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10/03/2024 | News release | Distributed by Public on 10/03/2024 06:14

President Gilliam Launches New Initiative: The Living Our Values Project

President Gilliam Launches New Initiative: The Living Our Values Project

Findings from two BU working groups will be presented this month

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University News

President Gilliam Launches New Initiative: The Living Our Values Project

Findings from two BU working groups will be presented this month

October 3, 2024
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During her inauguration speech as Boston University's 11th president on September 27, Melissa L. Gilliam said she was announcing a new initiative: "Creating a community in which each of us can fully contribute to the life of this campus requires each of us to commit to regarding one another with dignity and respect." She said the initiative will focus on "living our values and building our skills in discourse," while also "deepening our commitment to free expression."

Less than one week later, in a letter to the BU community Wednesday, Gilliam began to share details about what she calls "The LivingOur Values Project." Her aim, she writes, is to "transform Boston University into an even better version of itself." [Read the full text of the letter at the bottom.]

She says she is starting with this initiative because of the "awareness that many members of our campus community are experiencing pain and sadness related to global conflict and personal loss." In such time, she writes, "there is a tendency to distrust people who are different than us and to shut down speech and viewpoints that we find difficult or contrary to our own."

Two University people will take lead roles in the initiative: Kimberly Howard, a professor of counseling psychology and applied human development at Wheelock College of Education & Human Development, and Suzanne Kennedy, associate provost for special projects and emerging priorities.

"The Living Our Values project is important for BU because it will allow us to develop a shared understanding of the values that guide our work in the classroom, the lab, and across campus," Howard tells BU Today. "It will provide a common language for our expectations of ourselves and one another that can facilitate honest, respectful dialogue about points around which we agree and disagree."

Kennedy adds: "An exciting Presidential Initiative, the Living Our Values Project will ultimately reflect the voices of faculty, staff, and students on all campuses. We are beginning this work with a strength of mission and tradition, and the project will allow us to be reflective of this foundation and of where we want to go as an institution."

The effort will also involve two working groups that have been focused this year on addressing bias and harassment on campus related to religion and culture. Those working groups will present their findings to the BU community at an October 16 Town Hall. Muhammad Zaman, director of the Center for Forced Displacement at Boston University and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor of Biomedical Engineering and International Health, heads the Working Group on Muslim and Arab Life. Nancy Harrowitz, director of the Elie Wiesel Center for Jewish Studies and a College of Arts & Sciences professor of Jewish and Italian studies, heads the Working Group on Jewish Life, Antisemitism, and Anti-Israeli Bias.

Throughout its 185-year history, BU has often been a place where dissent, rallies, and protests were a part of the culture and fabric. Thousands of people gathered in Marsh Plaza in support of a Vietnam moratorium in October 1969. BU's independent student newspaper, The Daily Free Press, began publishing in 1970 in response to violent student protests on campus in the wake of the Kent State shootings. In 1986, BU students sued the University over their right to hang banners saying "BU Divest" in their dorm windows.

"Boston University has a rich history of free speech, diversity, and dialogue across differences," Gilliam writes. "I am hopeful that the Living Our Values Project will offer us the opportunity to consider and align our foundational values with the evolving needs and vision of our diverse community."

October 2, 2024

Dear Members of the BU Community,

I'd like to share my profound gratitude for your support during last week's inaugural events. I am humbled that so many of you came to offer your well wishes. As I said in my inaugural address, Boston University is a place that looks to its traditions to transform into an even better version of itself. On Friday, I announced several inaugural initiatives, and today I'd like to share information about one of them-the Living Our Values Project.

The Living Our Values Project will enable our campus community to identify and practice the core principles and beliefs that unite us all. These values can, in turn, guide our decisions, behaviors, and actions in ways that foster inclusivity, integrity, and positive impact. Kimberly Howard, professor of counseling psychology and applied human development, has graciously agreed to take the lead on this important work with the support of Suzanne Kennedy, associate provost for special projects and emerging priorities.

I've decided to begin with this initiative with the awareness that many members of our campus community are experiencing pain and sadness related to global conflict and personal loss. At such times, there is a tendency to distrust people who are different than us and to shut down speech and viewpoints that we find difficult or contrary to our own. Our traditions of free speech and academic freedom are critical to who we are as an institution and so is our tradition of diversity and finding common ground in order to engage difficult topics and acknowledge one another across our differences.

To that end, one of the first efforts of the project will be a Town Hall hosted by my office on October 16 with Nancy Harrowitz and Muhammad Zaman, who chaired working groups that made recommendations to address bias and harassment on campus related to religious and geopolitical identity. These groups were convened last year by President Ad Interim Ken Freeman. The chairs will discuss their findings with the community, and senior administrative leaders will be on hand to share the ways in which we are responding to the working groups' recommendations.

Over the long term, the Living Our Values Project will be driven by steering and implementation committees, along with appropriate subcommittees, consisting of students, faculty, and staff, to outline the project's framework and oversee new program development alongside opportunities for future growth. The discovery and development phases of the committees' work will take place throughout this academic year, with an eye to implementation in the fall of 2025. We will share more specific timelines via an accompanying website, which will launch in the near future.

During the early phases of this project, we will also prioritize training students, faculty, and staff how to facilitate, mediate, and/or take part in difficult conversations, along with how to emulate a high level of civil discourse. We will look to places such as the Howard Thurman Center for Common Ground and the University's founding principles to guide us.

Boston University has a rich history of free speech, diversity, and dialogue across differences. I am hopeful that the Living Our Values Project will offer us the opportunity to consider and align our foundational values with the evolving needs and vision of our diverse community.

I look forward to engaging with you in conversation about institutional values over the coming year. Thank you in advance for your partnership, and for your willingness to help build a community where all of us feel welcome, where open dialogue is the norm, and where, as our mission statement says, we prepare our students to be "resourceful individuals ready to live, adapt, and lead in an interconnected world."

Sincerely,
Melissa Gilliam
President

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