Diversity Goal Alignment System

The Diversity Goal Alignment System (formerly referred to as the diversity audit tool) was created to compile, organize, and examine how University of Puget Sound initiatives support a culture of diversity. The system functions as a complex database which organizes diversity initiatives, from ongoing policies and programming to single events or courses, by their target group. The target group information was gathered from groups listed in the university's equal opportunity statement.

The alignment system serves to fit each initiative into the diversity strategic plan, which aims to increase recruitment and retention of underrepresented groups on campus; to create a campus environment that provides institutional, social, and cultural support for diversity; to improve working and business relationships with diverse communities in the Puget Sound region; and to hold the community accountable for upholding the diversity strategic plan and making its goals a reality.

The alignment system was created in April 2007 by Kate Cohn ’00, while working in the Office of Institutional Research and the Office of Spirituality, Service, and Social Justice, after researching other universities' diversity evaluation tools. The system was then further developed by a working group comprised of faculty and staff from across campus, over the course of the 2007 year.

The alignment system will eventually be accessible by all campus departments in order to celebrate their unique and significant diversity work, identify areas that would benefit from further development, and capture a detailed picture of campus diversity.