The majority opted to continue to pay. Today, that loyalty has paid off.

The University Club reopened in September with a new catering partner, Aramark, which also provided $350,000 to replace worn carpet and furniture, redecorate and give the inside of the building a fresh coat of paint.

And while the pandemic’s latest victim – the supply chain – has delayed some of the new dĂ©cor, the University Club is already hosting catered events, serving lunch along with a new menu of pub dinners and is offering Thanksgiving take-out meals.

“Slowly but surely, we’re getting all the pieces back in place,” said University Club President Jeanine Triplett. “We were able to open again because everyone stayed with us.”

The club is waiving initiation fees to encourage more to join. A partial membership costs $15 monthly and entitles the member to dine in for lunch or a dinner in the pub. Other levels allow members to host private events with no rental costs. All members can participate in members-only events, such as Trivia Night.

“This is the place where people connect,” said longtime member Brian Buford, UofL’s executive director for university culture and employee success. “When you’re a young professional and you’re trying to find your way and establish yourself in your career, making those personal connections is really important. And so for the small price of membership, a lot of really valuable things happen here, a lot of important meetings happen here, conversations. I can think of so many times over the years that big transitions in my life or big moments in my career really happened over conversations here at the club.”

Matt Willinger, executive director of UofL Alumni, said the club is also great for recreation, especially for keeping tabs on the Cardinals when they’re on the road.

“Whether you’re coming down to campus to meet somebody for lunch or whether you’re joining a group of friends or family for a game to watch here at night, they’ve got a little bit to offer for everybody, no matter what you’re into,” Willinger said. “It’s just a great gathering place and the central location here in the middle of campus makes it really easy for everyone.”

Another longtime member, former UofL basketball player Phillip Bond, called the club the “best kept secret in town,” especially because of its variety of good food.

“I guarantee that you would enjoy it,” he said.

More information about the .Ìę

Michael Wade Smith, vice president for external affairs and chief of staff, informed senators of the university’s continuing commitment to providing fair compensation for faculty and staff. The identified the equitable compensation of employees as a critical aspect of institutional success. To honor the university’s commitment, Human Resources will lead two university-wide over the next several months. The studies will assess employee wages and Total Rewards, which include all available benefits such as health insurance, retirement and tuition remission.

“We are trying to increase compensation in spite of the limited resources that we do have and the turbulent time that we’re in,” Smith said. “We have our larger university-wide effort that’s underway; that’s going to take some time. But in addition to that, we are trying to make incremental gains wherever we can.”

Smith further acknowledged that the university’s compensation initiative contributed to the recent improvements in employee wages. In addition to the 1% salary increase that went into effect earlier this year, UofL staff and faculty also received a $1,000 bonus in August.Ìę

Executive Vice President and University Provost Lori Gonzalez provided senators with her insight on the current student enrollment figures. Both Smith and Gonzalez reported an increase in graduate school enrollment by 232 graduate students, but a decline of 194 undergraduate students. Gonzalez reported that universities nationwide are experiencing a decline in undergraduate enrollment due to COVID-19 and highlighted the impact of the enrollment efforts made by UofL employees.

“I want to point out that we started out at about 750 students down. We are now only 194 students down. This was a Herculean lift from our enrollment management team and the Cardinal family, and now this year we will be focused on retaining those students,” Gonzalez said.

Gonzalez also encouraged senators and their constituents to contribute to the Cardinal community of care by vaccinating for the upcoming flu season. UofL will offer flu shot clinics on both the Health Science Campus and the Belknap Campus until Friday, Oct. 1. Dates, locations and hours of operation for the clinic can be found on the .

“When we talk about a community of care, the one thing that people can do to make sure this a safe campus is to get vaccinated,” Gonzalez said. “Now in addition to COVID-19, we are getting ready to move into flu season. Just like we’re encouraging you to get your COVID-19 vaccine, please get your flu shot as well.”

Brian Buford, executive director of university culture and employee success, presented an overview of UofL’s reimagined employee onboarding experience. Launching in January 2022, the improved onboarding process aims to address issues that were identified through numerous focus groups and interviews conducted by the Employee Success Center.

New aspects of the process will include a full year of onboarding support through the Employee Success Center, increased onboarding support at the departmental level, a revamped new employee orientation, as well as a welcome gift during the first week of employment and again on the one-year employment anniversary.

Buford also announced that each department will have a designated liaison known as an onboarding navigator. As the point-of-contact for onboarding employees, navigators will strive to create a spirit of welcome for new hires within their department. Those interested in serving as onboarding navigators for their departments will have the opportunity to volunteer and receive training in the coming months.

Committee reports and a of the virtual meeting can be found on the . The next Staff Senate meeting will be held on Oct. 11 via Microsoft Teams.

