Inclusion or Diversity

Hub for Teaching and Learning Resources

Mon, 07/28/2025 - 13:45

A spring 2026 federal digital accessibility deadline is ushering in a new paradigm for disability accommodations.

A two-hour Canvas course is helping faculty study up on new federal accessibility guidelines for online content. There's currently a $200 incentive to take the course.

Campus Colleagues: Becky Richardson

stuxbury — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 19:36:10 +0000

Campus Colleagues: Becky Richardson stuxbury Tue, 02/04/2025 - 14:36

Becky Richardson’s desk — complete with its encouraging messages — is often one of the first things people notice when walking into the SOAR Program’s office in the College of Arts, Sciences and Letters Building: “All who enter as guests, leave as friends.” “Take the risk or lose the chance.” “Today is the day.”

There’s also the traveling sign that she’s given out to SOAR (Support, Opportunities, Advocacy and Resources for nontraditional undergraduates) students. That one reads, “Tough times don’t last, but tough people do.”

“Our students have been through a lot. Many of our students face personal and financial obstacles, most are raising families and many also care for older adults. That’s a lot of responsibility,” says Richardson, SOAR program assistant. “As silly as it might seem, seeing motivational words helps keep them in your head. I want these signs to remind our students that on tough days, they can get the support they need in the SOAR office — even if that’s just to vent. I have tissues ready for sad tears and happy ones.” With its mission to increase access to post-secondary education for nontraditional adult learners experiencing socioeconomic challenges, SOAR offers up to three semesters of partial tuition support and help with supplies like books and technology, along with other needs.

Richardson recently received the University of Michigan's Distinguished Diversity Leaders Award. A champion for students, Richardson advances a welcoming, supportive environment at ��-Dearborn. She’s an advisor and co-founder for ANTS, the nontraditional student organization; a co-counselor for ��-Dearborn’s chapter of Alpha Sigma Lambda, an honor society for adult learners; a Center for the Education of Women+ Scholar who now serves on their scholarship committee, and a member of the ��-Dearborn Prison Education Working Group.

In this month’s Campus Colleagues, Richardson shares why education advocacy is so important to her and how a little bit of the right support can go a long way.

Find people who will support you with your goals — they are out there.

Richardson says education is an equalizer. It helps grow skills and confidence and changes lives. She knows this from experience.

Richardson and her husband lost their jobs during the recession. Their home and cars soon followed. Then, after years of struggling and moving from place to place with their four children, a Michigan Works caseworker offered some advice. “He suggested going back to school and told me about the SOAR Program at ��-Dearborn. It changed my life,” she says.

It sounds like a nicely wrapped up story. But Richardson says it was a struggle for the seven years — from 2011 to 2018 — she took to earn her bachelor degree in behavioral sciences and women’s and gender studies. She says the SOAR office, and SOAR Director Ellen Judge-Gonzalez in particular, helped her see things that she didn’t see in herself.

“I originally wanted to get a degree where I didn’t have to interact with people. I wanted to work in a medical lab. My previous jobs were doing collections and working at a funeral home. As much as I tried to be positive, I was meeting people at their worst times and it wore me down,” Richardson says. “When I was a student, Ellen kept encouraging me to join student groups and work at the registration desk for events. She saw a natural ability in me when it comes to working with people. She later hired me as a student employee for SOAR and that turned into the fulltime position that I have today. Helping people transform their lives is hard, but rewarding. It’s exactly where I need to be.” Richardson has worked in the SOAR office for a decade.

The office itself is also a refuge because it’s a place where SOAR students share their stories of tribulations and triumph. Richardson says hearing how people overcome challenges is motivating. “You want to find people who help you feel less alone on your journey,” she says. “They will help you keep moving forward even on the hardest days.”

Richardson says she never expected to find a college initiative like the SOAR Program. But going through state social services programs and following up on advice shared with her changed the trajectory of her life. “It might not feel like it right now, but there are people who want to support you,” she says. “Don’t give up. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. And be ready to give it your all when a door opens.”

For adult learners considering a return to school to earn their first bachelor’s degree, check out the SOAR Program.

SOAR Program Assistant Becky Richardson, holding award, is pictured at the Jan. 28 awards ceremony in Ann Arbor with, from left, Disability and Accessibility Services Coordinator Judy Walker, SOAR Director Ellen Judge-Gonzalez, ��-Ann Arbor Executive Assistant to the President Brenda Rutkey, who is Richardson's sister, and Sociology Professor Francine Banner. Photo by Michigan Photography

After reaching goals, look for ways to pay it forward.

