Diversity

Laney Statement on Inclusive Excellence

Community and belonging are of the highest priority to Emory University and the Laney Graduate School. Diversity and community are fundamental to our commitment to graduate education, which provides students with deep expertise in their chosen fields, the creativity to cross disciplinary boundaries, and the courage to take on the most important and complex problems of our time.

We strive to create and strengthen an inclusive, respectful, and intellectually challenging environment that embraces individual difference. We are committed to proactively cultivating and sustaining an academic community that engages diverse intellectual capacity and that values open dialogue, cooperation, shared responsibility, mutual respect, and cultural competence — the driving forces that enrich and enhance innovative research and scholarship. 

To promote inclusive excellence, the EDGE initiative was established. EDGE’s goal is to recruit, admit, retain, and successfully matriculate doctoral scholars and masters’ practitioners who represent the inclusive excellence of our global community and graduate school. The initiative is achieved using a three-themed schematic that is interconnected and interdependent: Community, Programming, and Recruitment.

EDGE and its fellows, ambassadors, delegates, and partners are responsible for maintaining and sustaining initiatives focused on inclusive excellence. Many of the initiatives surround topics of:

1. Recruiting, retaining, and successfully matriculating historically underrepresented scholars and practitioners.
   • Historically underrepresented populations in graduate education are often specific to academic disciplines or fields. However, at Laney, we recognize underrepresentation as encompassing scholars and practitioners with marginalized identities across various dimensions, including race, ethnicity, gender, disability, national origin, age, health status, religion, veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, socio-economic status, immigration status, family background, neurodiversity, intersectional identities, and the broad spectrum of human experiences. 
2. Creating and Enriching an Inclusive Campus Community with cultural competencies and mutual respect. 
3. Developing Community Outreach and Engaging with local, national, and global Partners.

Laney Commitment to Equity and Inclusiveness

The Laney Graduate School is committed to fostering diverse and inclusive excellence. We aim to create an inclusive, respectful, and intellectually stimulating environment that values individual differences. Our academic community engages diverse intellectual perspectives and prioritizes open dialogue, cooperation, shared responsibility, mutual respect, cultural competence, openness, and understanding. We strive to share experiences, listen attentively, and engage in civil, generous, and constructive debates. However, there are times when the actions and behaviors of community members negatively affect others. To address this, we have the Bias Incident Reporting Structure to provide a space for  community members to report incidents that demonstrate bias.

LGS values open expression and vigorous debate within the bounds of civility and mutual respect. However, we are aware of the harmful impact bias incidents can have on our ability to trust, support, and learn from one another. Therefore, we encourage all members of the LGS community to use this mechanism for bias reporting. 

To report a bias incident, Please follow this link to the University’s Bias Incident Reporting Page in Campus Life. Please note this report can be done anonymously. Campus Life Leadership will contact LGS Senior Leadership if additional information is needed. 

If this reporting mechanism does not seem appropriate or if you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact LGS Associate Dean for Diversity, Inclusion, and Community Engagement, Amanda Marie James, for additional guidance. 

For more information contact: