A culture of Belonging in UW Bioengineering
At the University of Washington, diversity, equity, and inclusion are integral to excellence. We value and honor diverse experiences and perspectives, strive to create welcoming and respectful learning environments, and promote access, opportunity, and justice for all.

What Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion means to the UW Bioengineering Community
Towards Justice, we believe that engineers must understand the social justice aspects of technology research and development practices, and are therefore including these topics in our curriculum. Towards Equity, we believe that admissions, hiring and retention practices must utilize best practices shown to overcome institutional and individual biases. Our Department values Diversity as individual differences (e.g., personality, prior knowledge, and life experiences) and group/social differences (e.g., race/ethnicity, class, gender, sexual orientation, country of origin, and ability as well as cultural, political, religious, or other affiliations)1. We seek to have our educational and research programs represent the diversity of our country. Towards Inclusion, the Department focuses on intentionally creating a welcoming environment for everyone, absent of negative feelings and experiences such as fear, insecurity, social tensions, and unaddressed microaggressions, as well as fostering active, intentional, and ongoing engagement with diversity (1,2). These efforts are multi-dimensional and include collaborations with numerous UW programs, recruitment efforts, policies, curriculum, practices, faculty/staff promotions, decision making, and mentoring and continuing education for members of our community.

Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (JEDI) Committee
The UW Bioengineering JEDI committee has been tasked with developing mechanisms and providing guidance to increase our department’s level of expertise on equity and inclusive teaching and mentoring, and to provide similar expertise to our trainees.
JEDI Resources
Race and Ethnicity
- Graduate Student Equity & Excellence (GSEE)
- Office of Minority Affairs and Diversity (OMA&D)
- UW Samuel E. Kelly Ethnic Cultural Center
- UW Chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers (UW NSBE)
- UW Chapter of the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers (UW SHPE)
- UW SACNAS Chapter
- w??b?altx? – Intellectual House
- Undocumented student resources
Gender
LGBTQ
Individuals with disabilities
- D Center
- Disability resources for Students
- Disabilities, Opportunities, Internetworking, and Technology
International students
- UW International Student Services (ISS) office
- Undocumented student resources
- Career Center @ Engineering
- Counseling Center
INCLUSIVE ADMISSIONS OR HIRING
INCLUSIVE TEACHING
UW INSTITUTIONAL MISSIONS, POLICIES, AND RESOURCES
- UW 2022-2026 Diversity Blueprint
- Diversity at the University of Washington
- Diversity council
- Diversity statistics & policies
- Office of Inclusive Excellence in COE
- Strategic planning in the College of Engineering
- Disability Services
Feedback & Reporting Mechanisms
It is our goal that all members of the BIOE community feel included and supported. We want to highlight the resources available to you if you would like to provide feedback to improve the program or resolve a situation, or would like support in an incident of bias. We have provided links to different methods of providing feedback or reporting, and some information to help you decide which suits your purpose.
See also
Diversity at the University of Washington
UW Equity Focus, the UW’s hub for stories highlighting diversity and equity
In the News
‘A Totally New Observation’ published in Immunity
UW Bioengineering Professor Wendy Thomas and Stanford Professor Taia Wang reveal that mechanical forces can shape how antibodies interact with immune cells, opening new ways to think about cancer treatments. Stanford University’s Professor Taia [...]
MAB alumni launch biocoating company with Innovation Gap Fund support
A team of recent UW Master of Applied Bioengineering (MAB) graduates earned a grant from the Innovation Gap Fund for their startup CSFlow. The company develops novel antifouling coating technology to improve the reliability [...]
Pilot Grants Support Studies of Sex-Based Differences in Muscle Biology
Three projects were selected to receive funding through the Center for Translational Muscle Research’s 2026 Pilot Grant program, supported in part by UW BioE. The grants will go toward the collection of preliminary data [...]
NIH Backs Olanrewaju Lab’s Build Faster, Low-cost HIV Medication Tests
A multidisciplinary team from across the University of Washington, led by Bioengineering’s Professor Ayokunle Olanrewaju, earned support from NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. “Did you remember to take your medicine?” You’ve [...]
Wayne demonstrates new method of capturing the dynamic behavior of white blood cells
Macrophages, a particular type of white blood cell, can act in two distinct ways. They might be triggered by a pathogen and release proteins that encourage inflammation. In other situations, tissue in our body [...]
From student to mentor
UW Bioengineering PhD student Arie Lin-Goldstein earned an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship after years of hard work and valuable mentorship, while growing into an excellent mentor herself. Arie Lin-Goldstein was in a University of [...]