With her kids and husband — as well as many ��-Dearborn colleagues and professors — cheering her on at the ��-Dearborn Fieldhouse, Richardson says she will never forget her December 2018 graduation day. “When I walked across the stage, I could hear people yelling my name,” she says. “It was surreal to actually experience something that had only lived in my mind for so long.”

She says many of the same people also nominated her for the U-M award. Nominators were Judge-Gonzalez, Sociology Professor Francine Banner, Criminology and Criminal Justice Lecturer Aaron Kinzel, CASL Advising and Academic Success Administrative Assistant Maureen Sytsma and Disability and Accessibility Services Coordinator Judy Walker.

“This award is something I didn’t see coming. I almost didn’t believe it was real when I first got the email. The subject line said, ‘Congratulations’ and it came in at 4:26 p.m. in the afternoon right before the holiday break began. After all of the spam email warnings we’ve gotten, I thought maybe it was one of those,” Richardson says with a laugh. “But it was very real. It’s amazing to be at a place where the people continue to lift you up.”

Richardson works to express her gratitude through service to others. When SOAR students tell her they are behind on rent or their utilities are shut off, she connects them to financial support opportunities or organizations. If courses are a challenge, she lets them know about academic support services on campus. And there’s her open-door policy for her students. “Sometimes all we want is to know someone cares,” she says. “It’s important to remember where you come from and to be that person you once wished was there for you. I can’t say I’m perfect, but I try.”

Richardson is also an education advocate for citizens reentering society after prison. She served as a teaching assistant for a ��-Dearborn program at Women’s Huron Valley Correctional Facility and has seen the successes of some of her formerly incarcerated SOAR students like ��-Dearborn graduate Penny Kane.

“It’s as simple as, treat people how you want to be treated. What shocked me the most when I first worked in the prisons is how the women are trained to see themselves. When I asked their names to sign in, the women started listing off numbers. I kept saying, ‘No, I want to know your name and how to address you.’ Over time, they used their names instead of numbers — it changed the whole dynamic in such a positive way,” she says. “The returning citizens population is one group I am passionate about helping. I know people who have done their time and have difficulty getting jobs or an education because they were once in prison. Why are we still penalizing them beyond their sentence?”

In the SOAR office on an early Wednesday morning, Richardson makes coffee and heats water for tea — she wants it ready for the students who drop in to use SOAR computers or just want to talk. She organizes a virtual meet-up for her remote students. And she seeks out scholarship opportunities to help a student in need.

“I’m here today — with my college degree and a job I love — because of all the people who supported me. I want to be that person for someone else,” she says. “I’m here to pay it forward.”

Story by Sarah Tuxbury

Awards

College of Arts, Sciences, and Letters

Student Success

Student Engagement

First-Generation Programming

Off

Tue, 02/04/2025 - 19:35

SOAR Program Assistant Becky Richardson recently received a U-M award for leaders creating a welcoming and supportive working environment. Richardson’s advice? ‘Treat people how you want to be treated.’

SOAR Program Assistant Becky Richardson works to create a welcoming space for students. Photo by Sarah Tuxbury

Lecturer Rashid Faisal wants you to remember — and see yourself in — Cornelius Henderson

lblouin — Mon, 18 Nov 2024 14:19:21 +0000

Lecturer Rashid Faisal wants you to remember — and see yourself in — Cornelius Henderson lblouin Mon, 11/18/2024 - 09:19

Two years ago, the University of Michigan announced the launch of the Inclusive History Project, an initiative aimed at studying and documenting the history of the university that’s attentive to diversity, equity and inclusion. But ��-Dearborn Education Lecturer and ’20 EdD alum Rashid Faisal has been chasing down the life story of a 1911 African American U-M engineering grad for a lot longer than that. When Faisal first learned of Cornelius Henderson in 2006 during a conversation with one of his wife’s colleagues, Faisal was surprised he’d never heard of Henderson before, given that African American history is a subject he studies pretty intensely. According to the one-pager he was handed, Henderson was an engineer who was pivotal in two of the most groundbreaking early civil engineering projects in Detroit, the Ambassador Bridge and the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel. The other detail that immediately caught Faisal’s attention: Henderson attended one of Faisal’s alma maters — the University of Michigan — at a time when it had very few non-white students. “We knew very little about the Black students at the university who attended well before what we would consider the affirmative action era of the 1960s,” Faisal explains. “I mean, we’re talking about 1906 when Henderson started as a student. What was his life like? What was his experience like? It just opened up this window for me to try to learn more about the early African American students at the university.”

