Carolina MPA Calendar

• January 9: Spring/January 2023 term begins
• January 22: NCLGBA Regional Networking Event
• January 26: Un-Naming: Lessons Learned with Mike Smith, 10 am EST
• February 1-3: NCCCMA Winter Seminar, Winston-Salem, NC
• May 12-14: Spring Graduation Weekend

Trauma is common and affects us all, either directly or indirectly. Understanding what trauma is and how it shows up in our lives is critical to creating spaces that are more trauma sensitive. Trauma sensitivity recognizes that we have diverse experiences that impact us in different ways and moves us towards greater inclusion by making it safer for each of us to show up in a space as our whole selves.

What is trauma?1

Trauma is often talked about as a discrete event or experience- something that happens to us. In fact, trauma is our response to an intense event or experience that causes or threatens harm. There are at least four trauma responses- fight, flight, freeze, or fawn- which are adaptive mechanisms that our bodies use to protect us from harm. In that sense, these responses are normal, healthy, and important! But they can become problematic and disruptive when they show up at times in our lives when we aren’t in danger anymore (even if we perceive that we are). Our trauma responses may show up when we go through or see someone else go through an experience or event that is similar to what originally caused our trauma. This is called a “trigger.” But triggers aren’t limited to re-living or observing the scary thing that happened to us. Triggers can also be people, places, sounds, and smells. Sometimes just the feelings of being unsafe, threatened, and/or out of control, which we may have felt during that intense event or experience that originally caused our trauma, are enough to again cause a fight, flight, freeze, or fawn response. An example often used in trauma education is that of bumping into a bear in the woods and having the freeze response. You become still and quiet and your heartbeat and breath slow. In that moment, freezing may keep you safe. But that freeze response may no longer serve you, and may even become disruptive in your life, if afterwards you experience a freeze response each time you see a bear on TV or other times when you feel scared, unsafe, or out of control, like when presenting at a high stakes work meeting.

How can I create a trauma sensitive space?

As supervisors, colleagues, friends, or family, we can implement the trauma sensitive practices like those listed below to reduce the chance that someone is triggered and to support an environment that is safer and more inclusive.

• Ask people for their pronouns and preferred names, and then use them.
• Use content warnings. It’s impossible to know everyone’s triggers but there are types of events and experiences that we know are especially likely to cause trauma, such as interpersonal or identity-based violence, accidents, or severe illness. Give content warnings in advance when possible. For example, you can give a content warning in a syllabus or agenda rather than announcing it on the first slide of your live presentation.
• Let people know what to expect ahead of time by sending out agendas and explaining things like how parking will work or where folks can find bathrooms once they’re in the building (including single occupant bathrooms). If the plan changes, let folks know ASAP.
• Normalize self-care by letting attendees know that they can step out of the class or meeting if needed and include breaks for everyone in the agenda.
• Know that you can’t “fix” someone else’s trauma and learn about resources that folks can be referred to for help, like UNC Student Health or an Employee Assistance Program.
• Be patient with yourself and others. Stay open minded, commit to the learning journey, and strive to do better as you learn more.

1 The information provided here stems from my training in trauma sensitive yoga and is by no means a comprehensive treatise on the topic! Here are a few entities that have free online resources related to trauma: the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration  (https://www.samhsa.gov/trauma-violence), the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (https://www.nctsn.org/), the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies (https://istss.org/home), and the Justice Resource Institute (https://jri.org/). 

• Due January 11: Parr Center for Ethics applications for Graduate Fellows
• Due January 13: Paper Proposal Deadline for the NCPSA-NCPAA Joint Conference
• Due January 13: Deadline to apply for the Carolina Certificate in Innovation for the Public Good
• Due January 16: Apply for the Dialogue for Change Allyship in Action 2-Day Intensive Professional Development Retreat
• Due February 1: Deadline to apply for Community Engagement Fellowships
• February 22: NC Child Hunger Leaders Conference
• Due March 7: Join the Data Matters Short Course Series
• Apply to Write for the Local Reporter

The Parr Center for Ethics seeks applications for Graduate Fellows for the 2023 spring semester. The Graduate Fellows are a group of graduate students from across the University who share an interest in ethics. Fellows are able to use Parr Center resources to organize events focusing on issues in ethics, and they also have priority access to Parr Center events, which includes presenting work at the annual CRÉ/Parr Joint Conference in Ethics, having dinner with speakers, and taking a leading role in Parr Center programming (such as reading groups for undergraduates). We hope to welcome folks from your department to this vibrant and dedicated group of Carolina graduate students! 

