Breakthrough Advances in Faculty Diversity

Read this study to target limited resources to the initiatives most likely to increase the diversity of the institution’s faculty.

Based on extensive analysis of data on the faculty pipeline, examination of approaches and results at hundreds of universities, and over 150 hour-long interviews with provosts, deans, chief diversity officers, department chairs, and faculty, the report profiles replicable strategies from institutions that have achieved faculty diversity rates far greater than those of their peers, often after starting with rates well below average.

Set course and compass

Across the last two decades, efforts to increase faculty diversity have intensified, with a growing number of institutions launching initiatives to recruit and retain underrepresented faculty and increase the diversity of doctoral recipients. Despite these efforts, faculty diversification continues to proceed slowly.

Currently, the percentage of underrepresented minorities (URMs) among tenured and tenure-track faculty at four-year institutions is less than half as large as the percentage of URMs among undergraduates and about a third as large as the percentage of URMs in the U.S. population.

Between 1993 and 2005 URMs’ share of tenured and tenure-track positions increased less than two percentage points. In the same period, URMs’ share of the population increased five percentage points, leaving the proportional gap between representation in the nation and representation in the professoriate intact. Women’s share of tenured and tenure-track faculty positions also continues to lag behind women’s representation in the national and undergraduate populations. Although women have made up more than half of undergraduates for decades, they account for only about a third of tenured and tenure-track faculty at four-year institutions and a considerably smaller percentage of faculty in STEM fields.

 

Strategy 1: Making the Case for Faculty Action

The first challenge universities face in advancing efforts to recruit underrepresented faculty is educating the institution’s current faculty in a way that inspires action. While training sessions for search committees have become commonplace, most institutions find sessions fail to engage the faculty and have limited impact on recruiting outcomes or efforts.

The lesson best-practice institutions have learned is that faculty listen to other faculty and respond most favorably when engaged in an academic format. The University of Michigan, our case study institution, has developed a highly successful approach to faculty education that centers around seminar-style workshops led by faculty deeply engaged in the material they are presenting.

Components of Search Committee Workshop

 

Strategy 2: Resourcing the Recruiting Effort

Compared to other sectors, higher education has a far less developed infrastructure for recruiting its top knowledge workers. Most organizations similar in size to universities maintain a team of dedicated recruiters who work full-time year-round on finding and attracting top talent. Department professionals make final hiring decisions, but recruiting is structured to minimize the portion of the burden that they carry.

In higher education, by contrast, formal ownership for faculty recruiting is intermittent, not ongoing, with the vast majority of work falling to a committee of faculty that convenes only a few months before the interview period and disbands when a candidate is hired.

Recruiters, not departmental leaders, execute the early-stage tasks of identifying and pre-qualifying candidates; in later stages of the hiring process, recruiters support departmental leaders by handling communications and logistics.Throughout the recruiting process, search committee members continue to shoulder normal demands of teaching and research and receive little, if any, assistance with their work.

Strategy 3: Hardwiring Faculty Search Oversight

Cultivating the support of faculty is essential but typically not sufficient for achieving significant advances in faculty diversification. For most institutions, making substantial progress will require a mechanism for creating accountability for diversity efforts.

Several of the exemplar institutions we encountered in the research have achieved this goal by systematizing rigorous oversight of the faculty search process. While all universities monitor faculty searches in some way to comply with federal law, the approach of best-practice institutions differs sharply from typical practice. Three elements set exemplars apart from others: frequent checkpoints, senior reviewers, and signal interventions.

Strategy 4: Spotlighting Diversity Performance

While most institutions have conducted some type of diversity planning, few have seen the process make a discernible impact on faculty recruiting. Three pitfalls commonly undermine diversity planning’s effectiveness.

Case Study: Pennsylvania State University

• Each college and budgetary unit participates in a cyclical planning, review, and assessment process to improve diversity efforts
• Process is coordinated by vice provost for educational equity

At Pennsylvania State University, deans execute the diversity planning process for their individual school or college. The University provides guidance for unit-level efforts in its “Framework to Foster Diversity.” This 15-page document identifies seven institutional challenges (one of which includes recruiting and retaining a diverse faculty) and provides questions to guide assessment and goal setting in each area. Using the framework for guidance, each dean creates a diversity plan that assesses recent performance and outlines the college’s goals for the upcoming planning cycle.