Posted 1:25 p.m. Thursday, June 17, 2021
UWL Campus Climate has new name, same commitment to social justice
The UW-La Crosse Research & Resource Center for Campus Climate is embracing a name change that better captures its mission of supporting students and advancing social justice.
“We were really motivated by looking at where we were losing people and failing to connect or engage people,” explains AJ Clauss, program coordinator for the newly renamed Center for Transformative Justice. “Campus Climate was more of a generalized name, which was great. But it was time for some updating to help get our message out.”
The change was spurred by the events of the past year, when social justice dominated the national news cycle and many institutions, including universities, reassessed and renewed their commitment to driving change.
Clauss and others solicited input from campus stakeholders before landing on the new name.
The Center for Transformative Justice will retain all the services and resources of Campus Climate — including cultural humility workshops, social justice programming, hate/bias response and more. Its name is simply more direct about the need to actively address social injustice.
“Because of the two pandemics — COVID-19 and racial injustice — we’re really at a turning point that has been long overdue,” notes Clauss, who uses they/them pronouns. “It’s time to get louder about the needs of our community. We want to center our work with historically marginalized communities while also building spaces for allies or people who want to be allies to be in community, too.”
The name change, they say, will allow the center to put on a fresh face as it seeks to develop new partnerships and strengthen existing ones.
“We’ve developed a healthy reputation over the past 15 years for doing social justice work, and we’re hoping this change will help us continue and push that forward,” Clauss says. “This provides us with an opportunity to show what UWL is all about: Moving not only our campus forward, but our community forward as well.”
About the Center for Transformative Justice
The Center for Transformative Justice, originally called the Research & Resource Center for Campus Climate, was created in 2005 with the goal of creating a campus environment where the individual and collective are committed to welcoming, including and engaging the experiences and perspectives of all.
Over the years, the center has expanded its services and resources to meet the ever-changing needs of the campus and community.
Since its inception, it has been fully funded by students.