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New York State Unified Court System |
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Office of Diversity and Inclusion Debuts Online Resource LibraryBy Dan Santiago-Stewart and Melissa Wade, ODIODI is excited to unveil our new Online Resource Library! After many months of building and creating, the Resource Library is now live. The aim of this resource library is to share diversity and inclusion content and tools that will raise awareness and spark conversation, while also creating a central location for information on DEI-related issues and topics. Read on for more details, and a brief interview with the ODI staff members, Melissa Wade and Alyssa Herrera, who designed the site: 
What was the impetus for creating the Resource Library? ALYSSA: The Resource Library comes directly from the suggestions made by Jeh Johnson in his report to the court system following his investigation of the UCS in 2020, at the request of then-Chief Judge Janet DiFiore. There had been a few high-profile incidents of racial prejudice perpetrated by court employees, in addition to what was happening nationally, following the murder of George Floyd. The suggestion was made by Johnson, that the Office of Diversity and Inclusion create and maintain a resource that would serve the court system in our efforts to be more inclusive and address bias and discrimination. How did you go about getting started? MELISSA: The National Center for State Courts convened a meeting in 2022 among Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) leaders from across the country. ODI’s Director Tony Walters attended this meeting, where a connection was made among states who were interested in creating DEI resources for judges and court employees, with input from other states that had already done this. ODI’s Deputy Director, Rena Micklewright, and I then participated in a meeting with the Oregon Judicial Department, that had created a robust site using Microsoft SharePoint. Before that meeting, we had been considering a website of sorts for the Resource Library, but quickly began investigating SharePoint as an option for our Library as well. Judith Vergara, Vishnu Priya Tekumalla, and their colleagues in the Division of Technology and Court Research were instrumental in building our site and providing support and guidance as Alyssa and I taught ourselves how to create, populate, and style a SharePoint site to be functional and visually appealing. What should employees go to the site for? MELISSA: I’m hopeful that employees will go to the library to find resources on diversity, equity, and inclusion that will aid in their understanding of their colleagues, friends, family, and neighbors. We are all in different places in our journey relating to these topics, so whether you’re just learning about something for the first time, or you’re looking to go deeper in your understanding, I’m confident that the site will have helpful information for you. Additionally, most of ODI’s programs (and programs created by our partners) are recorded, and we provide many of those recordings here for ease of access. How were the categories selected? MELISSA: For the most part, the categories in the library are those that receive federal protection from discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, so these categories were not selected due to politics or personal opinion. When it comes to content, there were many people within ODI and the UCS who contributed ideas and resources to the library, and we hope that this shared approach will continue. What do you want the audience/users to walk away with after interacting with the content? ALYSSA: Court employees should feel that the resource library serves as an educational platform where we can all relate to something that has been provided. If court employees don’t walk away from the resource library feeling this way, we have more to do, and we hope they will share their ideas and thoughts on any subject matter that perhaps has not been showcased enough. What did you enjoy most about the project? ALYSSA: I welcomed the opportunity, and it was great to be part of the behind-the-scenes of the resource library; bringing to life a mere template with ideas and colleague collaboration, whilst imagining yourself as the audience and thinking about content, and trying not to compromise the user experience regarding navigation or crowding on the pages, was both challenging and rewarding. MELISSA: I loved collaborating with Alyssa on this project- she’s incredibly creative in a way that I’m not, so our skills complemented one another. I’ve long said, “Educate people and let them change their own behavior accordingly,” and any time I get to play a part in helping people to become more knowledgeable in a way that hopefully leads to a more inclusive and accepting workplace, I am pleased. I also appreciated the opportunity for self-teaching some new skills. Since Microsoft is the platform the UCS uses, we should be taking advantage of the tools that are available to us in our work. While SharePoint can be tricky to use and navigate, it’s more user-friendly than creating and manipulating websites; there are numerous possibilities for its use. How can court employees and judges suggest materials to be included? ALYSSA: Generally, materials are organized by items you can ‘read’, ‘watch’, and ‘listen’ to. If you have a resource you believe we should include, email us at [email protected] with that resource, using the subject line “Resource Library Submission” and we will consider it at our regular site content update meetings. 
Please enjoy browsing the ODI Resource Library at your leisure. We hope you’ll bookmark the Resource Library and visit often. |
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Need more info about ODI? Contact Us!Office of Diversity & InclusionPhone: (212) 428-2540 |
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