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The ability to have difficult conversations is a life skill that can help you build stronger relationships and resolve conflict. Marcella Runell, vice president of student life and dean of students, recently spoke to The Boston Globe about how the Mount Holyoke College community will foster this skill during this academic year.

In the interview, Runell touted this year’s Common Read, “I Never Thought of It That Way: How to Have Fearlessly Curious Conversations in Dangerously Divided Times” by Mónica Guzmán. In September, faculty and staff will meet virtually with Guzmán to discuss how to incorporate this book into first-year seminars, classes, academic spaces and cocurricular activities.

Runell pointed out that you may struggle to understand other points of view if you spend a lot of time on social media platforms, where you “tend to get your own views reinforced.” She also said that faculty and staff need to have “compassion and grace” as students learn about political activism, often for the first time.

Runell believes “I Never Thought of It That Way” ties into Mount Holyoke’s intellectually adventurous environment. In a previous interview, she called the book “the perfect Common Read for this moment and for our community.”

She added, “[Guzmán’s] work is all about challenging ourselves to engage in difficult conversations across opposing views, really leaning into relationships and getting curious about people.”

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