(The Center Square) – While many colleges have been shutting down DEI centers since January to comply with executive orders, Temple University’s medical school is simultaneously rebranding its diversity, equity and inclusion center and doubling down on its commitment to equity.
Director of Do No Harm’s Center for Accountability in Medicine Ian Kingsbury told The Center Square: “The Katz School of Medicine at Temple is doing a disservice to patients and students (present and future) by continuing to peddle ideological poison.”
Do No Harm is an organization of physicians, nurses, medical students, patients and policymakers dedicated to keeping identity politics out of medicine, according to its website.
Kingsbury told The Center Square that “racial favoritism is a drug that many medical schools can’t seem to quit.”
“Whether it’s defying the Supreme Court’s decision on affirmative action or defying executive orders on DEI, these institutions seem to have no regard for the law or popular will,” Kingsbury said.
Faculty, staff and students were notified this week in an email obtained by The Center Square that Temple University’s Katz School of Medicine would be changing the name of its Office of Health Equity, Diversity & Inclusion to the Office of Strategic Partnership in Healthcare Education and Resources (SPHERE).
“This new name reflects an expanded, school-wide commitment to advancing equity in the places where we learn, teach, discover, and care,” the email said.
The Temple email was signed by Marjorie Joy Katz Dean Amy Goldberg, senior associate dean of health equity Abiona Berkeley, and associate dean of health equity Andrew Sanderson.
The email explained that though references to the former DEI office around campus and online will now “transition” to SPHERE, “the team’s core work” is not changing.
“The education and training, community partnerships, student and trainee support, faculty development, and data-informed equity initiatives” formerly accomplished by the DEI office will “continue without interruption,” under SPHERE, the email said.
“People and partnerships” will not be changing either with the name shift, according to the email.
“The same colleagues you rely on will keep supporting you and your programs, while strengthening collaborations across Temple Health and Temple University,” Temple’s email said.
The email additionally stated that the medical school’s new office’s name ”underscores our shared belief that equity is not a single office or initiative; it’s the environment we create together.”
Recently, Temple University’s Lewis Katz School of Medicine received an overall D grade from Do No Harm’s new medical school index that ranks according to “academic excellence, transparency, and rejection of DEI.”
Last year, Temple University faced a lawsuit from Do No Harm for planning to hold an event only open to “educators who identify as Black, Indigenous and people of color,” as The Center Square reported. In the end, Temple opened up the event to white staff as well.
Since executive orders from Trump in January calling for the “termination” of diversity, equity and inclusion “in the Federal Government,” many medical schools have been shuttering or sometimes simply renaming their DEI offices, as The Center Square reported.
