UNC Greensboro's vision is to be a national model for how a public research university can achieve access and excellence to transform students, the institution, and the community. With origins as the segregated Woman's College (WC), our evolution as a southern metropolitan public university reflects race, place, and intertwined historical legacies. Embedded inclusive excellence, as a heuristic, frames the intentional, synergistic, and organic processes we engage in advancing faculty diversity and a more inclusive learning environment. Specifically, borrowing a central concept from economics, we illustrate cultural, structural/institutional, and social "embeddedness" that has supported significant and positive changes at our university.