attended at professional association conferences, and the BUILD program is free. As ​an added benefit, participants experience the sessions with other mission-driven DePaul faculty and staff, enabling them to form relationships with others on campus." -Kate