In our increasingly diverse and globalized world, cultural competence has become an essential skill. Cultural competence refers to having an awareness, understanding, and appreciation for different cultures. It enables us in Building Cultural Diversity and Effective Communication with people from various cultural backgrounds. Developing cultural competence leads to reduced prejudice, more inclusion, and greater collaboration in our personal and professional spheres.

What Does It Mean to Be Culturally Competent?
Cultural competence is all about seeing culture as central to human identity. When we make the effort to understand different cultural perspectives and worldviews, we can connect better with others. Cultural competence involves:

• Seeking to understand different cultures - their histories, traditions, communication styles, values, beliefs, and practices. This includes an understanding of intersectionality and the diversity within cultures.

• Being aware of our own cultural lens - how it shapes perceptions, judgments, and behaviors. Reflecting on our biases helps us check assumptions.

• Developing cross-cultural communication skills - using culturally sensitive language, adapting our communication style, and listening actively.

• Standing against stereotyping or discrimination - calling out biases, racism, prejudice when we see it.

Why Cultural Competence Matters More Than Ever
With globalization and migration, our workplaces and communities have become melting pots of cultures. As per statistics:

• Over 250 million migrants crossed borders in 2022.
• 1 in 7 marriages in Western nations is now intercultural.
• The purchasing power of minority groups is growing rapidly.

This diversity brings richness but also complex challenges - conflicts due to misunderstandings, exclusion of minority groups, and implicit biases.
Developing cultural competence is key to facing these challenges. It enables more effective cross-cultural communication, bringing people together across differences.

Benefits at the Individual Level
On a personal level, cultural competence can open our minds, reduce prejudices, enhance creativity, and lead to more fulfilling relationships.

•We are able to connect meaningfully with people from diverse backgrounds - making new friends and networks.
• It allows us to communicate clearly and prevent misunderstandings.
• We can manage conflicts better - exploring different perspectives before reacting.
• Our critical thinking sharpens as we challenge stereotypical assumptions.
• We can appreciate and enjoy the arts, food, traditions of more cultures.

Benefits for Organizations and Businesses
With culturally competent employees, companies reap significant advantages:

• Increased innovation & better solutions with diversity of thought.
• Improved team collaboration due to intercultural sensitivity and inclusion.
• Higher employee engagement & retention as needs of minorities are addressed.
• Expanded customer base by marketing appropriately to diverse segments.

As per research by McKinsey, culturally diverse companies perform better financially. Cultural competence is vital for global business competitiveness.

How Individuals Can Build Cultural Competence
Building cultural competence is an ongoing process but here are key strategies individuals can use:

1. Acknowledge your biases: We all have unconscious biases - recognizing them is the first step to countering them. Take bias tests to uncover blindspots.
2. Immerse yourself in other cultures: Read books, watch movies, eat cuisine from different cultures to expand your perspectives. Local cultural festivals are great too.
3. Improve cross-cultural communication skills: Learn best practices for communicating across cultures - active listening, cultural references, sensitivity.
4. Expand your diverse network: Connect with people from different backgrounds. Follow minority voices on social media.
5. Speak up against stereotyping: Call out biases and racism around you. Stand up for inclusion.

How Organizations Can Cultivate Cultural Competence
For intercultural competence at an organizational level, strategic initiatives are vital:

1. Offer cultural competence training: Conduct seminars addressing biases, diversity, cross-cultural communication for employees.
2. Make leadership commitment visible: Leaders should vocally advocate for inclusion, model cultural competence.
3. Recruit more diversely: Seek talent from minority backgrounds - have internships/scholarships for them.
4. Make employee policies more inclusive: Offer religious accommodations, celebrate more cultural events at work.
5. Seek community partnerships: Collaborate with cultural non-profits for perspective.

Global Citizenship Calls for Cultural Competence
With societies around the world becoming intricately interwoven, cultural competence has become integral for cooperative coexistence. Our economies rely on trade partnerships with other nations. Supply chains meander across borders. Digital workspaces bring together remote collaborators from several time zones.