When Faisal began that research, he learned of people like George Jewett, who, in the 1890s, became the first African American varsity football player at U-M. And there was Eddie Tolan, a world-record-setting Olympic sprinter who ran track at the university in the 1930s. But Faisal was continually drawn in by the details of Henderson’s story. The rough existing sketch of Henderson’s life that existed at the time was that he was the only African American student in the engineering college and was a standout student despite being isolated by his white classmates. When Henderson graduated and began looking for work, he was denied by every engineering firm in Detroit — except one, which offered him a janitorial position. Fortunately, a chance encounter with one of his U-M classmates led to a better opportunity: The young man urged Henderson to apply for work at his employer, the Canadian Bridge Company in Windsor. Henderson took the advice and ended up building a career there that spanned 47 years, climbing the company ladder from entry-level draftsman to structural design engineer by the time of the Ambassador Bridge and Detroit-Windsor Tunnel projects.

Education Lecturer Rashid Faisal has been chasing down the story of Cornelius Henderson for nearly two decades. Photo by Annie Barker

That general story alone made Henderson an interesting figure, but Faisal was hungry for more of the textural details of his life. And as he did more research, he often encountered things that complicated the traditional narrative. First and foremost, the young Henderson, the University of Michigan student, was often assumed to be a person who endured isolation as the college’s lone Black student. Faisal says one of his professors even described being particularly impressed by Henderson’s achievements in mathematics and science because he, unlike his white classmates, did his work “without help.” But Faisal says other details of Henderson’s life give us reason to question this assumption. Henderson, Faisal says, would have been part of what W.E.B. Dubois often called the “Talented Tenth” — a term for an influential class of early 20th-century African American leaders who were highly educated and dedicated to bettering circumstances for Black Americans. Henderson’s father was a college president and considered one of the most highly educated men of his era. His mother was a teacher. His older brother also attended U-M, went to medical school at the Detroit College of Medicine and became a prominent Detroit doctor. And though he was likely the only Black student in the college of engineering, he shared a rich social life with other Black students who were members of the Epsilon Chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, the oldest Black fraternity at U-M. His fraternity brothers included people like Richard Hill, a U-M law student who later mentored Thurgood Marshall. “Henderson came from a certain kind of Black American cultural capital: the Black church, the Black fraternity system and historically Black colleges and universities,” Faisal says. “So, from an outsider's point of view, it may have appeared he was doing this all on his own. But just because the culture of support was rendered invisible doesn’t mean the culture didn’t exist. In many ways, he was part of the elite of American society at that time.”

Aside from the Ambassador Bridge and Detroit-Windsor Tunnel, Henderson contributed to a wide variety of projects, including serving as architect and engineer for Memorial Park Cemetery, the first Black cemetery in Detroit. Faisal has uncovered evidence that indicates Henderson was also involved in the construction of multiple apartment buildings and hospitals in the city. Photo courtesy of Rashid Faisal

Faisal thinks recognizing that Henderson’s achievement didn’t happen in a vacuum is important for a number of reasons. First, he says casting Henderson as exceptional, or doing what he did “without help,” feeds the so-called “magical Negro” narrative, a racist trope from the era that framed Black intellectual achievement as unusual. Moreover, in erasing the context for Henderson’s admittedly remarkable life and rendering him only as a talented person who overcame obstacles, we make his story less accessible and relatable to contemporary audiences. For example, it’s long been a priority for higher education institutions to increase representation of Black students in STEM disciplines. But Faisal says if we’re erasing or misrepresenting historical examples like Henderson, we’re failing to give today’s students the opportunity to see themselves not as trailblazers in a field where they've historically not “belonged,” but as part of a long story of achievement in which they are simply the latest chapter. “In the absence of historical memory, we ask students to understand what they’re doing as new when we have a blueprint from the past,” Faisal says.

