The Office of Student Belonging and Inclusive Excellence (OSBIE), along with the efforts of the Inclusive Symbols and Actions Task Force, is continuously working to improve and ensure inclusivity on campus with a variety of initiatives and projects, the implementation of which began last year.
Starting this semester, a feature is now available, allowing students to update their first names for official class rosters and on display in Canvas. The name-change initiative has been discussed and in the works for a few years, but recently has seen more push from students and faculty to make it a reality.
The new feature, which can be accessed through myHilltop, grants any student the option to easily modify their given name, change nicknames back to legal names or switch to their preferred name by filling out and submitting a Smartsheet form. The name change will make the student’s chosen name available to display on class rosters and Canvas. Erica Zamora, director of OSBIE, emphasized the main effort of the project was to make it available for any student, any reason and in a seamless manner.
”Whether it be for changing to a preferred name, or removing it altogether and saying, ‘I just want to go by my legal name,’” Zamora said. “All of those things can be done at one spot, through one form, and it’s so easy.”
Zamora and Associate Professor of literature Alex Barron, who leads the Task Force alongside Zamora, both expressed how collaborative the efforts were to make this project possible, from keeping faculty and professors in-the-know about the new feature to campus technology staff working to make sure it is able to run smoothly for student access.
“We were trying to make sure that as we rolled it out we were being communicative and telling people what it would look like and answering any questions,” Barron said.
An estimated 20 students have already used the new feature since the start of the semester, with positive feedback from those who have used it thus far. One student, sophomore Roony Puga, expressed their appreciation for the feature, for they had anticipated said feature for themselves and other transgender and gender-nonconforming students.
”It’s working out really great, and it is very gender affirming,” Puga said. “I’m definitely a lot more comfortable and feel better being (in) class and existing just as a person.”
Zamora expressed how the name-change feature is just one of many inclusive campus initiatives that have been introduced, as many are still in the works, including the upcoming gender-inclusive housing for the fall and more emphasis on bystander intervention training. Zamora, Barron and other faculty and staff continue to work towards promoting campus diversity and inclusion.
”We’re really trying to cultivate that we’re not just putting out processes to help one certain group, but that we’re trying to think about how we do things to create a culture of care,” Zamora said. “Where it’s not just the university that cares about you, but it’s that we all care about each other.”
