Familiarize with our Student Associations and Diversity & Inclusion Initiatives designed to improve your experience and further enhance the climate within our community.

The University of Chicago is committed to creating a positive, respectful environment of shared inquiry and learning for all members of our community.  We concur with the President and Provost’s statement on diversity (Feb 2020), which emphasizes that “we must be an intellectual community where all scholars feel welcome, heard, and encouraged to do their best work.”

Moreover the Department of Physics values the benefits that diversity brings to life and to science. Whether an undergraduate student, graduate student, post-doctoral researcher, staff, or faculty member, in our Department you’ll have the opportunity to collaborate with people from all over the world and from all walks of life.

The Graduate Recruitment Initiative Team

The Graduate Recruitment Initiative Team (GRIT) began as a grassroots student organization and has grown to encompass 18 graduate programs in the Biological Sciences Division (BSD), Physical Sciences Division (PSD), and Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (PME) at the University of Chicago with over 50 members and a dedicated faculty counterpart in the form of the Diversity Council. GRIT is committed to enhancing diversity, inclusion, and equity across the BSD and PSD graduate programs.

LGBTQIA+ Physicists

Our department and university is committed to providing a safe and inclusive environment for sexual and gender minorities. The LGBTQIA+ Physicists Group, formed in 2020, meets occasionally for social events and is in the process of planning what other types of events and advocacy we want to do. The purpose of this group is to provide a space to socialize within the department and to advocate for the needs of LGBTQIA+ members of the physics community.

WAGMiP – Women and Gender Minorities in Physics

University of Chicago Women and Gender Minorities in Physics is an active part of the Physics department that strives to include and empower undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral scholars. We host and participate in a variety of professional development events including our biweekly Women in Physics Research talks involving speakers from various fields of research and many Universities, and annual visits to Argonne and Fermilab.

Grad Influence Mentoring program

The Grad Influence Mentoring program is a graduate student organized initiative aimed at fostering graduate connections within the department, by pairing incoming students with upper year students who are experienced in navigating academic and personal issues. Incoming students are paired with a compatible upper-year student (via a short survey) and then encouraged to meet throughout the year for coffee, which is paid for by the department. Through this program, each student will get access to the resources and network of their mentor, as well as have easy access to a mentor that can answer questions about the department or campus life.

Racial and Ethnic Minorities in Physics (REMiP)

We all have unique stories to tell. Our wonderful Physics community is made up of people spanning various cultures. At the University of Chicago Physics Department we commemorate each other through the celebration of our diverse cultural background. We welcome any member of our community to share their story and culture in hopes of creating an inclusive environment that amplifies the voice of each individual. Among the rest we held regular “Celebration of Diverse Cultures” meetings to try out typical food and watch movies.