Indeed, over his many years as an educator of both K-12 and college students, Faisal has leveraged Henderson’s story to challenge students’ views of themselves, others and history. He’s used Henderson’s life as a leaping off point for students to do oral histories of their own families, a project that’s led many students to discover unknown family legacies of college attendance, including some first-generation college students who realized they actually aren’t the first. In 2016, Faisal led a team of fourth-, fifth- and sixth-graders, who did their own research on Henderson and created a traveling exhibition, which they presented throughout southeast Michigan, including to a class of ��-Dearborn graduate students, and which was on display at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History for an entire year. Most recently, with support from an Inclusive History Project grant, Faisal asked ��-Dearborn students in his multicultural education course to reckon with the “multiple identity” features of Henderson’s life, especially the sometimes conflicting forces of his race and social class. The results were fascinating. Faisal found it interesting, for example, how easily one Arab American engineering student was able to find herself in Henderson’s story, as she faced similar challenges as a woman in a predominantly male field. For one white male student, it was a revelation that a Black intellectual class even existed at that time. “I had one student who wondered if maybe the discrimination Henderson faced in looking for a job was based on his language,” Faisal recalls. “And I found this so interesting because her comments seemed to be based in certain assumptions of her understanding of the Black vernacular, when in reality, Henderson, because he came from an elite class, probably talked like the rest of the guys in those engineering firms. But I was glad she made that point. It shows that what we see today informs our understanding of the past, and that we often try to understand things that are unfamiliar to us in terms of what is familiar.” Faisal says the hope in doing an exercise like this is that students, when they’re out in the world working as educators, will approach issues of identity in a more nuanced way. “So when that student is out there teaching her unit on Black history, maybe she won’t just reach for Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass,” Faisal explains. “She’ll reach for the lesser-known figures. She’ll make the cross-cultural comparisons. And when you do that, the story becomes alive.”

Along with Howard Lindsay, Lurine Moncrease and Sharon Sexton, members of the Black Historical Sites Committee at the Detroit Historical Museum, Faisial helped create a new historical marker honoring Henderson in Detroit’s Riverside Park. Photo by Annie Barker

Henderson has now been part of Faisal’s life for nearly 20 years, and in some ways, he may be reaching the end of what he can do with the historical record. Unfortunately, many of the details of Henderson’s engineering achievements were likely lost in a fire that destroyed a significant portion of the Canadian Bridge Company’s historical records. But Faisal reckons he’s not quite done with Henderson. He’s thinking his next project might be a book series on Henderson’s life for children and young adults. And he’s hopeful that the next round of Inclusive History Project funding will enable him to create a walking tour of sites connected to the history of U-M’s early Black students, which would include a new historical marker honoring Henderson in Detroit’s Riverside Park near the Ambassador Bridge. “From my perspective, everything U-M is doing with the Inclusive History Project, it’s all positives and no negatives,” Faisal says. “I could see this as a project across all major universities with long histories — and I hope they follow our lead.”

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Story by Lou Blouin

College of Education, Health, and Human Services

Student Success

University History

Education

Off

Mon, 11/18/2024 - 14:17

With an Inclusive History Project grant, the education lecturer is challenging his students to reckon with the nearly forgotten life story of a 1911 African American U-M grad who became an accomplished Detroit civil engineer.

Cornelius Henderson attended U-M at a time when it had very few Black students and went on to contribute to two of the most ambitious early civil engineering projects in Detroit: the Ambassador Bridge and Detroit-Windsor Tunnel. Photo by Annie Barker

Administration & Governance

Takeaways from the Oct. 15 Conversation with the Chancellor

lblouin — Mon, 21 Oct 2024 12:59:47 +0000

Takeaways from the Oct. 15 Conversation with the Chancellor lblouin Mon, 10/21/2024 - 08:59

The past few years have been a historically tough time for higher education, but last week’s Conversation with the Chancellor event was full of good news for ��-Dearborn. Enrollment is up. This year’s budget features a small surplus. The university’s capital campaign is off to a solid start. And the university is taking important steps on new initiatives, like broadening its DEI efforts. If you weren’t able to attend the event, we’ve recapped some of the big takeaways below. Or you can watch the full Conversation with the Chancellor.

There’s a lot of good news on enrollment and the university budget

In the past few years, demographic challenges and the pandemic have made it a historically challenging time for higher education, with enrollments declining at hundreds of institutions across the country. ��-Dearborn actually fared better than most universities over the past few years. In 2023, the university even welcomed its largest first-year class. But in 2024, it’s unequivocally good news on enrollment. This year’s incoming class of full-time, first-year students is up 4.7%. Transfer and graduate student enrollment is also up. And for Grasso, the brightest of the bright spots are the 9% increase in the four-year graduation rate over the past three years and the 2% increase in the six-year graduation rate compared to 2023. “Our students are taking more courses, which means that they’re going to graduate faster, which means everything is going in the right direction,” Grasso said.

This encouraging enrollment picture is translating into a healthier university budget. Grasso noted that universities can, and often do, grow enrollment while still losing money because of generous subsidies to student tuition. But at ��-Dearborn, we’ve also increased our net tuition revenue. In fact, for the first time in several years, the university has a small budget surplus.

