Question: Give an example of how you have advocated for graduate student needs and experiences on your campus or in your work.
Ashanka Kumari: As described in my previous response (linked here), I am a student-leader and participant across several graduate-student focused organizations in my department and campus communities. More specifically, I have lead the movement towards a series of ongoing monthly conversations regarding graduate student sustainability, equity, and inclusivity in my department. Graduate students meet with faculty members in our department once a month to advocate for and discuss ways we can have a stronger graduate student culture, especially one that is more welcoming for students from historically marginalized positions and experiences. As a leader in these conversations, I develop lists of concerns (with the input of other graduate students in my department), agenda items, and lead these larger conversations with faculty. These conversations are hard — tension among faculty and graduate students are often challenging to navigate, and part of my role is to find respectful ways to communicate our concerns without impeding on existing power structures in the department. With the aid of a faculty member-leader in the office of diversity at my university, the small group of graduate students at the front of these conversations have helped out department begin to make significant changes to the training and structures in our faculty. For instance, faculty and teaching assistants participated in a implicit bias training last semester as a result of these conversations. This is just the beginning, and my dedication to these ongoing conversations is one example of how I continue to advocate for graduate student needs and experiences.
