Editor’s note (9/11/23): This article was updated to correctly reflect the set of requirements for this year’s DEI Passport program.
The University of Alabama SGA brought back its Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Passport program for the 2023-24 academic year with a new point system aimed to further encourage participation in DEI programming.
Students and organizations may gather points by attending DEI-approved events classified as social enrichment, cultural exploration or educational engagement events. The category depends on the event’s time length and level of engagement, with social enrichment events being the shortest and educational enrichment ones being the longest.
The old passport system required participating students to attend three events from each of these three categories to complete the passport. Now, these categories will have a point value assigned to them as well.
With the new system, events will no longer be able to count toward multiple categories.
Bella Loia, the SGA vice president for diversity, equity and inclusion, said the new system is more streamlined, user-friendly and engaging.
“I think this is going to really incentivize some students to go to those longer programming events,” Loia said.
One, two and three points will be awarded for social enrichment events, cultural exploration events and educational engagement events, respectively.
Points organizations accrue will count toward 11% of their grade when applying for block seating per the new system implemented earlier this year; point totals will be evaluated based on an organization’s total membership. Student organizations can track their passport points on the mySource website.
Additionally, DEI cabinet members will now record attendance by staying at the events for five to 10 minutes after they start instead of students individually scanning a QR code.
Loia said individual participation is emphasized, and she hopes this program will serve as a platform to increase the visibility of more DEI events.
“The core mission of the DEI Passport program is to [connect] students with diversity, equity and inclusion programming that’s happening on campus,” Loia said. “There are so many amazing things that are happening on this campus that a lot of students aren’t aware of.”