The capital campaign is off to a solid start

Speaking of money, the university is in the midst of its latest capital campaign, which has been dubbed “Look to Michigan” to highlight the state's potential to solve big-picture societal problems and the vital role higher education plays in that. ��-Dearborn has yet to publicly announce its fundraising goal for the campaign, but Grasso shared that we’ve already raised about $25 million. The public launch of the campaign is Oct. 25 and the university will be hosting a major fundraising event at the newly renovated Michigan Central Station in May 2025.

What ‘institutional neutrality’ means for ��-Dearborn

Grasso also discussed a proposed institutional neutrality bylaw, which the U-M Board of Regents was reviewing at the time of the Oct. 15 Conversation event and ultimately approved at their Oct. 17 meeting. The new policy means the U-M president, members of the president’s leadership team (which includes the Dearborn and Flint chancellors), deans, directors, department chairs and others authorized to speak for the university or an academic unit will not, on behalf of the institution, make public statements on social or political issues that are not directly connected to internal university functions. Grasso noted that his office already has a similar set of principles that inform his public statements, though it has not applied to deans and other university leaders. You can read more about the new institutional neutrality bylaw in this article from The Record. Relatedly, ��-Dearborn recently updated its expressive activities policy, which governs its approaches to things like protests, demonstrations and free speech on campus.

The future of DEI at ��-Dearborn

One of Grasso’s big priorities for 2024-25 is getting the Office of Holistic Excellence off to a good start. Created in early 2024, the office is spearheading diversity, equity and inclusion-related efforts at the university, but Grasso noted its vision is much broader than the traditional scope of DEI. While the university will continue efforts to improve student, staff and faculty demographic diversity on campus, he also wants to focus on measurable initiatives that enable students from diverse backgrounds to develop their full potential and make the university a richer place. “There is a narrative that seems to be on campus that we’re walking away from DEI. Nothing could be further from the truth. We’re doubling down on the essence and foundations of DEI,” Grasso said. “[We want to] understand what individuals are bringing not just by their demographic characteristics, but by their life experiences, their perspectives. This is why this is a more holistic approach.” You can read more about Grasso’s views on DEI in our recent article, “Can we still find a path to civil discourse?”

Other highlights

The Renick University Center’s first floor renovation remains on track to be completed by early next year.
Grasso announced that the Facilities team is putting together a plan for installing natural plantings around the campus parking lots so the front door to the university isn’t a “sea of cars.” You can read more about ideas to improve the front entrance of campus on the comprehensive campus plan.
Could the university’s budget surplus translate into a mid-academic-year bonus? Grasso teased such a possibility (to spontaneous applause). He promised additional details later this year.

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Story by Lou Blouin

Enrollment

University-wide

Chancellor

Off

Mon, 10/21/2024 - 12:59

Couldn’t make last week’s town hall with Chancellor Domenico Grasso? We have a recap of some of Grasso’s takes on enrollment, the budget, the current capital campaign, institutional neutrality and ��-Dearborn's new Office of Holistic Excellence.

Vice Chancellor for External Relations Ken Kettenbeil (left) talks with Chancellor Domenico Grasso in Kochoff Hall on Oct. 15, 2024.

Sharing nature’s beauty through touch, smell and sound

stuxbury — Wed, 16 Oct 2024 13:58:18 +0000

Sharing nature’s beauty through touch, smell and sound stuxbury Wed, 10/16/2024 - 09:58

Standing on a cruise ship deck recently, Donna Posont felt the wind in her hair, heard the crashes of the waves and enjoyed how the sun felt as it warmed her. Traveling with a group of nearly 25 friends, Posont says she did a lot of observing along the Canadian Atlantic coastline — and she credits her keen senses and a handy tool for giving her the ability to experience it differently than many others.

“Being a blind person, I don’t have the inconvenience of having sight dull my other senses. I’m lucky to appreciate things differently,” says Posont, who always has her white cane to help her navigate new and familiar spaces. Recalling her adventure, she then laughed: “Yes, I got lost on the ship. I should have had the crew take me on a tour first so I got more familiar with the layout. But my sighted friends were lost all the time too, so I don’t think it had to do with blindness.”

“People are people and we just have differing abilities from one another. Some of us need to plan differently. Just because you can’t see doesn’t mean you have a lack of vision.”

EIC naturalist Donna Posont

She’s right. And many people have called her work visionary. Environmental Interpretive Center staff member Posont, a 2015 College of Arts, Sciences and Letters alum, is a winner of the 2024 National Federation of the Blind’s Dr. Jacob Bolotin Award, which honors individuals and organizations that are a positive force in the lives of blind people. And earlier this month, Posont traveled to Grand Rapids to accept the Michigan Alliance for Environmental and Outdoor Education’s Merit Recognition Award. She also was featured in the latest issue of Audubon magazine.