In this global village, we need to see human commonalities over differences. We have to consciously overcome ethnocentric worldviews passed down through generations. With compassion and cultural competence, we can counter prejudice with empathy. We can have challenging conversations. We can accord equal respect and dignity to all human beings regardless of cultural identity.

The alternative of sticking to siloed identities is turmoil, conflict and chaos. By making the effort to walk in another’s shoes, cultural competence paves the path to solidarity and harmony.

Conclusion
The need of the hour is recognizing that beneath surface variations all humans share fundamental similarities - in our aspirations to care for our families and better our prospects. Cultural competence awakens our humanity. It paves the righteous path ahead to an equitable, just and peaceful global community.

BOZEMAN — Montana Shakespeare in the Parks will travel to 65 communities in five states this summer to perform two classic Shakespeare plays.

For its 52nd season, the traveling theatre group, which is an outreach program of Montana State University’s College of Arts and Architecture, announced the playbill will feature “Hamlet” and “The Winter’s Tale.”

The season kicks off June 12 with a four-night run of “Hamlet” at the MSU Grove, located immediately east of the Duck Pond along South 11th Avenue, followed by “The Winter’s Tale” June 19-22 at the same location. All eight performances begin at 8 p.m. and — like all the troupe’s summer tour stops — are free and open to the public.

“Hamlet,” one of Shakespeare’s most famous plays, tells the story of the young prince of Denmark who returns home after his father’s murder and must grapple with the weight of his responsibility to avenge that death, to outmaneuver his scheming uncle and “to be or not to be.”

“I believe that all of Shakespeare’s plays are timeless, but ‘Hamlet’ has a point of view that everybody can identify with,” said Kevin Asselin, MSIP executive artistic director and “Hamlet” director. “I think we are all individually a version of Hamlet and can relate to the character on some level.”

A bit lighter, with more comedy and an abundance of magic, “The Winter’s Tale” spans 16 years during which a jealous king accuses his wife of infidelity and exiles his daughter to Bohemia, where she is raised by shepherds and falls in love with the Bohemian king’s son. It also features Shakespeare’s stage direction “exit, pursued by a bear,” which the MSIP staff thought was fun and relevant to communities in the Northern Rocky Mountains .

“The play is one of Shakespeare’s last, and as such is blessed with a writer who really understood how to manipulate the form to achieve new heights of storytelling,” said Eva Breneman, director of “The Winter’s Tale.”

After the opening shows in Bozeman, the group will hit the road, traveling across Montana with stops in Idaho, North Dakota, Washington and Wyoming. They will perform 78 shows in 65 communities, making this MSIP’s largest tour to date.

More than 80% of MSIP’s funding is donation based or comes from grants and sponsorships. Actors and staff, a total of about 50 people, will start rehearsing, building the set and designing costumes next month. Nine of the 11 actors who will perform the two plays this year have performed with MSIP in the past.

To view a complete tour schedule, visit MSIP’s website, www.shakespeareintheparks.org/shakespeare-in-the-parks/.

The Downtown Bozeman Association, Visit Bozeman and additional sponsors, and participating downtown restaurants, pubs, and cafes are excited to bring you the 4th Annual Downtown Bozeman Restaurant Week from April 22-28th! This 7-day event will be filled with good eats and drinks, off-menu specials, exclusive dining experiences, plus chances to win some fabulous prizes from our local sponsors!

Start planning your date night, birthday dinner, employee appreciation brunch, or whatever excuse you need to dine in Downtown Bozeman because our amazing businesses are ready to serve you! We will be raffling off incredible prizes via multiple-visit punch cards and social media contests; details to come.

A list of participating establishments for the 4th Annual Downtown Bozeman Restaurant Week as well as all the specials and fun to be found will be available online at https://downtownbozeman.org/restaurantweek soon - please stay tuned! Please note, event hours and specials will vary depending on the business.

Restaurant Week will be the week of April 24-30th, rain or shine, and is free and open to the public! Whether you're a breakfast fanatic or someone who never skips dessert, we're sure you'll find something to tickle your taste buds at Restaurant Week.

Thank you to our generous Sponsors!

