Creating connections, building community

Throughout the year, C+V hosts events, speakers, webinars, and discussions and carries out various initiatives to create connections and build a sense of belonging at the University of Denver. C+V is working to create programs and events that help our community feel connected and supported. 

If you have an event idea, we would love to hear it! Please email CommunityPlusValues@du.edu to connect with us.

Initiative

Growing the You Rock! Awards Program through Campus Partnerships

About

We are excited to report that through a partnership with VPFA, Community + Values, Human Resources & Inclusive Community, Student Affairs and Inclusive Excellence, and Advancement, Alumni Engagement, we are now expanding the You Rock! Awards program. This will enable us all to acknowledge the great talent, dedication, resilience, and courage of our entire DU community. Anyone, whether student, staff, faculty, alum, parent, or friend, can nominate a fellow community member for their small and larger accomplishments.

Event

Past Event: C+V Community Talk: Creating a Resilient Community: Lifting Each Other Up

About

After our last webinar and conversation with our community, the C+V team realized how important it is for us to maintain focus on how we lift one another up and support each other. With all that is going on in our city, state, nation, and world, we know how difficult it can be for all of our community members. Therefore, in Part II of our resilience and coping webinars, which featured the Dean of Graduate School of Professional Psychology, Dr. Shelly Smith-Acuña, Clinic Director of Sturm Center, Dr. Katy Barrs, and Director of Sport & Performance Psychology and Professor, Dr. Mark Aoyagi, as they spoke about how we can all show up for one another and support each other as we continue to navigate these times.

Thursday, July 23 | 11am-12pm 

Event

Past Event: C+V Community Talk: Resilience and Coping During Tough Times

About

As we continue to navigate the ups and downs during these times as a community, we recognize the importance to be there for one another. This conversation featured DU Women's Gymnastics Head Coach, Melissa Kutcher-Rinehart, and Senior Project Manager for DU Impact 2025 and C+V, Chase McNamee, as they shared how we cope during these tough times and find ways to keep going as a community and supporting one another.

Coach Kutcher-Rinehart shared resources used by the team to further resiliency:

 

Thursday, July 9 | 11am-12pm 

Event

Past Event: C+V Community Talk: Beyond Taking a Knee: Policing Equity and Activating Community

About

C+V invited the DU community to join us for an authentic, in-depth conversation on police and community relations featuring DU alum Dr. Tracie Keesee, SVP and Co-Founder of the Center for Policing Equity. In this conversation, we explored police reform, community engagement, and how to most effectively harness the energy of this moment for true change.

Resources: 

Event

Past Event: C+V Community Talk: Real Talk with Alumni: Being Part of the Change at DU and Beyond

About

Join us for a conversation with DU alumni, Kelly Schlabach, Ariel Zarate, Makia Jones, Neda Kikhia, and Daniel Gonzalez, as we continue conversations on how we build a sense of belonging, inclusivity, and explore our values as a community. Our alumni panel shared their experiences and shared how we can all continue to show up for each other, build community, and fight institutional racism.

 

 

Thursday, June 18 | 11am-12pm

Event

Past Event: C+V Community Talk: Racial Justice Part II: Continuing the Conversation

About

As our community continues to discuss how we all can fight against injustices and systemic racism, we will come together again to continue the conversation about racial justice and what allyship looks like, especially during these times. During this webinar, we were joined by Dr. Apryl Alexander and Dr. Lavita Nadkarni from the Graduate School of Professional Psychology.

 

Update

A Letter to the DU Community from C+V: In Solidarity & Strength

About

Read Community + Value’s full letter to the DU community in response to the continued violence against Black people with the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and Ahmaud Arbery. The C+V Steering Committee refuses to stand by in silence or passivity and let this systemic violence and crimes against Black people and their lives continue to happen. We reassert, in the strongest terms, our continued stance against institutional racism, violence, bias, hate, and injustice.

Initiative

Inclusive Teaching Practices Site Launch

About

Led by Valentina Iturbe-LaGrave, PhD, Director for Inclusive Teaching Practices and Co-Lead of the Community+Values initiative, this project aims to solve complex problems, engage multiple perspectives, foster greater belonging, show compassion beyond boundaries and shape the future of our world. This is inclusive teaching at the University of Denver.

