MOORHEAD, Minn. – MSU Moorhead attended and participated in the NCAA's Inclusion Forum last weekend in Indianapolis. Representatives from the MSUM athletic department, along with campus officials from MSUM's Diversity, Equity and Inclusion offices, attended the three-day forum in hopes of bringing what they learned back to campus and mobilizing it in a meaningful way.
 
The athletic representatives attending the forum included head soccer coach and Athletic Diversity and Inclusion Designee Christie Kopietz, Assistant Athletic Director for Compliance and Student Services Jason Sobolik and student-athletes Natalie Jens (women's basketball) and Simone Lewald (soccer). The athletics contingent was also joined by Dr. Frank King, Associate Provost for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and Jered Pigeon, Director of Diversity and Inclusion.
 
"One of the big reasons why I am so excited about the crew that went to the NCAA Inclusion Forum was that it included leaders from outside of athletics on our campus," said MSUM Athletic Director Chad Markuson. "Both Dr. King and Jered Pigeon are great partners with athletics currently and the learning and discussions from the seminar will enhance that partnership more broadly."
 
The NCAA Inclusion Forum brings together higher education officials, intercollegiate athletics leaders and students who are passionate about improving the educational and professional environments for student-athletes, coaches and administrators. MSUM was selected to participate in a Division II Enhanced Program at the forum. This program would challenge the group to create an action plan to be implemented on campus following their return. Education sessions on each of the office of inclusion's five core areas of disability, international, LGBTQ, race/ethnicity and women/gender equity were featured at the forum. 
 
"This event provided a great opportunity for different parts of campus to work together in developing an action plan to implement on campus. People who don't interact with our student-athletes got a chance to know them more than just an athlete," said Sobolik. "The student-athletes had an opportunity to interact with administration as well. It was a great, collaborative effort."
 
The Action Plan
 
In the group's ideation process, their initial action plan narrowed in one specific goal: Create a sense of community across Dragon athletics. The group pinpointed three terms that would best reach that end goal: Skill, Knowledge and Awareness. These terms stem from the disconnect MSUM student-athlete feel from the campus at large as well as their fellow student-athletes in different sports. 
 
"Those terms were selected for the action plan because we cannot know how to proceed without determining where we are now and the gaps that we have," said Kopietz. "As a group, we concluded that MSUM athletics has some awareness of diversity, equity and inclusion, but can grow its awareness through acquisition of more knowledge."
 
Lewald added that the terms were selected after a careful thought process of what student-athletes (and students overall) have access to when it comes to matters of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. "Our team decided that MSUM is in-between awareness and knowledge. What drove us to those factors was that MSUM has resources to provide students with DEI help, but the reach is not there," said Lewald, who will be a senior for the Dragons in the fall. "Furthermore, MSUM needs to increase awareness of the therapist center, International Students Center, DEI Center and much more."
 
Pigeon stated that part of the action plan should be to utilize student-athletes and their leadership qualities across campus as a whole. "Student athletes are leaders across our community at MSUM. Right now, we don't leverage this fact to assist the overall campus," he said. "Athletes report not feeling a part of the larger campus and the larger campus says that athletes are not a part of the larger campus. This has to be a priority."
 
Dr. King noted that starting this action plan on a smaller sample size like athletics was crucial in their thinking process. He states that the action plan can translate to campus as a whole, but believes athletics is the correct proving group for the plan. "Awareness of the problems faced by our scholar athletes is first, then we need to gain knowledge of the issues through research and listening. That is the only way we can move forward," he said. "That will help us become aware to be able to share that information to our campus."
 
The group felt as though the action plan will bring the MSUM athletics community closer together. That benefit was somewhat lost following the COVID-19 pandemic. "COVID really depleted the opportunity for interaction," Kopietz said. "We need to rebuild and grow the connections between teams and the campus overall so we can get back that sense of community which makes us all feel a part of something bigger than ourselves."
 
