Nikole Hannah-Jones, creator of historically inaccurate “1619 Project” at The New York Times, will keynote the American Association of Veterinary Medical Colleges’ (AAVMC) 2022 conference.
Yes, you read that correctly, this is a conference for veterinary medical colleges – as in animal medicine.
But, as with most colleges and universities these days, the conference has less to do with science and more to do with being woke. A description for the conference spells it out (emphasis added):
The AAVMC’s annual conference is considered one of the leading professional development events in international academic veterinary medicine. Hundreds of educators and other leaders from the veterinary medical profession gather every year for a three day-symposium that features respected thought-leaders from around the world, explores issues and opportunities, shares best practices, and focuses on diversity, equity and inclusion. The conference also features the AAVMC’s annual Advocacy Day on Capitol Hill.
The conference runs from March 3 to March 5, with Hannah-Jones speaking March 5. There are also keynote speakers for March 3 and 4, neither of whom have anything to do with veterinary medicine. Dr Anthony P. Carnevale will speak on Thursday and “currently serves as research Professor and Director of the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, a position he has held since CEW was created in 2008,” the website for the conference says. Dr. Randall Bass, who will speak on Friday, and “is Vice President for Strategic Education Initiatives and Professor of English at Georgetown University, where he leads the Designing the Future(s) initiative and the Red House incubator for curricular transformation,” according to the website.
The schedule for the conference shows the focus is on diversity, with one of the first sessions titled “Diversity Community Meeting, several sessions about admissions and outreach, and a session Thursday morning titled “Use of a Hackathon to Design a Longitudinal Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging Thread in a Laboratory Animal Medicine Residency Program.”
Other sessions include “Health and Wellbeing Among LGBTQ+ Veterinary Professionals and Students: The Impact of Institutional Climate,” “One Small Step Toward Increasing Diversity in Veterinary Medicine – Diversity and Inclusion Pledges,” “Strategies for Integrating Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Skills into Pre-Clinical Professional Skills Coursework,” and “Our College Community’s Response to Challenges Following the Death of George Floyd.”
In addition to the focus on wokeness, attendees at the conference will also have to show proof of vaccination against COVID-19, even as states across the country have stopped requiring such proof.
The conference includes a Leadership Academy that takes place between February 28 and March 1 and an Advocacy Day on March 2. Advocacy Day appears to actually focus on what one would expect from a veterinary conference, according to the website:
The Governmental Affairs program works to secure resources in support of academic veterinary medicine. This includes informing and influencing policymakers and their staff on important issues that affect veterinary medicine’s impact on public health, including biomedical research, agriculture, and animal welfare, as well as both direct and indirect support for colleges of veterinary medicine.