Event

Past Event: C+V Community Talk: Racial Justice: How We Show Up for One Another

About

This C+V webinar focused on how we, as a community, can fight against injustices and can create a more inclusive institution for all. We know how important showing up for another is, and we wish to create a space for support and checking in on each other. In this webinar, we learned about racial justice and what allyship looks like, especially during these times. We were joined by Dr. Art Jones, Interim Vice Chancellor for Diversity and Inclusion; Dr. Kristin Deal, Director of the Office of Diversity and Inclusion; Dr. Tom Romero, Associate Provost for Inclusive Excellence Research and Curricular Initiatives; Neda Kikhia, Program Manager of DU DialogUes; and Dr. Thomas Walker, Director of Office of the Inclusion and Equity Education. Some of the panelists are willing to be contacted by DU affiliates with follow-up questions; their contact info can be found via their office webpages and/or DU online directory.

 

 

Reflection Questions  (and their goal in parentheses). Due to time, only questions 1 and 3 were addressed. 

  1. Recent prejudice, racial injustice, violence, and resistance are recent and perhaps well broadcast, but not new experiences. What was your earliest/most impactful realization of race and racial injustice?  (naming our own identities and learning journey around this issue)
  2. What has been the cost to you of racial injustice: relationships, career, institutions, communities? (While not digging for trauma, what are the real costs of racial injustice, and not just to people of color?)
  3. What has worked for you in supporting/being supported by others? What has not helped? What do you need/not need from those wishing to help?  (while not speaking for all our people, we can share some, probably generalizable truths)
  4. How have you continued to learn, act for change, and self-care in this work over time? (while not speaking for all our people, we can share some, probably generalizable truths)
  5. What is one thing you now know, that you wish your 1st encounter self had known or known to do then? (hoping our reflective insights might spark others to consider what they think/do now…)

Resources mentioned/related:

 

Event

Past Event: C+V Community Talk: Compassion Meditation: Taking a Break Together

About

As we navigate this difficult time together, C+V realizes the importance of mental health, wellness, and taking time to rest and take care of ourselves. Sometimes we just need a moment to "be." This session on Compassion Meditation was led by Molly Clarke, a holistic health coach, registered yoga teacher + owner of Soulbeam Wellness. During the webinar,  participants dove into mindfulness, specifically compassion meditation, what that is, why it’s important during times like these, and how we can incorporate it into our daily lives.

Mindfulness Resources: 

  • Mindfulness Apps: 
    • Calm, Headspace, Insight Timer, Buddhify
  • Mindfulness Books:
    • The Miracle of Mindfulness by Thich Nhat Hanh
    • Where You Go, There You Are by Jon Kabat-Zinn
    • The Untethered Soul by Michael A. Singer 
    • The Power of Now by Eckart Tolle 
  • Mindfulness/Spirituality/Wellness Podcasts 
    • Expanded Podcast with Lacy Phillips
    • Highest Self Podcast with Sahara Rose 
    • Oprah's SuperSoul Conversations 
    • Mind Body Green Podcast
    • Soul on Fire Podcast with The Balanced Blonde 

 

 

Event

Past Event: C+V Community Talk: A Healthy Mind in a Healthy Body

About

This week’s webinar features Dr. Lotta Granholm-Bentley, Professor and Founding Executive Director of the Knoebel Institution for Healthy Aging; Professor Daniel Linseman, College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics; and Lilia Koza, Cellular and Molecular Biology Ph.D. Candidate, Knoebel Institution for Healthy Aging. The panelists will discuss how maintaining a healthy lifestyle and understanding aging can improve physical and mental health, quality of life, wellness, and community.

Resources: 

Event

Past Event: Special Edition Community Talks: Our DU Values: A Community Conversation

About

On Thursday, May 14, 2020, over 80 members of the DU community joined Chancellor Haefner as he facilitated a Special Edition C + V Community Talk featuring DU community panelists, Grace Sullivan, Dr. Johnny Ramirez, Dr. Allison Friederichs, and Wade Loo. The panelists were asked to tackle the essential question:  

‘Crises have a way of testing us—as individuals and as communities and societies. And we all respond to these tests in a different way. They shared what they are feeling personally, and what they are seeing in our community, as COVID-19 has such profound impact?’