As chair of the DEI Committee of the RE Board of Trustees, I work with distinguished members Stephanie Dua P’27 ’24 ’22, David Duckenfield P’20 ’22, Susan Lampen ’71, P’99, Jon Madorsky ’91, Elana Oberstein-Harris ’93, P’27 ’24 ’23 and Ricky Stokes ’94, P’28 ’26. The racial and ethnic make-up of the committee is purposefully multicultural. As an institution, one goal is to have a board whose committees, student body, faculty and leadership team are a reasonable cultural reflection of Miami-Dade County. Ransom Everglades is led by Head of School Rachel Rodriguez and Chief Operating Officer David Clark ’86, an increasingly diverse board of trustees, a strong leadership team whose diverse make-up is exemplary, plus a faculty and student body that each year becomes more reflective of Miami-Dade County. We are benchmarking ourselves for continued national leadership. 

One of the DEI Committee’s first decisions was to ensure that our work was rooted in thoughtful methodology, qualitative data gathering and formalized processes. We began by first seeking to get some sense of the community by simply reaching out. We interviewed current students, alumni from various generations, current and past parents, senior faculty and staff, current and former trustees, and other stakeholders. As we conducted our initial inquiries, it became clear some believed DEI to be beneficial only to certain groups at the exclusion of others. Others believed DEI served as a metaphor for hiring, admitting and otherwise benefiting unqualified individuals. Both perspectives are a gross misunderstanding of this work. 

McKinsey & Company defines diversity, equity and inclusion as three closely linked values held by many organizations that are working to be supportive of different groups of individuals, including people of different races, ethnicities, religions, abilities, genders and sexual orientations. That definition provided the foundation and core principles when RE adopted Diversity and Inclusion as one of its strategic imperatives. Here at Ransom Everglades, we focus on ensuring that every member of our community feels included, safe and confident that they belong. Our work is designed to address all students, without exception, including those who historically have fallen under the umbrella of being underrepresented, Asian, Black, LGBTQ, Muslim, Jewish, or socioeconomically disadvantaged. 

Our approach has five imperatives: effective recruitment of high-potential students and faculty, retention of talented students and hires, effective programming, effective communication, all with measurable performance goals. Accountability is important; data collection and analysis allow us to measure progress and ensure that school leaders, staff and trustees meet the school’s objectives. Our accomplishments to date have been impressive and laudable. Ransom Everglades continues to strive to meet or exceed the best-practice standards advanced by the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), and meet or exceed benchmarks reached by local peer institutions. With the commitment of the Office of Inclusion and Community Engagement and the Office of Admission and Enrollment Management, we have seen encouraging trends. 

We have witnessed annual record increases in the recruitment and retention of Black and Asian students and faculty. We have also seen an unprecedented increase in DEI programming and communication. We have offered more high-impact multicultural events, from panels and guest speakers to campus celebrations and the expansion of student clubs and affinity groups, than ever before in the history of the school. The programming has been multifaceted, inclusive and timely. RE annually celebrates Black History Month and Hispanic-Latino Heritage Month and commemorates the Holocaust with campus-wide events. More recently, we have expanded our all-school cultural recognitions to include Lunar New Year, the Mid-Autumn Festival, Diwali and Juneteenth. Last year we supported our students as they observed Ramadan, held a Hanukkah Menorah Lighting Ceremony and celebrated LGBT History Month. We also conducted significant anti-hate and antisemitism training for faculty, staff and students. RE also continued to bring a diverse array of speakers to engage the student body, including the first openly gay State Senator of Florida, Shevrin Jones.

I arrived as a student at RE in 1987. I grew as a student and I enjoyed serving as captain of the football and basketball teams and leading the tennis team to a state championship in 1989. While I loved my time at RE and forged lasting bonds, it was clear the school had not yet formally adopted the work of inclusion as a priority.  

Upon arriving, I was one of five Black male students on campus. There were about nine girls between the two campuses. We created our own sense of belonging, our own spaces. I was a co-founder of the Black Student Union, today’s Black Student Association (BSA), the first formally recognized cultural and ethnicity-based student organization. In 1989, this was controversial. Today, it is a part of our fabric. We have over eight such groups. Nearly four decades later, we understand that inclusion requires the buy-in, work and commitment of the entire community, including faculty, administration and the board.

RE’s reach is always adapting. We must preserve the gains we have made in addressing the needs of historically disenfranchised racial and ethnic communities. At the same time, we must always be able to expand that reach to both overlooked and newly emerging populations in the RE community. Ransom Everglades remains committed to the ultimate focus of DEI: an inclusive community where everyone is safe, belongs and is able to thrive. We are not perfect as an institution, but we remain guided by our core values and the vision of our school’s founders, Paul Ransom and Marie Swenson. We strive every day to leave our school, and the world around it, better than we found it. This is The RE Way.