The CHEC Center (Cultural Humility Empathy & Compassion Center) was developed in 2015 by Dana Brickham, Jennifer Bowes, and Brett Kuwada. Their mission is to assist individuals and organizations with having deep and meaningful dialogue around issues related to diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Dr. Kuwada was introduced to a framework called Cultural Humility (Tervalon & Murray-Garcia, 1998) in 2013. This framework changed Dr. Kuwada’s understanding of cultural competence and launched a year long journey into developing the interpersonal tools needed to practice Cultural Humility effectively. Two of the most important components, empathy and compassion, stood out and became the focal point for practicing Cultural Humility. In a 2014 presentation to faculty and staff at Everett Community College, Cultural Humility, Empathy & Compassion was introduced (Kuwada, 2014). Later discussions with Dr. Brickham resulted in the acronym CHEC (Cultural Humility, Empathy & Compassion), being developed. Two years later, Dr. Brickham and Dr. Kuwada collaborated with Jen Bowes and a common interest emerged; the desire to change our current framework for self-growth and organizational growth around issues related to diversity, equity, and inclusion. After implementing this new framework into the classrooms, it was discovered that people were very receptive, and, ultimately, an entirely different feel toward many difficult conversations around race and multicultural discussions occurred.
After noticing the positive change, Dr. Brickham, Jen Bowes, and Dr. Kuwada decided the framework needed to be expanded outside of classroom settings and introduced to the larger public audience. Over the years Dr. Brickham and Dr. Kuwada presented this topic at a wide variety of conferences around the nation. Being well received, the trio decided to develop the CHEC Center to expand this concept to an even broader audience.
Currently, the professionals at the CHEC Center deliver individual, group, and organizational trainings, continuing education, seminars, conferences, small group facilitation, one-on-one work, and other individually tailored services. Please see our “Services” page for more information on how the CHEC Center may be able to serve you or your organization.