The intercultural engagement and leadership department will be hosting Strengths for Social Justice on March 5 to teach students how to use their own strengths to best address important social issues.

According to Katy Williams, assistant director of intercultural engagement & leadership, the idea for the event came from both her own experience as a strength coach and the events of the past summer. It left her considering that  not everyone fights causes in the same way and what would be the best way to utilize individual strengths for causes. 

“How can we kind of talk about this in context of our students to help our students understand activism and advocacy in a way that’s unique to them,” Williams said.

Williams is a certified strengths coach and has hosted other workshops on campus. 

Clifton’s strength-based model utilizes an assessment to determine the top five natural talent themes for each person. The workshop is not designed to offer a deep dive into the topic, but more to cover the basics to help participants understand their biggest strengths and how to use them. 

”We give you a lens to help you understand ‘these are where my strengths are, maybe I can use these to have a stronger impact,’” Williams said.

To her, these conversations are valuable to start, to help learn through social justice movements. This event offers participants a way to do that without it being intimidating of discovering where they can start and where they can go in their efforts. 

According to Williams, the event has pulled interest from students. 

“When I do workshops I rarely get emails about workshops. I’ve gotten emails from people saying, ‘I’m not on campus, can you make it virtual, I’m really interested in this,’” she said. 

The event is a co-collaboration in the department with Cynthia Rios, who is well-versed in social justice. The event is going to have limited registration and will be virtual. If registration closes, students are encouraged to contact IEL  and sign up. Registration ends March 1.