Home

The UCSD BIPOC Student Supoort Coalition (BSSC)

Uniting under-represented graduate students across UCSD STEM communities.

Mission Statement

Our mission is to create safe spaces and opportunities for those who identify as members of marginalized groups in the Life Sciences community at UCSD. We will form support networks, plan steps of actions and advocacy with faculty and administration, and provide career building opportunities. The BIPOC Student Support Network (BSSC) aims to be cross-departmental to encompass a broad network of minority students who may have shared experiences and face similar challenges. BSSC aims be a centralized hub for diversity and inclusion initiatives and will continuously support actionable change to improve the racial climate at UCSD.

UCSD BSSC Resources

  • Slack workspace
    • We are hosting an interdepartmental, student-oriented Slack workspace to serve as a safe space for students to build community, freely discuss concerns, and receive support from peers.
  • Social gatherings
    • We aim to form a social group that facilitates networking and community building through regular, informal gatherings sponsored by BSSC.
  • Mentorship opportunities
    • We aim to help connect interested BIPOC graduate students with undergraduate BIPOC students, through, but not limited to, undergraduate pathway programs (UC LEADS, STARS, UCSD SPACES, BUMMP) and high school mentorship opportunities to increase access to higher education. These opportunities would include but not be limited to: lab mentorship, personal statement revising, resume writing, fellowship/grant review. This would serve as a centralized means to organize and disseminate information about Life Sciences mentorship opportunities to graduate students, postdocs, and faculty.
  • Faculty Liaisons
    • We are recruiting designated faculty from STEM departments and graduate programs that are sensitive to issues that BIPOC students face. These faculty will be responsible for communicating with students in BSSC and meeting to implement necessary improvements in their departments and in Life Sciences as a whole.
    • We aim to organize town-hall meetings between students and faculty liasons to allow advocating on behalf of students to the administration in order to improve program climate and deal with issues as they arise.