Administrators pledged $1 million toward enhancing efforts to recruit minority faculty members after a report released Thursday criticized Northwestern’s level of faculty diversity.
The report, issued by the faculty diversity committee, detailed findings on women, black and Latino faculty at NU. Although critical of NU’s diversity efforts, the report noted that the university ranks near or above the national average in most categories.
While the committee’s 2000-01 report says NU can take “some modest satisfaction” in its hiring and retaining of women faculty, it calls the university’s record in hiring black and Latino faculty members “far less impressive.”
With Latino faculty in particular, the report states the “numbers and percentages are much lower than we desire, and they have recently declined after peaking in 1997.”
The report urges faculty search committees to “seek out women and members of minority groups for faculty appointment.”
That could be accomplished by tracking hiring outcomes, pursuing active hiring policies and cultivating relationships with minority students at other institutions, the committee reported.
The $1 million pool will fund viable proposals promoting increased faculty diversity. In order to receive funding, applicants need to submit their ideas for hiring initiatives to the committee by Oct. 15, