Overview

Purpose

The Dartmouth Department Climate Initiative is committed to supporting department-led change by providing meaningful climate data to promote awareness around climate issues, initiate productive discussions, foster local ownership of climate, and inform department-led improvements in policies, norms, and interactions. Data generated through the initiative provide a snapshot of the climate.

People

  • Vicki V. May, PhD, PE, Professor of Engineering and Director of the Academic Department Climate Initiative oversees the Climate Initiative and compiles and distributes the Climate Profiles.

  • Office of Institutional Research at Dartmouth administers the climate survey.

  • Kardia Group LLC, experts is academic climate, leads workshops to interpret climate survey results and develop effective change strategies.

Process

The first step in the Climate Initiative process is a climate survey, which will be administered in individual departments roughly by division over the course of the 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 academic years. Separate climate surveys have been created for faculty, staff, postdoctoral fellows, graduate students, and undergraduate students. The surveys are based on those developed and used extensively at the University of Michigan and elsewhere.

Survey responses will be compiled into a series of Climate Profiles by Prof. May with support from the Office of Institutional Research at Dartmouth and the Kardia Group (experts in academic climate). Climate Profiles will be created for each participating department:

  • Broad Experiences in the Department

  • Specific Experiences in the Department

  • Department Climate: Overall Quality, Conditions, and Concerns

  • Department Climate: Bias, Exclusion, and Differences in Experiences

Additionally, a summary of the current experiences of students, staff, and faculty by division will be shared with the Dartmouth community.

A series of seven monthly workshops will be offered by Kardia Group LLC with support from Prof. May to interpret the Climate Profiles and help departments determine effective strategies for shifting the departmental climate. A team of representatives from each department will participate in the workshops. Workshop topics include: leading productive data-informed discussions, interpreting each of the Climate Profiles, and developing effective action plans. Departments will implement action plans in the year following discussion of their Climate Profiles. Prof. May will follow up with department teams to check in on progress and changes. Funding is available to support change initiatives and will be distributed as needed through the workshops.

Prof. May will evaluate the effectiveness of the overall Climate Initiative through observations, interviews, and focus groups.

Confidentiality

Only Dartmouth’s Office of Institutional Research will have access to the raw survey data and individual responses; appropriate data security protocols will be used to maintain full confidentiality of these data.

Confidentiality will be protected when compiling Climate Profiles and divisional summaries through the following measures: promoting high response rates during data collection; combining results across departments where necessary in order to achieve minimum reporting levels; only reporting by gender, rank, and/or race when such reporting cannot be traced back to individuals; summarizing written comments; and combining individual items into scales as needed.

A department may choose to share their Climate Profiles beyond their department in whatever way supports their goals.