Sinek is a renowned motivational speaker, author and TED Talk presenter. He is best known for his TED Talk, “How Great Leaders Inspire Action,” which has amassed over 53 million views worldwide. Sinek and Bendapudi discussed how leadership, employee engagement and initiatives through the ESC can contribute to making the University of Louisville a  great place to work, one of the goals of the 2019-2022 .

The center, currently located in suite 202 of Grawemeyer Hall, provides UofL employees with professional development opportunities, onboarding, mentoring, workshops and other engaging initiatives and programs.

Bendapudi and Sinek’s discussion was facilitated by Brian Buford, executive director of university culture and employee success. Although this event officially signified the opening of the ESC, Buford and his teammates, Laura McDaniels and Meagan West, have been working tirelessly since last fall to get the ESC off the ground. Throughout the past few months, the team has provided over 20 Learning Cafes and other virtual workshops to university employees, for example.Ìę

Bendapudi and Sinek started the virtual event by discussing the role of leadership within the university community. Sinek said true leadership is the responsibility to see those around us rise. The ESC serves to embody this type of leadership by encouraging and supporting university employee development. Bendapudi expressed that the goal of the center is to nurture the leadership potential of university employees while guiding them on their journey to becoming better, effective leaders. Sinek further highlighted the importance of this employee-centered initiative from university leadership.

“I love the fact that [the University of Louisville] is focusing on its own people.” Sinek said. “So many universities don’t understand the role of leadership. At other universities if you ask senior leadership ‘what’s your priority?’ they will always say the same thing – the student, which it’s not. The role of senior leadership is to take care of the people who take care of the students.”

The two speakers also touched on the importance of employee engagement and empathy in the workplace, a main pillar of the ESC.

The center will strive to make the university a great place to work by providing various employee-centered resources and opportunities for personal and professional growth. It serves as a safe space for employees to have honest conversations with other members of the university community. Coaching circles allow employees to gather and collaborate on significant topics, such as anti-racism initiatives. Well-being retreats and mindfulness initiatives are also offered to cultivate a strong community of care. All of these efforts complement that “great place to work goal” and, ideally, will lead to happier, more productive employees.

“When people in an organization feel like the organization sees them, hears them and recognizes them as human beings – that they have ambitions and stresses
 [when the university] looks to take care of them as human beings – then they can invest all of their energy into the work that they’re supposed to be doing,” Sinek said.Ìę

This emphasis on care was echoed by the ESC staff. According to Buford, the success of the university hinges upon the ability to care for each and every member of the community. The center aims to provide a necessary source of care for employees by ensuring that their voices are heard and their personal and professional development is prioritized. To the ESC staff, success goes beyond the easily measurable metrics such as retention or productivity. Creating a great place to work requires a commitment to caring for the employees.

“To be a great place to work, we have to create an experience where employees feel connected to UofL and have a sense of belonging, hope and trust; where they are growing and learning new things they can put to use in their lives or future jobs; and where they are part of a community that cares about them,” Buford said.Ìę

Buford also announced that as part of the ESC opening celebration, the new Cardinal Leadership Institute will also launch in early March. Among the audience for the virtual event were several instructors for the institute, as well as 23 university leaders that will comprise the inaugural cohort.

Current measures to minimize the spread of COVID-19 are in effect and all events with the ESC are currently held virtually on Microsoft Teams. A of past meetings and workshops can be found on the , as well as the video recording of the .

From March 2 to March 20, the Human Resources Employee Development and Success Office is taking applications for a pilot program in which staff members can spend time in a department or office different from the one in which they work. The short-term learning opportunity is similar to an internship or a practicum in which the staff member will get real-life experience in an area of interest and can learn from university colleagues.

The Staff Fellowship Program supports the goal of ensuring UofL is a great place to work “because it is a workplace dedicated to personal growth and professional development.”

“Being a great place to work means giving employees a way to explore their career interests, especially at a university where education and growth are such pillars of our mission,” said Brian Buford, director of the Development and Success Office. “The beauty of working at a university is that there are endless opportunities to test the waters and discover new paths. You don’t have to leave UofL to figure out your perfect fit.”

The Employee Development and Success team will choose up to 10 employees for the pilot and work with them to create their fellowship placements. A fellowship will generally consist of 30 to 60 onsite days that could be done all at once or incrementally, depending on the nature of the work to be done and the employee’s workload in their home department. Participants will develop agreements with their unit heads for temporary staff release and to discuss how the employee will cover work assignments for the duration of the fellowship appointment.Ìę

“Giving employees the opportunity to consider other jobs might seem counterintuitive in some ways, because we don’t want to lose them. But I am confident the gains will far outweigh the risk of seeing good people leave,” Buford added. “When people work in departments where they feel valued, have opportunities to grow, and know that someone cares about their development, things like loyalty and engagement go way up.”

Visit to apply or learn more.