The second blind person in the United States to become recognized as a certified interpretive guide by the National Association for Interpretation, Posont started a birding program at ��-Dearborn for individuals with low-to-no vision in 2009. Birding by Ear and Beyond, an all-ages bird walk, takes place from 9 a.m. to noon on the second Saturday of the month and begins at the EIC. Posont says sighted friends and family members are also welcome to attend and learn ways to experience their environment without using vision.

“The warmth from the sun on your shoes tells you that you are walking into a clearing. You can identify plants by smell,” says Posont. “You know a bird is a mourning dove by the way the wind whistles through their wings when they are taking off.”

Posont, a retired social worker who supported school-aged kids with visual impairments for many decades, enrolled in college at ��-Dearborn in 2008. Posont says she always wanted to be a scientist. But in the 1970s, when she first attended a university in her home state of West Virginia with the goal of studying biology, the school could not accommodate her in science labs and classes. So she found a fulfilling career in social work. Experience taught Posont — who progressively lost vision beginning around age 8 due to retinitis pigmentosa — that she could appreciate science outside of a lab. She’d go the nature route.

While on hikes with a friend at the Environmental Interpretive Center prior to enrolling at ��-Dearborn, Posont — who can see light, so she knows if it is night or day, but does not have usable vision — experienced the campus and the natural environment it offers. It was also close to her Dearborn home, where she moved decades earlier when her husband’s career transferred the family to Michigan. Learning about the strong environmental sciences programs, Posont knew ��-Dearborn would be the right fit for her.

She first got the idea to focus on birds when she was a ��-Dearborn student completing an internship at Camp Tuhsmeheta, a west Michigan outdoor education facility established by the Michigan School for the Blind. To help the children experience nature, Posont got an idea: She’d use bird songs as an entry point. She ordered plush birds that played recorded sounds. They’d listen to bird calls together and she’d make them relatable by assigning English-sounding words or phrases to them. For example, a translated cardinal sound is “Wit, wit! Cheer, cheer cheer!”

Posont says her ��-Dearborn professors also inspired her. As time went on, they became mentors and then friends. Her field biology professor, Orin Gelderloos — or Dr. G as generations of students have called him — taught her about the differences in tree bark and Posont would feel every trunk. She, in many ways, modeled her teaching style after his go-out-and-do lessons.

Later, as Gelderloos neared retirement, he and Posont worked together as a team . “He was my eyes and I was his ears. For example, when looking for birds with students, I’d tell the class what bird they were hearing because his hearing wasn’t as strong. He’d see it, point it out and tell them about it,” Posont says. “We were a great team then and when I see him, we’re still a good team.”

Posont says she’s proud of the connections she made on campus and her ��-Dearborn degree in environmental sciences with a naturalist concentration, and a biology minor. “Nearly 40 years later, I got that biology education I always wanted,” she says. “I also learned that I am a teacher — I didn’t realize that before — and how much I sincerely appreciate the beauty in our world.”

But birding and the great outdoors is about much more than nature to Posont. It’s a way to showcase blind people’s unique abilities in a way that increases confidence through experience and education.

“Through the years, I have had the pleasure of witnessing people once inhibited by their unique abilities turn into scientists taking off down the path using their canes. There have been some people who have been afraid to touch new things. Then, all of a sudden, they would be shaping bird beaks with homemade play-doh. And I’ve seen people who were afraid of speaking in front of others eventually learn to write Braille so they could have notes and share information,” she says.

Posont continues to explain that it’s not just learning about the birds — it’s about knowing what tools are available and becoming comfortable using them. “I always have my cane. I didn’t want to use it when I began losing my sight because acceptance is a process. But once I did, I learned this cane is my freedom. It allows me to travel and to ask for help. People who see it are more likely to stop since they realize that I’m blind. I’ve been able to do so much because of what’s available. I want others to know tools like canes aren’t a sign of weakness — they are the way to independence.”

Posont says knowing what’s available — she started receiving the support she needed after joining the National Federation of the Blind in 1979 — and learning from others is essential. Once concerned about the safety issues that might arise with parenting, Posont, a mother of five, learned from her NFB peers how bells on shoes and ultra-specific communication make the job much easier.

Now the grandma of 14 watches her grandchildren and plays games like Braille Uno with them. “I just need to remind them that they need to use their words. I can’t see if they are shaking their heads yes or no,” she explains.