Foodie: PRIME Incorporated, US Foods, Visit Bozeman, 94.7 The Moose, XL Country 100.7

Side-of-Fries: AC Hotel, Bozeman Spirits Distillery, Bozeman Magazine, Element Bozeman, KBZK, The LARK, Lewis & Clark Motel, Nicholas and Company, The Sapphire Motel

Cherry on Top: Allegra Marketing, Print, & Mail, Lockhorn Cider House

For more information, please visit https://downtownbozeman.org/restaurantweek and https://visitbozeman.com/2024-restaurant-week or contact the Downtown Bozeman Partnership office at 406-586-4008.

Occurring annually on April 1^st, April Fools’ Day has been celebrated for several centuries by different cultures, though its exact origins are unknown. April Fools’ Day traditions include playing hoaxes or practical jokes on others, often yelling “April Fools!” at the end to clue in the subject of the prank. While its exact history is shrouded in mystery, the embrace of April Fools’ Day jokes by the media and other outlets has ensured the unofficial holiday’s long life. April Fools’ Day has provided lots of fun humor throughout various nations.

April Fools’ Day is all about getting someone to fall for a prank or made-up tale. In modern times people around the world, including we Montanans, have gone to great lengths to create elaborate hoaxes. Newspapers, radio, TV stations and websites have participated in the April 1^st tradition of reporting outrageous fictional claims that have fooled their audiences.

A Sampling Of April Fools’ Day Hoaxes

•   The Montana news media in past years reported the following: “A petition in Montana seeks return of the Yellowstone Jackalope (a jackrabbit sporting deer horns) to public lands around Parks. Parks wildlife managers say they are in the early phases of reviewing a petition that seeks to reinstate jackalopes to the greater Yellowstone area, but they have not set a deadline for acting on the filing… .”

]Today, the town of Douglas, WY is the Jackalope Capital of the world. You can buy everything from Jackalope souvenirs to postcards with Jackalope deer horns, and even a Jackalope hunting license, which allows hunting Jackalopes in Wyoming only from midnight to 2 a.m. one night a year. It does not mention bag limits.

• In 1997, the BBC aired a story on how Swiss farmers were experiencing a record spaghetti crop, and showed video footage of people harvesting noodles from trees.
• In 1998, Burger King took out a full-page ad in USA Today announcing its development of the Left Handed Whopper. The burger had the usual toppings, but they were turned 180 degrees so they wouldn’t drip on left-handed customers.
• In 1985, Sports Illustrated published a fictitious story by George Plimpton about a never-before-heard-of pitching prospect by the name of Sid Finch, who could throw a baseball 168 miles per hour. Wow!
• On April 1, 1996, Taco Bell announced it had purchased the Liberty Bell and would rename it the Taco Liberty Bell.
• In 1962, a TV station in Sweden announced that viewers could convert their existing black and white sets to display color by pulling a nylon stocking over the screen.
• In 2002, the British supermarket chain Tesco published an ad stating that a genetically modified ‘whistling carrot’ had been developed. The carrots were said to be grown with tapered air holes, and, when fully cooked, would produce a whistling sound.
• In the spring of 1908, Missoulians woke up to some exciting news. The report stated that during the construction of the St. Paul Railroad bed in Hell Creek Canyon, rock blasting had opened a cavern in a rocky bluff, revealing encrusted stalagmites and stalactites with swarming pools of blind fish. A second chamber revealed gigantic fossils of dinosaurs of the late Jurassic period. As reported by the news media, a couple of blind fish were caught and taken to the Shapard Hotel for display. Visitors who showed up to see the live specimens were shown a mackerel fish instead. A classic GOTCHA! Visitors, undoubtedly, left the hotel with lobster-red faces. Ah, to be so suckered on April Fools’ Day.