The department didn’t have to look far to find someone to lead the effort.

Brian Buford, assistant provost for diversity and executive director of UofL’s LGBT Center, has been selected to serve as director of employee development and success. He will take the reins of the new program beginning Dec. 3.Ìę

“This is a remarkable opportunity for me to support Dr. Bendapudi’s vision for UofL as a great place to learn, a great place to work, and a great place to invest,” Buford said. “I’ve been focusing these last several years on the ‘great place to learn’ part of that vision, and now I can turn my attention to the ‘great place to work’ part.”

This won’t be Buford’s first foray into HR issues. A 30-year employee, he previously served as manager of organizational effectiveness.

Buford and John Elliott, interim associate vice president for human resources, already have begun planning for the new initiative. Focus areas will include:

• Leadership development and preparing managers to be great leaders
• Onboarding for new employees, both during their first day at UofL and ongoing to help ensure their successful integration at the department level as well
• Cultural competency skills that employees need to help foster and create a climate of belonging and inclusion
• Staff fellows, mentoring and succession planning strategies
• Fostering a climate that makes UofL a great place to work

“Leadership development, staff fellowships and development, and onboarding are key areas for us,” Elliott said. “We will work together with the campus community to ensure these are well-structured programs that address the needs and concerns raised across our campuses, and that will align very closely to Dr. Bendapudi’s vision. With Brian’s experience, credibility and leadership, I am confident the quality will be high and the results will be impressive.” 

Elliott said HR plans to build programs, curricula and infrastructure during the current fiscal year and expects to start deploying programs as soon as possible.Ìę

“The University is committed to developing its people through these various strategies, and we will be working very hard to launch as soon as administratively possible,” he said.Ìę      

Buford has led the LGBT Center since its creation in 2007, turning a one-person operation into a program that is consistently ranked among the nation’s best. Under his watch, UofL has earned a five-star rating on the Campus Pride Index, a key national ranking of inclusiveness; launched an LGBT-themed housing community, the first of its kind in the South; opened a satellite office at the Health Sciences Center; partnered with community leaders on strategic fundraising initiatives; and worked with UofL’s School of Medicine to develop a national model for improving care of LGBT patients.

Those efforts and others have led to numerous local and national honors including a UofL Outstanding Service Award and a seat on the American Red Cross National Diversity Advisory Council.

Mordean Taylor-Archer, vice provost for diversity and international affairs, stressed that Buford’s change of position will not diminish UofL’s commitment to the LGBT community.

“Much to the contrary, Brian has done such an extraordinary job in leading the way for UofL to become a five-star campus it benefits all of us for him to broaden the scope of his work,” she said.

Buford agreed.

“We have outstanding leadership in place, and this transition will enable the center to fill some additional roles that will take its efforts even farther,” he said. “I think I’m most proud of the fact that LGBT inclusion is now firmly part of the university’s fabric and that the center has incredible support across campus. Being inclusive and welcoming is who we are.”

Soon, though, his primary focus will shift to improving campus engagement and professional development across the university.

“I just can’t wait to get started,” he said.

“There is probably no other aspect of college life that has a great impact on LGBTQ students than housing and residence life — where we live, who we live with and how we feel about the place we come home to each day makes all the difference in the world,” said Brian Buford, assistant provost for Diversity and executive director of the LGBT Center. “Our staff is the best in the country, bar none. I have seen the care and love they put into every room assignment and into training every RA and that all comes from a great leader in Julie Weber.” 

Buford added that under Weber’s leadership:

• The housing team provides one-on-one support and guidance to transgender students to make sure they are assigned rooms and roommates where they can flourish and feel safe.
• Our Bayard Rustin Themed Housing Community has grown in size and prominence, thanks to Weber’s dedication to making sure students have opportunities like this.Ìę
• RAs and RDs receive great training on being allies and regularly host LGBT-themed floor meetings and workshops to send a message of inclusion. They do a great job of asking residents about their preferred names and pronouns, and creating a climate of trust.

Buford also shared a personal story about Weber, outside of her work with campus housing.Ìę

“Our students have been raising awareness for several years about the FDA ban on gay men giving blood. After the Orlando Pulse Night Club tragedy last year, Julie and her team hosted a blood drive for the victims and as always, we invited people to give in honor of someone who could not because of the ban,” Buford said. “I had loved seeing people do this over the years because it’s the kind of activism that I love most, but nobody had ever given for me. Julie called me and said, ‘Look I hate giving blood, but I want to give for you and I will do it if you will sit with me and help me through it.'”

“We believe very strongly in all of our students being as important as one another, and providing great service to each and every student that lives on campus is what matters to us,” Weber said, acknowledging her staff that is “so firmly committed to treating our students fairly and equitably and with the highest service that they can.” 