"Our action plan will increase the culture of MSUM athletics to get the inclusion across all athletes and provide a sense of belonging and closeness," added Lewald.
 
The Takeaways And Impact
 
Each attendee had a personal answer to the question: What was your biggest takeaway from the NCAA's Inclusion Forum, how did it impact you and how did it possibly challenge you?
 

"The conference theme was the power of proximity.  In order for us to feel that we can be proximal to another human being we need to be vulnerable so that the connection can be authentic.  I resonated with the phrase 'you have to be yourself, everyone else is taken'.  When we feel we can embrace our truest selves we can then perform at our best and add so much value to those around us. It made me feel less alone. Despite the political climate around diversity, equity and inclusion in this country people are still fighting. It challenged me to be more proactive in my life, in the department and in the campus community." – Christie Kopietz

 

"I thought it was great overall. There were some amazing panels and the keynote speakers were some of the best I've ever seen at a conference. Understanding the experiences of Scholar Athletes is important and this helped. The information pertaining to trans athletes needs to be shared more because of so much misinformation. I don't think I was challenged, but I do think I was educated in an area I know little about. I don't think most non-athletes know what the scholar athletes do and the hard work they put in to be scholars and athletes." -  Dr. Frank King

 

"Learning different perspectives from other people and gaining a deeper understanding of what true DEI spaces are supposed to be. It was just really inspiring to hear people speak from such a high level of intelligence and education. Many of them brought new perspectives and ideas to me that have given me a renewed sense of purpose and a clear vision for the future of MSUM athletics." - Simone Lewald

 

"A big takeaway is that the field of DEI intrinsically aligns with the work in athletics. A huge thing I also heard was that student-athletes are very busy with the demands of work, school and life. I see there is greater need to develop direct collaborations with the student affairs division. It challenged me to think about ways to intersect my work with athletes. It also opened my eyes that I need to do more to get to know the the athletes as they are hungry for learning." – Jered Pigeon

 

"My biggest takeaway from this conference is that we all have room to improve to make our campus a better and more inclusive place. This conference was so inspiring! I made so many amazing relationships with people from all over the world, and I left feeling motivated to be better and improve a sense of belongingness across the MSUM campus. It challenged me to reflect on my own experiences and what I can do better to create a sense of belongingness with everyone around me."  - Natalie Jens

 
The Next Step
 
In their return to campus, the group decided that the most important facet of their action plan was to create a sense of belonging within MSUM athletics. "All Dragon athletes are here to be STUDENT-athletes, the campus community is vital to their success in life like their athletic ability is vital to success in their playing arena," said Kopietz. "If we invest time in each other to develop stronger and closer relationships, everyone would benefit."
 
"The first step is to create a sense of belonging within Dragon athletics. Once that is achieved, we then add programming with the general student body so they have an opportunity to interact with student-athletes outside of a classroom environment," Sobolik added.
 
Jens, who will be the incoming Student-Athlete Advisory Committee President in the fall, is planning to hit the ground running with concrete steps from the group's action plan. Jens intends to survey MSUM student-athletes at this year's student-athlete awards banquet on May 1. The intent is to gauge the sense of community and belonging within the student-athlete population. From there, those results will directly dictate what type of programming and events will best fit into the overall action plan.
 
"The survey will help, but we also want to hold focus groups. Another thing will be to define the roles of ADID, SWA and FAR within athletics and how the CDO and other diversity leaders work together and work together smarter," said Pigeon of the survey plan. "We can leverage the team model. From there, we can look how to create community within the team, or cohort, like each freshman class. There is a new sense of energy for DEI in Nemzek!"
 
The hope is to utilize those results and create programming and a safe DEI space to foster a sense of culture and belonging among all student-athletes. Beyond that would be connecting student-athletes and the athletics department with the wider campus community to establish an all-encompassing sense of belonging. Dr. King sums it quite easily in regards to the group's overall goal and mindset towards the action plan.
 
"We are all Dragons!" he said.