Looking at her life, her travels and the recent awards, Posont says she didn’t know what was possible when she started losing her vision. What she once saw as a disability she now sees as a sense enhancer. She acknowledges that not having sight is frustrating at times, but wants others with vision impairments — when they are willing and ready to accept it — to realize how much can be done without sight.

“The younger person I once was — who cried and cried and cried because she couldn’t fit in — would be amazed at where this difference in ability has brought us,” Posont says. “You can still get married and have kids if that’s what you want. You can identify birds. You can be a scientist. You can be a teacher. You can experience the world through your other senses. That young person I once was would be amazed at what was possible. And now it’s her turn to let others see what’s possible for them.”

Story by Sarah Tuxbury

College of Arts, Sciences, and Letters

Teaching Resource

Environmental Interpretive Center

Off

Wed, 10/16/2024 - 13:50

National and statewide awards honor EIC staff member and ’15 alum Donna Posont for her work as an inclusive naturalist educator and advocate.

Donna Posont, right, leads monthly bird walks for people with visual impairments once a month on ��-Dearborn's campus. Photo by Michael Solomon

Alum Zaineb A. Hussein has found her place

lblouin — Tue, 24 Sep 2024 15:42:32 +0000

Alum Zaineb A. Hussein has found her place lblouin Tue, 09/24/2024 - 11:42

The week after 9/11, 17-year-old Zaineb A. Hussein and her mother, Mariam, who had immigrated to Dearborn in 1977 with her husband during the early years of the Lebanese Civil War, were shopping at an estate sale on the west side of the city. Zaineb didn’t share her mother’s love of rummage and garage sales, but when she spotted a pair of ice skates that she simply had to have, she was glad she had tagged along. Her mother led a friendly negotiation over the price, until an elderly woman interrupted and told her mother to “go back to your country.” Zaineb instantly filled with anger. “My mom is my heart. You come near my mom and I see red,” she says. Zaineb was just about to lay into the woman when her mother urged her to hold back. “I was, like, ‘Are you kidding me?’ But my mom said, ‘Stop — she doesn’t know better.’” Then her mother turned to the woman and declared simply, “I am an American citizen and we are proud to be here.” The host of the estate sale, apparently mortified by the encounter, offered her the ice skates for free. They decided to leave without them.

Hussein recalls the encounter as one of her early formative lessons in politics. First, it showed her that, even though her mother had been born elsewhere and would always be viewed as a “foreigner” by some people, she still had so much pride in her identity as an American. Her mother’s roots here mattered to her, and she felt them as strongly as any other American. Second, Hussein says it taught her that you can’t always “meet fire with fire.” “If you really want to see a change in people, you have to be able to demonstrate that in a way that will be received,” she explains. Hussein says that lesson was reinforced again and again over the next few years as a student at ��-Dearborn, where she majored in history and political science. On a diverse campus, her classmates were hardly a monolith when it came to faith, values and politics, and her classes gave her countless opportunities to hone her skills in communicating with people who had views different from her own. More importantly, she developed a working view of human nature, one which makes it feel not just like a political cliché when she extols the virtues of trying to understand others’ views, even ones you might detest. “I think at ��-Dearborn, I really learned that my interpretation of something could be very different from another person’s — even if we were looking at, say, the same historical events,” she says. “I think that’s when I realized just how much our life experiences make us who we are. If you and I lead very different lives, we’re going to have different perspectives, different stories, different values. So if you want to communicate with someone, you have to start there.”

That perspective is certainly part of what has helped Hussein build a dynamic career alongside some of the biggest names in Michigan politics. Post-graduation, she initially headed to Lansing, where she worked for a half decade with the Michigan Department of Human Services and as a director of constituent affairs for then-Michigan State Senator David Kzenek. After burning out on the Lansing political culture, Hussein welcomed an opportunity to return to Wayne County, where she worked as the county’s director of diversity and inclusion and deputy director for external affairs for the county executive. She never thought she’d return to Lansing. But after a conversation with a colleague led to an unexpected opportunity in the Secretary of State’s office, she took a position working as Jocelyn Benson’s deputy chief of staff, where, among other things, she spearheaded minority group outreach initiatives during the 2020 election.

