This toolkit series is intended to guide UMass community members in understanding, interpreting, reflecting on, and responding to findings of the 2021 Campus Climate Survey. We encourage you to explore this section where you may download our PDF toolkit or peruse the web-based content below.
We encourage you to use this toolkit for a group or classroom discussion, or as a resource for yourself as you consume the findings of the survey.
The University of Massachusetts is more than an institution of higher education. For over 6,500 faculty and staff, this is also their workplace. Be it salting and shoveling our walkways, preparing the food we eat, advising our students, managing our books (both literally and figuratively), or teaching our classes, the employees here work hard to ensure that the business of the University is done well. Like the overall composition of our campus, this work is conducted by people who hail from a diversity of backgrounds and life experiences. Our campus is richer for their presence.
Yet, we know that there are broad challenges facing our campus community and evidence of them is found in the responses surrounding workplace climate. Disproportionately impacted in the workplace by the pandemic, staff reported higher levels of dissatisfaction than faculty with the university’s response. Faculty and staff with a disability were more likely to report mistreatment in the workplace, and to specifically report it as bullying. LGBTQIA+ and female-identifying faculty and staff were more likely to report difficulties in work-life balance. Also notable are the voices which are underrepresented in these survey results. Numerous barriers to participation, logistical and relational, resulted in frontline staff – the people who do service work on our campus and often hold positions of less institutional power – being less likely to complete the survey. We recognize that there is much to be learned from their stories and will strive to create better access to participation in the future.
These findings reveal opportunities where meaningful changes can be made. By leaning into community and the imperative to care for one another, we can work together to make this campus a place where people thrive, and their ambitions are realized. This toolkit is a starting point, where we take this is up to us.
Learn More About the Campus Climate Survey
You can review all of the reports released for the Campus Climate Survey in our Climate and Culture section, where we provide transparent data and reporting on areas of belonging, friendships and connections, perceptions of campus climate, classroom climate, and workplace climate.