Under the leadership of our new Chancellor, ACC’s students participated in guided discussions about the sort of college that they need us to be. As I wrote last week, their discussions led to four values that are now guiding (and will continue to guide) our work: Courage, Compassion, Joy, and Yes. This is the second in a series of blog posts about these values and what they mean for those of us on the instructional leadership team.
As a college, we have this statement to help us understand Compassion: “We believe in empathy, kindness, and being other-centered in all that we do.” As an instructional leadership team, we came up with the following behaviors or expectations for each other:
- Compassion is evident in teamwork. As a team we will engage in active listening, and we will consider our word choices and language.
- We will seek to understand.
- We will act in empathy.
- We will recognize and value individual differences and lived experiences.
- We will provide support in difficult student issues wherever possible.
- We will assume positive intent.
- We will center people/humanity in our work.
- We will respect others by supporting, treating, and engaging with others the way they want to be supported rather than the way we might want to be supported.
- We will realize others do not always share our thinking, work ethic, perspectives, or lived experiences.
On behalf of all of us in the instructional leadership team, we ask that you hold us accountable for acting with compassion with each other and with all of our faculty and staff and students.