Hussein declares with an understandable amount of pride that she’s rarely had to apply for a job — she’s usually been recruited — and her current position is yet another example. When her longtime friend Abdullah Hammoud, a fellow east Dearborn native and ��-Dearborn alum, expressed interest in running for mayor of Dearborn, Hussein was all in — first answering Hammoud’s call for help with the campaign, and later, when he won, taking on the role of his chief of staff. Alongside Hammoud, Hussein says she’s found a place and a team that makes her feel like she could stay awhile. She sees the work Hammoud is doing as mayor as historic. Indeed, as the first Arab American to be elected mayor in the city’s history, the charismatic young executive is regarded as a symbol of the growing political power of Arab Americans not just locally but nationally. But more than that, Hussein insists what makes Hammoud special is how focused he is on doing the actual work of healing a young, demographically diverse city whose history has been pocked by multiple periods of anti-Black and anti-Arab racism. For example, shortly after Hammoud took office, the administration decided to host the first ever Dearborn-Detroit block party along the cities’ shared border. Hussein remembers more than one instance of a Black Detroiter coming up to the mayor, remarking that it was the first time they ever felt welcome in Dearborn. “I think with this administration, you’re seeing a team that’s actively coming to terms with our history and that’s trying to rectify many past practices that have hurt people in our communities,” Hussein says. “I do think we’re at an inflection point. When I was growing up, it was Arab Americans on the east side and white residents on the west side. But now, almost anywhere you go, you’re finding a diverse group. And people increasingly see our diversity as our strength.”

This moment of transition hasn’t always been smooth. Hussein says there are still outlier voices in the city who aren’t on board with this vision. The past year, in particular, has presented its share of challenges. The war in Gaza thrust Dearborn, which is home to one of the larger Palestinian diasporas in the U.S., into the national spotlight. Some of the old tropes about Arab Americans and Dearborn quickly found new life online and in the press, including a Wall Street Journal op-ed titled “Welcome to Dearborn, America's Jihad Capital,” which drew national backlash, including forceful criticism from Hammoud and ��-Dearborn Chancellor Domenico Grasso. As chief of staff, Hussein got used to handling death threats against Hammoud, sifting out which ones to bring to his attention and which to let the police address quietly in order to not cause him added stress. The team has also wrestled with how to use the spotlight to potentially exert their influence on the national conversation over the war. From the start, Hammoud has been outspoken in his criticism of the assault on Gaza and of the Biden administration, a view that’s shared by many in the city. Earlier this year, the collective frustration morphed into a much-talked-about political liability for Biden, as the then-presumptive Democratic nominee risked losing an important part of his coalition in a tightly contested must-win state. In January, Biden’s campaign manager reached out to Hammoud for a meeting. Hammoud turned them down, telling them he would be open to talking with actual policymakers, but not campaign operatives. A few weeks later, the administration followed up by sending several high-ranking officials to Dearborn.

When Hammoud and his advisors were making decisions about these events, Hussein says there was a surprising amount of unity in the room. It’s one of Hussein’s main jobs, of course, to keep the team tight, and working behind the scenes like this is definitely an underappreciated political craft. For Hussein, it’s about being able to spot great thinkers to put around the mayor, but also knowing how to rein them in when a decision must be made and there’s only a couple hours to do it. It’s about pushing talented people past their limits to get something that’s just a little bit better — and not making them hate you for it. And it’s also about being extremely politically aware of opportunities and political landmines. “I try to see things through all possibilities and outcomes, whether I agree or disagree with the approach,” she says. “If one word in a statement we’re putting out could be interpreted differently, then we have to have a plan to address that if that happens. That’s why we labor so hard over words and ideas. Everybody sees the world a little differently.”

Hussein has made her career working behind the scenes for other people, but she’s made enough of an impression that she now gets asked semi-regularly about whether she’ll run for office some day. “Never” is her quick response on the day we talk. Her explanation is that she doesn’t like talking about herself, and she thinks she can have far more impact by using her talents to elevate others, rather than just herself. It’s a nice sentiment, and rings as sincere, if a bit self-deprecating and deflecting. But I then ask if she has anyone in her life that disagrees with this self-assessment. “There are a few people,” she says, noting that one of them is an influential mentor. I then point out that her logic seems sound if she’d be running for legislative office, but her self-described talents — pushing people, helping diverse teams gel, taking pace and crises in stride, anticipating all possible consequences of a decision, listening to diverse constituents — sound like a nice toolbox for an executive. “I guess you never say never,” she says.

Hussein did run for office — once. She was elected junior class president of Fordson High School. Her slogan was “Ask not what Zaineb Hussein can do for you. Ask what you can do for Fordson.” “I know, super cliché. But I thought it was very cool,” she says, smiling. As a person who puts a lot of stock in the power of words, no doubt she’d come up with something better next time.

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Story by Lou Blouin. Photos by Annie Barker.

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Tue, 09/24/2024 - 15:41

The chief of staff for Dearborn’s first Arab American mayor talks about why she loves making change from behind the curtain and why she’s still a hard ‘no’ on running for office herself.