On June 2, 2026, the Office of Inclusive Excellence (IE) continued its special topic series: Tea with IE.
Fueled by a spirit of dialogue and engagement (as well as an assorted tea potluck), Tea with IE presents the UCLA community an opportunity to learn firsthand with UCLA’s top experts on a host of topics.
This Tea session was hosted by Mr. Thomas Griffin (Campus Ombudsperson/Director of Ombuds Services; Ombudsperson, UCLA Health and Health Sciences) and Mr. Chett Miller (Manager, Risk and Compliance, UCLA Campus Life), and explored the challenging and rewarding process of building bridges across UCLA.
Overview
Mr. Griffin and Mr. Miller led an illuminating discussion, walking participants through their experiences navigating communication, conflict, and interpersonal challenges — all in the noble mission to inspire people to truly connect.
Participants
As the Office of Inclusive Excellence’s final session of Tea with IE for the 2025-2026 academic year, this event drew a robust 40+ registrants (split between in-person attendees and Zoom). Featuring a mix of faculty, staff, and students, the audience was engaged by the speakers’ powerful examples of people’s efforts to build bridges — with others, within institutions, within themselves — in an effort to create a campuswide culture of inclusion and dialogue.
Takeaways
In the very spirit of the “Tea with IE” series, participants were able to learn, discuss, and engage with fascinating and challenging new perspectives in a friendly, inclusive space. With Mr. Griffin’s and Mr. Miller’s expert guidance, the group explored the crucial questions their work entails:
1) How do we hold people accountable, while simultaneously allowing them to express themselves?
2) How do we balance the needs of the university?
3) How do we keep everything entered on our critical values — the values of difference, disagreement, and dialogue?
While there are no easy answers, the work remains essential. And the mission is to help fellow Bruins — to be themselves, to be free of pain, to recognize the goodness in the people around them.
At the end of the day, the speakers encouraged the audience to continue the necessary bridge-building work to which we all aspire. The goal may sound paradoxical, but it is the ideal result for UCLA, as an institution, as an employer, as a community: to be 100% committed to budling healthy bridges and 100% committed to caring about others and helping them flourish.