April Fools’ Day can include some humorous household pranks which you may have experienced including:

• Emptying the salt from the kitchen shaker and replacing it with sugar.
• Placing a whoopie cushion under the couch cushions.
• Changing the time on every clock in the house by one hour.
• Placing bubble wrap under an area rug for an instant reaction.
• Removing the batteries from the TV remote, driving a TV watcher crazy.
• Calling a tobacco store and asking if they sold Sir Walter Raleigh tobacco in a can? If they said, “Yes, we do,” you would say: “Well, Sir Walter really would like to be let out of the can!” Their salty reply was usually a little ear warming, but a gotcha win for the caller.
• April Fools’ Day is the one date on the calendar when jokes and mischief are expected. Keep in mind that there are some ingenuous trick artists out there waiting to say, gotcha! It was Stephen King who wrote, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.” If the same person deceives you again? Well, you might as well have a big sign pinned on your back that says gullible. It’s your fault for letting it happen a second time.
• If you do get pranked, take in good stride. People who get hoaxed are chosen for their good humor, and the likelihood they’ll be a good sport.

BOZEMAN, Montana (March 29, 2024) – Today, at approximately 11 a.m., the Bozeman Police Department responded to Walmart (1500 N. 7th Ave.) after Gallatin County 911 received an emergency phone call for a fight in progress. As officers were responding to the location, the caller told dispatch one of the people involved in the fight had been stabbed.

Patrol officers, along with detectives, arrived within minutes and located both persons who were involved. An investigation revealed just prior to the fight the suspect had been huffing canned-air outside one of the store entrances. Shortly thereafter, the suspect began acting irate, and without provocation, physically assaulted a person who had been standing nearby. During the assault, the victim feared for their safety, and in self-defense, stabbed the suspect in the abdomen with a small pocketknife. The victim was able to separate from the suspect just prior to officers arriving on scene.

The suspect was transported for medical care and is being treated for non-life-threatening injuries. The victim sustained minor, non-life-threatening injuries.

Detectives concluded the victim’s actions were made in self-defense as they were lawfully protecting themselves from an unprovoked, physical assault. Detectives are continuing their investigation into this incident and anticipate forwarding their findings to local prosecutors for the suspect's actions.

“The staff at Walmart were instrumental during this investigation and provided an invaluable amount of support as they partnered with our investigation team,” Captain Joseph Swanson of the Bozeman Police Department stated.

Those who witnessed the assault are encouraged to contact Detective A. Kappler at 406-582-2028.

BOZEMAN – An annual dance marathon put on by a Montana State University student club on March 24 raised $9,129 for Shodair Children’s Hospital.

Montanathon Dance Marathon said about 100 students participated in the six-hour event, which included dance lessons, active fundraising, prize giveaways and a speaker from Shodair, according to Rachel Hould, an MSU student and executive director of the club.

“Montanathon Dance Marathon is a student-led organization that was created to raise money for our local Children’s Miracle Network hospital, which is Shodair,” Hould said. “Our mission is to raise as much funds as possible and spread education about Shodair and the work being done there.”

Miracle Network Dance Marathon is a fundraising program of the Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals, which raises funds for local member hospitals to provide vital treatments to pediatric patients, according to the organization’s website. Over the years, Montanathon Dance Marathon has raised more than $87,000 for the Helena-based hospital.

Hould said Montanathon Dance Marathon also hosted dodgeball, swing dancing and tie-dye fundraisers during this academic year, and the organization continually collects donations online.

HELENA – Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks will host a virtual meeting to gather input for the 2025-26 fishing regulations. The virtual meeting is scheduled for April 9, at 6 p.m. 

Fishing regulations are now under a process like hunting regulations, going through a comprehensive public review every two years. Fishing regulations are printed during odd numbered years.  

To review FWP’s proposed regulation changes, go to fwp.mt.gov/aboutfwp/public-comment-opportunities/fishing-regulations. FWP will also accept and review fishing regulations changes proposed by the public during the initial review time period.  

Staff will use this public input to refine regulation proposals to the Fish and Wildlife Commission. The final fishing regulations proposals will be available for public comment in August, and the commission will adopt, modify or reject the proposals at its October meeting. 

For information on how to participate in the virtual meeting, click here.

