A Message from Center Director Alvin Tillery
In the fall of 2019, I approached the Dean of the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern University, Adrian Randolph, with a vision to transform the research center that I founded on campus, the Center for the Study of Diversity and Democracy, into a major hub for leadership education on diversity, equity, and inclusion. We decided that the first step in our plan would be to build a certificate program based around a robust set of on-line offerings with our corporate partner 2U/GetSmarter, Inc. The first course, “Leading Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion,” launched in October 2020. I am excited to announce that 18 months after we began this journey—on MLK Day, January 18, 2021—the learners from this first section received their certificates bearing Dean Randolph’s signature. A huge congratulations to all of the members of Cohort 1 who received their certificates this week!I want to thank Dean Randolph and the other leaders in Weinberg College—Edward Gibson, Associate Dean of Faculty; Danny Fisher, Associate Dean for Finance and Business Operations; and Francesca Petty, Chief of Staff—for supporting the development of this program. Danny Fisher, who has now moved on to be Chief Operating Officer at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management, has been the driving force behind making this happen on the business side at Northwestern.
I also want to thank our partners at 2U for seeing the value proposition of our program and working so diligently to boost its success. Simon Greenwold, 2U’s Vice President and General Manager for the Northwestern partnership, has nurtured this program with alacrity and care. David Sutphen, 2U’s Chief Strategy Officer, has boosted the program and the CSDD in ways that would have been unimaginable at the start of this process. And, of course, there would have been no program without the hard work of the amazing learning design, enrollment, technical, and student success teams. I am particularly grateful to Kristen Harmse, Jeanne Meyer, and Veronica Appleton, who kept me focused and honest through the learning design process.
I am deeply indebted to all of the amazing thought leaders and practitioners—Julie Castro Abrams, Eric Abrego, Keith Bernard, Joi Bourgeois, Matthew Cahill, Megan Francis, Paige Maisonet, Kari Pendoley, Patti Perez, Paria Rejai, and Amy Steadman—who took time out of their busy schedules to sit for interviews in the course. The debt is even greater to the four CSDD Advisory Board members—Mala Htun, Brian Hetherington, Paula Pretlow, and Brian Posner—who allowed me to feature them in the course while simultaneously joining our other board members, Adam Karr, Jill Hetherington, and Jeffrey Zukerman, in providing me with sound strategic advice about program development.
As I said in the beginning of this message, this is just the first step that the CSDD is taking to provide transformative leadership training on diversity, equity, and inclusion issues. Please stay tuned and look for opportunities to join us as we expand our work in this area.
Thank you!
Al Tillery
Director, Center for the Study of Diversity and Democracy