Watch Weber’s acceptance speech below: 

Pride Week is a series of events hosted by the center, which aims to create a safe, inclusive community for everyone regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity and expression. Events continue through Nov. 7.

“As I look at the last 10 years, Pride Week is one of the highlights of the experience for me,” said Brian Buford, assistant provost for diversity & LGBT Center executive director. “It’s a time to celebrate with the entire campus community and to affirm our commitment to being an inclusive and welcoming place.”

There will be two keynote speakers during Pride Week, Jonathan Higgins and Noell Rowan. Higgins, an editor for Campus Pride and Lambda Literary writing fellow, will speak on topics related to intersectionality, race, gender and sexuality. Rowan, professor and associate director of the school of social work at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, will speak on topics including the unique challenges for aging LGBT people and awareness of clinical and social needs of LGBT communities.

Higgins’ talk begins at 7 p.m. Nov. 2 in Strickler Hall, Middleton Auditorium, Belknap Campus. Rowan’s talk is from 12 to 1 p.m., Oct. 31 at the Health Science Center, Kornhauser Auditorium, 500 S. Preston Street.

In addition to the keynotes, Pride Week schedule highlights include:

• Belknap Pride Kickoff & Resource Fair: Oct. 30, noon to 2 p.m., Red Barn & West Plaza. Resource fair, free food and flag raising ceremony.
• Queering your Career: Career Exploration and Preparation for LGBTQ+ Students: Oct. 31, 12:30 p.m. to 1:30 p.m., Student Activities Center, Room 309K. Free lunch and panel discussion.
• Health Sciences Center Pride Picnic & Resource Fair: Nov. 1, 11:30 a.m to 1 p.m., Health Sciences Center courtyard. Resource fair, free food and music.

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The Southern Accent exhibit, which questions and explores the complex and contested space of the American South, will be on display until Oct. 14 at the Speed Art Museum. The event, “Queer Eye on the South,” was held Sept. 28 and provided attendees a chance to view the exhibit from a LGBTQ perspective.

“We’ve always considered the Speed Art Museum to be one of the city’s most LGBT-inclusive spaces, but Interim Director Stephen Reily really wanted to be even more intentional in letting the LGBT community know that they are welcomed and celebrated there,” said Brian Buford, assistant provost for diversity and executive director of the LGBT Center. “We decided to co-host this reception and viewing of the Southern Accent exhibit as a way of celebrating a community where compassion and inclusion are deep values.“

Dr. Jongwoo Jeremy Kim, an associate professor of art history in the Department of Fine Arts at UofL, and Miranda Lash, the curator of the exhibit will lead a tour, with special focus on the exhibit’s LGBT elements.

“Southern Accent is a powerful contemporary art exhibition that investigates the historical consciousness of the American South in imagery, objecthood and sound,” said Kim. “Among the key ideas structuring the exhibition is queerness — or what we may call disruptions that undermine concepts of coherent, immutable identities. Miranda Lash, the curator of the exhibition, and I look forward to discussing artists such Skylar Fein, Roger Brown, Catherine Opie, and Andy Warhol, while furthering the ongoing collaboration between the Speed Art Museum, the Hite Art Institute, and the LGBT Center at the University of Louisville.”

“This year, we are celebrating the LGBT Center’s 10th anniversary and we are thrilled that the museum is joining with us to honor this milestone,” Buford said. “Everyone is welcome — whether you or LGBT or not — because it took the collective commitment of all of us together to reach this point.”

Photo of Kim provided by the .

UofL earned five out of five stars in the Campus Pride Index, released this week by Campus Pride, a national nonprofit organization that rates colleges and universities according to their support of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues.

Additionally, UofL is the only public institution in the south to be recognized by the organization.Ìę

In order to be in the Top 25 listing, an institution had to score the highest percentages in the LGBTQ-friendly benchmarks for policies, programs and practices.

The Campus Pride Index is designed to help campuses learn ways to improve their LGBT campus life and shape the educational experience to be more inclusive, welcoming and respectful. It also provides students a tool for finding inclusive schools.

Brian Buford, assistant provost for diversity and director of the LGBT Center, commended work happening university-wide in support of LGBTQ students, including a LGBT Studies minor program, the School of Medicine’s curriculum infusion efforts, and LGBT meeting space at the J.B. Speed School of Engineering.

The Campus Pride Index cited several reasons for UofL’s high ranking, including having an LGBT Center that offers a variety of programs for the campus community, LGBTQ inclusive career services, LGBTQ clubs at the undergraduate and graduate level, trans-inclusive healthcare, free and anonymous HIV/STI testing, and LGBTQ student scholarships

“As we celebrate the , this is a great affirmation that our campus is on the right track,” said Buford. “We have a new vision for the next five years that is pretty exciting and will take us even further in becoming the school of choice for LGBT students.”