Skip to main content
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
STEM
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • University Statements
  • Syracuse University Impact
  • |
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
Sections
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • University Statements
  • Syracuse University Impact
  • |
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
STEM

College of Engineering and Computer Science Launches Inclusive Excellence Dialogue Circles

Tuesday, February 19, 2019, By Alex Dunbar
Share
College of Engineering and Computer ScienceDiversity and Inclusion
people sitting at table

The dialogue circles in the College of Engineering and Computer Science bring people together in small groups to foster mutual understanding and trust, uncovering new ways to work together and solve problems.

Over the next two years more than 500 faculty, staff and students in the College of Engineering and Computer Science will take part in Inclusive Excellence Dialogue Circles that address the challenging issues of race, ethnicity and gender head-on through open dialogue.

The dialogue circles bring people together in small groups to foster mutual understanding and trust, uncovering new ways to work together and solve problems. Each circle is led by diverse, trained facilitators to address and encourage understanding across identity differences.

“The circles are an opportunity for all our ECS community, our students, our faculty and our staff to be in a room, in a safe environment where ground rules are set so people can feel comfortable and people can openly share information about their background and their experiences,” says interim Assistant Dean of Inclusive Excellence Karen Davis.

“It’s really about students interacting with other students and really learn more about each other and the people who are on this campus so we can be more successful together,” says Shazif Shaikh ’19.

“The facilitators are there to help guide a conversation, help introduce talking points, help make sure everyone’s voice is being heard and everyone is free to express what they need to express,” says Charles Keppler ’18.

“Because once you are comfortable with who you are and you understand who someone else is, it makes it easier to break down barriers,” says Davis.

“I participated in the pilot program last fall,” says Keppler. “It allows people to open up and I think there is an opportunity even for people who are hesitant at first to really find their own way in the conversation and find their own dialogue.”

“There are certain topics we are very passionate about in our lives and so we begin to realize we may be on different sides of the argument, at the root we share certain key beliefs and we want the betterment of everyone involved. It’s just the way that we approach it so it is really understanding the perspective everyone takes,” says Shaikh.

“At the very least what you get from it is this significantly greater ability to communicate and to have this dialogue with people and have hard conversations which is increasingly important in today’s environment,” says Keppler.

“This is life,” says Davis. “After you leave college you don’t know where you are going to go to live, you don’t know where you are going to work, you don’t know who you are going to be working with, so really this is the stage that is being set for the rest of your life.”

The college’s student dialogue circles (listed in MySlice as ECS 400/600) are graded, one-credit courses. By participating, students gain skills to become more competitive candidates in the global workplace and learn to forge healthier, more effective relationships.

Current ECS students can sign up for an Inclusive Excellence Dialogue Circle through this Google doc.

ECS faculty and staff can register via this Google doc.

  • Author

Alex Dunbar

  • Recent
  • Vintage Over Digital: Alumnus Dan Cohen’s Voyager CD Bag Merges Music and Fashion
    Monday, July 7, 2025, By John Boccacino
  • Empowering Learners With Personalized Microcredentials, Stackable Badges
    Thursday, July 3, 2025, By Hope Alvarez
  • WISE Women’s Business Center Awarded Grant From Empire State Development, Celebrates Entrepreneur of the Year Award
    Thursday, July 3, 2025, By Dawn McWilliams
  • Paulo De Miranda G’00 Received ‘Much More Than a Formal Education’ From Maxwell
    Thursday, July 3, 2025, By Jessica Youngman
  • Law Professor Receives 2025 Onondaga County NAACP Freedom Fund Award
    Thursday, July 3, 2025, By Robert Conrad

More In STEM

6 A&S Physicists Awarded Breakthrough Prize

Our universe is dominated by matter and contains hardly any antimatter, a notion which still perplexes top scientists researching at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider. The Big Bang created equal amounts of matter and antimatter, but now nearly everything—solid, liquid, gas or plasma—is…

Setting the Standard and Ensuring Justice

Everyone knows DNA plays a crucial role in solving crimes—but what happens when the evidence is of low quantity, degraded or comes from multiple individuals? One of the major challenges for forensic laboratories is interpreting this type of DNA data…

Student Innovations Shine at 2025 Invent@SU Presentations

Eight teams of engineering students presented designs for original devices to industry experts and investors at Invent@SU Final Presentations. This six-week summer program allows students to design, prototype and pitch their inventions to judges. During the program, students learn about…

WiSE Hosts the 2025 Norma Slepecky Memorial Lecture and Undergraduate Research Prize Award Ceremony

This spring, Women in Science and Engineering (WiSE) held its annual Norma Slepecky Memorial Lecture and Award Ceremony. WiSE was honored to host distinguished guest speaker Joan-Emma Shea, who presented “Self-Assembly of the Tau Protein: Computational Insights Into Neurodegeneration.” Shea…

Endowed Professorship Recognizes Impact of a Professor, Mentor and Advisor

Bao-Ding “Bob” Cheng’s journey to Syracuse University in pursuit of graduate education in the 1960s was long and arduous. He didn’t have the means for air travel, so he voyaged more than 5,000 nautical miles by boat from his home…

Subscribe to SU Today

If you need help with your subscription, contact sunews@syr.edu.

Connect With Us

  • X
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
Social Media Directory

For the Media

Find an Expert Follow @SyracuseUNews
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
  • @SyracuseU
  • @SyracuseUNews
  • Social Media Directory
  • Accessibility
  • Privacy
  • Campus Status
  • Syracuse.edu
© 2025 Syracuse University News. All Rights Reserved.