DEI Plan: Mid-Year Update 2025

As part of our commitment to “Mean Well, Speak Well, and Do Better,” the DEI Committee of the Board of Trustees presented a strategic plan at our Annual Meeting in June 2021.

As we embark on year four of the Glen Urquhart School DEI Strategic Plan, the administrative DEI team, led by Director of Upper School Brad Belin and Director of Lower School Emily Rabinowitz-Buchanan, is proud to update the community on our progress towards goals related to GUS people and programs. We welcome any feedback as enhancing our work in these areas certainly requires the efforts of the full community.

Admission +

• Opened the 24-25 school year at 20% percent students of color, meeting our goal to 20% before 2026. As enrollment has shifted through the year, we are currently at 19.7%.
• Revised our application questions to collect more specific data on our students' racial and ethnic identities. We now also ask families to share all languages spoken at home.

Hiring and Retention +

• Continued to implement a formal process for self-reporting race and ethnic identity to better track our progress towards the goal of 10% faculty and staff of color. Reported percentages of self-identified BIPOC faculty members: Academic Year 2023–2024: 7.2%; Academic Year 2024–2025: 7.8%
• Retained NEMNET to help assist in our active recruitment + identification of a diverse faculty + staff.

Board of Trustees & Parents +

• In partnership with the Board of Trustees, the DEI Committee continues to explore topics for ongoing board professional development. Recent conversations have focused on current events and the broader national discourse, with an emphasis on how the Board and the Committee can support the school and its continued commitment to the important work of diversity, equity, and inclusion.
• GUS Families were invited to share about their family’s specific Heritage, Holidays + Traditions via survey, as well as invited to share with the community at All School Meeting.

Curriculum +

• Added a dedicated Spanish language section to the library with a specific focus on titles that are Spanish literature, and not just translated to Spanish. This effort aims to increase the number of titles that provide ‘windows, mirrors, sliding doors’ for our multilingual Spanish-speaking students, and all GUS community members.
• Worked to create more interdisciplinary projects rooted in real-world contexts, as well as provide more opportunities for students to learn about underrepresented identities. Some examples include, but are not limited to: the study of indigenous groups from Spanish speaking countries; practicing math literacy + linguistic (Spanish) skills at a local restaurant; 'A Place at the Table' project, where 7th grade students reflect on how gender, race, and class shape who they are by making space for a lesser-known person who has faced oppression or marginalization.

Co-Curricular Activities +

• Sent four Upper School students and one faculty member to the AISNE Middle School Diversity Conference in February.
• Partnered with Global Works Travel for the annual 8th Grade Service + Leadership trip (April 2024 and April 2025). Students visited Puerto Rico as part of a cultural immersion and service-based work trip to support ongoing rebuilding efforts in areas of the island devastated by Hurricane Maria in 2017.
• GUS participation in North Shore Pride Parade in June 2023, and plans to participate again in June 2024.
• Held two Spanish-speaking lunches for faculty + students who identify as Spanish-speakers outside of GUS, as well as GUS community members who would like to participate as non-native Spanish speakers. Lunches will continue on a regular basis.

Professional Development +

• Hosted Jenny Jun-lei Kravitz at GUS to facilitate an all-day professional development centered around “identifying and discussing existing barriers to leveraging existing equity and inclusion strategies, skills, and knowledge” in February 2024.
• Sent two administrators to the AISNE DEI Conference in October 2024.
• Sent an administrator and a faculty member to the National Association of Independent Schools People of Color Conference (PoCC) to engage in two and a half days of DEIJ-focused workshops + affinity spaces.
• A GUS administrator co-presented “Bridge to Belonging: Nurturing Transracial Adoptees in School Communities” at both the AISNE DEI Conference (regional) and at the NAIS PoCC Conference (national).
• A ten-person faculty DEI Committee was established in the fall of 2024. This group meets every 2–3 weeks, with a specific focus on program development and policy.