Montana State University ecology graduate Thomas Meinzen is pictured in Idaho conducting research on insects in roadside habitats. His review paper on the risks and benefits of such habitats to insect populaitons  was published recently by the journal BioScience. Photo by Diane Debinski

BOZEMAN – Spring is here, and soon the insects we notice all around us during Montana’s temperate seasons will reappear in yards, fields, outdoor recreation areas and along roadsides. With them will be the pollinators, such as bees and butterflies, that are frequently found living, nesting and foraging amid roadside flora.

But are such habitats helpful or harmful to the species that use them? The question has been the subject of study for years, and a review article by a Montana State University graduate detailing the research of hundreds of scientists was published recently in the journal BioScience.

“The BioScience paper was essentially an introduction to my thesis,” said lead author Thomas Meinzen, who in 2023 earned his master’s degree in biological sciences in MSU’s Department of Ecology in the College of Letters and Science. “I felt like this was the most important part because it’s really addressing questions about the overall impact of roadsides on (insect) population levels.”

Building on his lifelong enthusiasm for biology and natural history, Meinzen’s interest in these questions grew when he took an applied population ecology class during his MSU coursework.

“I learned that vital rates—birth, death and emigration—are so important in understanding how habitats can benefit or harm species,” he said.

Numerous studies highlight the floral resources and connectivity pathways provided by road verges, while others explore the attendant risks, including traffic collisions, pollutants, herbicides and mowing activities. Yet scientists don’t know how these benefits and risks balance out, and whether roadside habitats are more harmful or helpful to insect populations.

“A lot of these questions are unanswered – not because no one’s thinking about them, but because there’s so much we still don’t know about insects,” Meinzen said.

While at MSU, Meinzen set out to fill a portion of that knowledge gap by conducting a study on enhancing roadside habitat for pollinator conservation funded by the Idaho Transportation Department. The study became the bulk of his master’s thesis, for which he spent two summers conducting fieldwork at 63 different road verges in southeastern Idaho, including along state, U.S. and interstate highways.

Meinzen surveyed plants, bees and butterflies at each of the 63 sites twice each summer, as well as at a subset of the verges each August. He said the data provided a sense of how plant and flower communities relate to butterfly and bee diversity and how the highway type influenced diversity at each site.

“We found the overall result was that smaller, state highways had greater bee diversity. Bee diversity was also higher in less green areas, which was not what we anticipated,” he said. “We found, at least in southern Idaho, that the bright green areas tend to be dominated by non-native, invasive plants, while the drier, browner areas had native plants like sagebrush and tended to be better for bees.”

Results of the butterfly surveys were less conclusive, he said, probably because butterflies are more likely than bees to be generalists with wider habitats and less specific floral preferences. The survey results helped the MSU team formulate recommendations for Idaho’s roadside managers to prioritize plantings for pollinators along smaller highways and to protect sagebrush ecosystems.

“Sagebrush habitats might not look as showy, but they seemed to provide what bees needed – open ground for nesting and a variety of different blooms throughout the growing season, which is better than a lot of flowers one time of year,” Meinzen said.

Because his work in Idaho answered only some of the myriad questions ecologists have about roadside habitats, Meinzen said, he wrote the review of many additional studies to synthesize the wealth of information available for those creating roadside management plans.

The article was selected as the Editor’s Choice for the January edition of BioScience. And Meinzen – along with co-authors Diane Debinski, head of MSU’s ecology department, and MSU ecology professor Laura Burkle – were interviewed about roadside habitats and pollinators for the BioScience Talks podcast last month.

“It’s exciting as a young scientist to have a paper selected for that award and podcast, so I could share these ideas in a way that’s hopefully more accessible to people,” said Meinzen, who now works as an urban forester in Portland, Oregon.

His advice to anyone wishing to help native pollinators is to avoid using herbicides and pesticides when possible and to prioritize native flowers and ground cover when choosing plants.

“It’s important for people to know pollinators are declining really rapidly, and that it’s a big concern,” he said. “Trying to promote a diverse, native ecosystem without pesticides is the best way we can help native pollinators.”

