Office of Diversity, Equity, And Inclusion Newsletter
Dear Colleagues,

On June 28, 1969, the NYPD raided the Stonewall Inn, a longstanding Gay bar in New York’s Greenwich Village. In this era, bars and restaurants known to be gathering places for the LGBTQIA+ community were regularly targeted and raided across the country. The patrons of the Stonewall Inn refused to line up and show identification when asked by the NYPD that day in 1969. Several patrons were arrested and a riot ensued. In 2019, the NYPD apologized for their actions at Stonewall and the discriminatory and oppressive laws at the time.

Nationally, June is recognized as Pride month to commemorate the Stonewall Uprising which many consider to be the spark of the LGBTQIA+ liberation movement; Although, there were several acts of LGBTQIA+ resistance, like the Compton Cafeteria riots of 1966 in San Francisco, which predate Stonewall. 

This Pride month, our office has curated a series of modules on best LGBTQIA+ healthcare practices and invited a renowned Intersex justice activist, Sean Saifa Wall, to be our keynote speaker. It’s a great privilege to openly discuss these topics at the IHP and to be out as a Queer Gender Variant Person, when so many can not. Our office also acknowledges the grief some of us are experiencing at this time as a result of current events and the sharing of video footage highlighting violence against Black people. Please refer to a statement below on these events by Executive Director, Kimberly A. Truong, Ph.D. If you have any questions about our programs or ideas for future collaborations please email us .

Sincerely,
Kay Martinez
(Pronouns: They/Them/Theirs)
The Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
LGBTQIA+ Best Healthcare Practices Series
This webinar series will be a mix of instruction and interactive activities to help health care practitioners create a more inclusive practice for LGBTQIA+ patients. To register for each module, please click on the title of the module and you'll be directed to a Zoom registration page.
Learn some of the foundational knowledge for working with LGBTQIA+ patients and colleagues. This module will cover principles of gender, sexuality, terminology, and intersectionality.
The second module of this series will help participants think of actionable ways to make their everyday healthcare practice more inclusive for LGBTQIA+ patients and to practice communication skills. Topics will include the physical clinical environment, forms and documentation, pronouns and names, and inclusive language.
Would you like to learn more about Gender pronouns? How can you share your pronouns? How can you ask someone else about their pronouns? Learn all this and more at our Pronouns 101 workshop.
The third module in this series will have participants build on communication skills through case discussions.
Back by popular demand and for IHP community members who want more self-care and mindfulness workshops, the "moving meditation" of Tai Chi clears the mind, gently moves the body, relieves stress, boosts immunity, and, above all, feels good! During this time when many around the world are indoors, the Tai Chi/Qi Gong practice allows us to have a break from working from home, caring for family, and the inundation of news and social media that fill our minds. We can only be full if we empty ourselves to receive energy, and Tai Chi and Qi Gong offer simple yet mindful routines to help achieve this balance. Tai Chi is also a relatively physically accessible practice for our elders and those with chronic health conditions, who are most at risk with the current COVID-19/coronavirus pandemic.
Anthony Abraham Jack , PhD, Harvard University, 2016, is a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows and Assistant Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. He holds the Shutzer Assistant Professorship at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. The Privileged Poor: How Elite Colleges Are Failing Disadvantaged Students is his first book. It has won numerous awards and was recognized by NPR Books on their Best Books of 2019 list. His research documents the overlooked diversity among lower-income undergraduates: the Doubly Disadvantaged­—those who enter college from local, typically distressed public high schools—and Privileged Poor­—those who do so from boarding, day, and preparatory high schools.
Sean Saifa Wall is an Intersex activist, artist, and public health researcher based in Atlanta. As co-founder of the Intersex Justice Project (IJP), his work seeks the end of medically invasive and unnecessary surgeries in the United States that target intersex children and adolescents by empowering intersex people of color to advance that change.
Resource Sharing
COVID-19 Volunteer Opportunities in Chelsea and Revere
The Chelsea Pandemic Response Team is currently seeking volunteers to helping at local pop-up food pantries. please fill out the more detailed form and you will be contacted when your skills and availability align.

Revere is looking for 20-30 volunteers for various shifts Monday through Friday (7AM – 12PM for set up and distribution, 12PM to 3:30PM for set up only) and Wednesday nights from 6PM to 8:30PM to pack and distribute meals at their central food distribution site, Rumney Marsh Academy, 140 American Legion Highway. Spanish speakers are needed for morning shifts and Wednesday nights. Sign up Here.


Strong Minds Study
The Disparities Research Unit at MGH is running a study funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, called  Strong Minds.   Strong Minds is a culturally-adapted mental health intervention, available in English, Spanish, Mandarin, and Cantonese. We partner with community-based organizations and clinics to help identify clients that might benefit. Participants in the Strong Minds study may receive 10-week psychoeducational sessions to learn to manage emotions and stress, or calls with a Care Manager and referral to services, free of charge. Patients are screened for eligibility, which includes not having received therapy in the past 3 months. Screenings and the program are offered fully by phone or Zoom. You may refer cases and we can reach out to patients to see if they are eligible.

To participate in the Strong Minds study, or if you would like additional information about this study, please contact the Project Director, Dr. Larimar Fuentes, at (617) 643-0514 in English; or Mr. Liao Zhang, 617-417-4783 or Ms. Emma Zhao, 617-800-5662 in Mandarin or Cantonese. Email at  STRONGMINDS@mgh.harvard.edu .
Message From Executive Director, Kimberly A. Truong, Ph.D.
The past few weeks have been especially challenging to see how Black communities have been affected by racism. News stories about the lives and deaths of Ahmaud Aubery Breonna Taylor , Brianna Hill , George Floyd , and Rana Zoe Mungin, have been on my social media feed as have the experiences of Travis Miller , Keith Gambrell , Antonio Braswell, Marcus Bradley , Christian Cooper, and others. These stories have had adverse effects on the mental well-being of people of color as they navigate and negotiate racism amid a pandemic. At MGH IHP Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, we recognize the collective pain and struggles of Black communities.

Simultaneously, m embers of the IHP community are participating in the asynchronous portion of our Orientation Program, What’s the IHP’s Role in Health Care? Exploring the Impact of Power, Privilege, and Positionality (PPP) . PPP was created in 2018 as IHP students sought support for having more conversations about race and racism.

Some of us may interpret these current events impacting Black people as isolated incidents between individuals. Through PPP, we are learning how complex racism is. What we are seeing today is how Black communities are affected by the stereotypes that exist about them, such as being criminalized or having higher thresholds of pain , which leads to life and death situations. Participation in PPP has helped us to better understand how these “isolated” experiences are actually quite interconnected within a system of oppression known as racism.

Individuals at the IHP have had conversations with the DEI team about these topics and we would like to both acknowledge the collective pain some of us are experiencing and appreciate everyone involved in PPP as we create opportunities for reflection and discussion on race and racism. We will be offering PPP again in the Fall if you'd like to join us as our IHP goal is 75% participation. For those who need additional support, EAP/SAP is a resource available to faculty, staff, and students at the IHP.

In July, we will have a journal club focused on Critical Race Theory, and more specifically, the permanence of racism tenet. I and the DEI team are available to meet, share additional information and resources, and collaborate on education, programming, and policies.
Advancing Care For a Diverse Society