We propose that the five cultural competence literacies defined in the 2019-2020 Northeastern Student of Color Caucus Impact Report be established as NUPath requirements and that they are incorporated into co-op preparation, and New Student Orientations to realize Northeastern’s stated commitments to diversity, inclusion, and cultural agility in the 2025 Academic Plan.

We recommend that additional funding be allocated to the following University entities to expand their ongoing programs and initiatives, including hiring additional staff/faculty, to assist in fulfilling Northeastern’s stated commitment to diversity, inclusion, and cultural agility:

• Northeastern Cultural Centers, especially the John D. O’Bryant African American Institute, Latinx Student Cultural Center, and the Asian American Center.

• Programs in the Department of Cultures, Societies, and Global Studies, especially Africana Studies and Asian Studies and for the creation of a Latinx Studies program.

Cultural Competence – As defined by the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention’s National Prevention Information Network, is “the integration and transformation of knowledge about individuals and groups of people into specific standards, policies, practices, and attitudes used in appropriate cultural settings to increase the quality of services; thereby producing better outcomes.” (Centers for Disease Control & Prevention 2015, 6). For the purposes of this research and to remain consistent with Student of Color Caucus definitions, cultural competence can be considered to include the following five literacies:

1. Gender Literacy – an understanding of gender bias and the way patriarchal ideologies shape societal conceptualizations of gender. Individuals with high levels of gender literacy will be able to recognize their own gender-identity and how it fits into the broader social context of gender-based privileges and power. They will be able to recognize and respond to bias based on gender-identity and expression

2. Racial/Ethnic Literacy – an understanding of racial and ethnic bias and the way racialized thought and history have created disparate outcomes for people of color. Individuals with a high level of racial literacy will be able to recognize and define terms like racism, microaggressions, and whiteness. They will also be able to recognize their own positionality in a racialized context and the privileges and powers that their positionality either affords or denies them

3. Religious Literacy – an understanding of religious bias with an emphasis on anti-Semitism and Islamophobia. Individuals demonstrating high levels of religious literacy will be able to recognize and respond to anti-Semitic and Islamophobic rhetoric as well as understand the ways in which Christian belief systems function as a hegemonic ideology in shaping American social, cultural, and legal decision-making

4. Socioeconomic Literacy – an understanding of the ways in which economic background affects access to privilege and opportunity. Individuals demonstrating a high level of socioeconomic literacy will be able to articulate how wealth inequality exacerbates and complicates other societal inequities

5. Queer Literacy - an understanding of homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, and the historical role of heteronormative thought that serves at the backdrop for each of these terms. Individuals demonstrating high levels of queer literacy will be able to recognize and respond to bias related to sexual orientation as well as articulate the ways in which sexual orientation and gender identity function as fluid identities