To apply, please visit here. Applications are open and due January 11th. Our first event will be a case writing workshop with NHSEB Director on the evening of January 12^th at Casual Pint. 

Hello, 

The University Office for Diversity & Inclusion is excited to announce the launch of our inaugural Dialogue for Change (DfC) program.  

DfC is a two-day intensive professional development retreat that takes participants through a concise Intergroup Dialogue (IGD) experience and provides them with concrete skills to create meaningful change in their communities. Participants will learn more about the tenets of IGD, engage in self-reflection, and develop their identity as a change-agent through interactive exercises.    

We are interested in participants with various levels of dialogue experience, who are passionate about self-reflection, community-building, and engaging in productive conflict.  

There will be two retreats, one for staff & faculty, and one for graduate & professional students. 

• Staff & Faculty: February 24-25, 2023 
• Graduate & Professional Students: March 3-4, 2023  

To learn more about the program and apply to participate, please go to: go.unc.edu/d4c23  

Applications are due January 16, 2023.  

A special thank you to our co-sponsors, The UNC School of Social Work and UNC Gillings School of Public Health.  

If you have any questions, please reach out to Ari Weinbaum (amwein@unc.edu) or Cloe Liparini (cloe@unc.edu).  

Sincerely,  

The UODI Team 

We are seeking a diverse cohort with representation across social identities including, but not limited to race, ethnicity, gender, age, socioeconomic status, religion, sexual orientation, gender expression, (dis)ability status, nationality, geographic origin, language use, first generation, veteran/military, and political ideology.   

The National Consortium for Data Science, in partnership with RENCI and the Odum Institute, is hosting its springtime iteration of the Data Matters short-course series, virtually from March 13 - 16, 2023 — during UNC Spring Break. It’s a great way for someone to learn new skills and expand their knowledge on a subject as they apply for internships, jobs and promotions. 

Data Matters: Spring Ahead | Virtual | March 13 - 16, 2023

Data Matters™ is a week-long series of one and two-day courses aimed at students and professionals in business, research, and government. The short course series is sponsored by the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, the National Consortium for Data Science, and RENCI. Our first-ever springtime series, Data Matters: Spring Ahead, will feature a selection of our most popular two-day courses. Learn more on their website. 

Among the classes available are:

• Introduction to Effective Information Visualization, Eric Monson. Visualization is a powerful way to reveal patterns in data, attract attention, and get your message across to an audience quickly and clearly. However, there are many steps in that journey from information to influence, and many questions – what visualization tools to use, how to get data into the right format, and which choices to make when putting it all together to tell your story? This course will quickly walk participants through a wide variety of data and chart types to help even beginners feel comfortable embarking on a new visualization project.
• Visualization for Data Science in R, Angela Zoss. Data science skills are increasingly important for research and industry projects. With complex data science projects, however, come complex needs for understanding and communicating analysis processes and results. Ultimately, an analyst’s data science toolbox is incomplete without visualization skills. Incorporating effective visualizations directly into the analysis tool you are using can facilitate quick data exploration, streamline your research process, and improve the reproducibility of your research. This course is designed for two audiences: experienced visualization designers looking to apply open data science techniques to their work, and data science professionals who have limited experience with visualization.

• Basics of R for Data Science and Statistics, Justin Post. This course introduces participants to discrete choice models, econometric models of how people choose between discrete outcomes, such as mode of travel to work or type of treatment for pain. The course will cover the subset of discrete choice models known as random utility models. These models are often used in disciplines such as economics, transportation, and public health. No prior knowledge is expected, and the course will cover logistic regression, multinomial logistic regression, and nested logistic regression. Hands-on exercises will be conducted in R. 

• Introduction to Python, Laura Tateosian. Python is a consistently top ranking programming language. Python syntax is easy to learn and the language is well-suited for rapid data exploration, as well as larger data science projects. This course will help you add basic Python skills to your data science tool belt, so that you can then go on to explore some of the vast number of libraries written in Python. Learning Python is important for any aspiring data scientist. This course is designed for students with some prior exposure to computer programming, but no Python experience. Participants will be introduced to core Python elements for working with data.

The deadline for registration is March 8 for Monday/Tuesday courses and March 9 for Wednesday/Thursday courses.

Please let me know if you have any questions or if you need any additional information.

Best,

Jayasree