Montana State University Plant Growth Center manager David Baumbauer hosts a tour of the facility, pictured in the background, during the third annual Sustainability Summit on Tuesday, March 26, 2024, in Bozeman, Montana. The event highlights elements of sustainable campus infrastructure, such as new energy-efficient lighting in the Plant Growth Center. MSU photo by Colter Peterson

BOZEMAN – The keynote speaker at Montana State University’s 2024 Sustainability Summit on Tuesday urged students to make choices with the knowledge that, while their individual power may be limited, their collective actions over time can affect everything on Earth.

Hunkpapa Lakota backcountry freestyle skier and activist Connor Ryan delivered that message during the annual summit hosted by MSU’s Office of Sustainability. The summit showcases campus-wide research, highlights efforts to make the university’s operations more sustainable, and updates the campus community on progress toward MSU’s long-term carbon-neutrality and zero-waste goals.

During his lunchtime speech, Ryan stressed that the actions of individuals in their own communities will contribute to significant, wide-reaching change in the long run, even if those actions don’t seem tremendously powerful in the short-term.

“The power of a wave isn’t in the mist that precedes it but in the power of the big wave that comes behind it,” he said.

The keynote address drew a crowd to MSU’s Strand Union Building, where posters displayed informational charts and architectural renderings of current and planned campus buildings and their energy-efficient design elements. Other highlights from the summit included sustainability-focused tours of MSU’s utility, research and landscape infrastructure; workshops on teaching sustainability; and presentations on related research being conducted by MSU students.

In his keynote address, Ryan offered his perspective as an athlete who views backcountry skiing in the Rockies as more than just a sport. For him, he said, it’s a dance, a prayer and a way to ceremonially reconnect with his Indigenous heritage and the places he came from. That connection is a major theme of the award-winning documentary film he co-directed, “Spirit of the Peaks,” which features his work and athleticism and which was shown on campus Monday evening to kick off the summit.

Ryan said that though he grew up on Colorado’s Rocky Mountain Front, it wasn’t until his adulthood, when he began exploring his heritage, that he began to understand his connection to the natural world. That understanding dawned during a sweat lodge ceremony, he said. After collecting creek water for the ceremony within view of the mountains where he skis, he was told that the water, in the form of steam, would become part of his body when he inhaled it, just as water from snow would become his blood after melting in the spring.

“I had the realization that this water I was carrying into the lodge was the water I’d been skiing on,” he said. “It was the first time I realized I was connected to this snowpack.”

Ryan told his audience that an Indigenous understanding of the interconnectedness of all things in nature is useful in informing environmental choices.

“Nothing in nature lives for itself,” said Ryan. “It’s up to us not to always do what’s profitable or what will bring us pride or glory or success, but instead for us to reapply those rules to everything that grew beside us on this planet.”

Ryan said actions taken at the grassroots level are more powerful than people realize, and he urged students to find ways they can work for sustainability while maintaining faith that those efforts matter.

“We as human beings can never leave nature – we are nature,” he said. “Everywhere we are is because of a decision made before us. If we want things to be different, we have to make different decisions.”

BOZEMAN — Montana State University Extension will offer a program that brings social engagement and dementia awareness to communities across Montana in April, May and June.

The Mobile Memory Café offers free, research-informed resources to caregivers and individuals with early-onset Alzheimer's disease or dementia. Registration is not required to participate in the Mobile Memory Café. The program was developed by Dan Koltz, MSU assistant professor and Extension gerontology specialist.

“Living well with dementia is a challenge,” Koltz said. “The Mobile Memory Café seeks to provide social engagement for caregivers and individuals in communities across Montana.”

Topics covered by the Mobile Memory Café include prevention, brain health, nutrition, sleep, social activity and physical health. The program is supported by the Montana Geriatric Education Center, County and Statewide Area Agencies on Aging and the Alzheimer's Association Montana Chapter.

“We are fortunate to have several partners working alongside us to provide critical healthy aging resources,” Koltz said. “We invite anyone interested in learning more about living well with dementia to visit the Mobile Memory Café this spring.”

Stops are scheduled in April, May and June in Anaconda, Butte, Darby, Drummond, Hamilton, Helena, Kalispell, Libby, Polson, Ronan and Roundup. A full list of dates, locations and additional details can be found at montana.edu/extension/health/healthy_aging/index.html.