The Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion & Anti-racism: 2022-2025 Strategic Plan Framework

A message from the Office of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion & Anti-racism (EDI-R)

Following our response to the Human Rights, Equity, and Inclusion (HREI) organizational review report, the EDI-R Office had paused non-essential work during the month of December to invest our time into the reflection, planning, and building of our 2022-2025 Strategic Plan. We are deeply grateful to the University of Waterloo community for understanding the need for this pause, and as a result, we are pleased to share the framework of our 2022-2025 Strategic Plan

Drawing on our mission to build, incubate and enhance EDI-R competency and capacity across campus to identify and interrupt institutional barriers and embed equity within policies, processes, environments and experiences at the University of Waterloo we are committed to reaching the following goals by 2025: 

1. Lead and facilitate culture change 

2. Ensure EDI-R leadership is centralized, accessible and accountable 

3. Increase the financial sustainability of the EDI-R Unit 

This framework will guide the rest of our strategic plan which will be released May 2022.

In addition to the framework, we are excited to launch two new EDI-R projects and initiatives:

Program Area Leads (PALs)

We are recruiting 20 staff and faculty from across UWaterloo to help assist with embedding equity and anti-racism in their units/areas. The PALs program aims to develop and support new and existing EDI-R leads to assist with the centralizing and harmonizing of this work. If you know anyone who may be a great fit, please encourage them to apply here.

EDI-R Intake Form 

The EDI-R office is here to support you. To help us best identify and support the needs of our campus community, we have launched an online intake form where individual or departmental requests can be made. These requests can include recommending new projects, a training request, disclosure of harm, general EDI-R inquiry etc.

Additional EDI-R projects that will be launched within the calendar year include: 

1. AIWL: Advancing into Waterloo Leadership: a pilot program that aims to support racialized employees achieve transferable skills and knowledge to advance into senior leadership/management roles.  

2. EDI-R Office Fellowship Program 

3. Anti-Racism Impact Assessment 

As you review the framework and new projects, we welcome and look forward to your feedback. Please share any comments, suggestions, or questions by emailing: equity@uwaterloo.ca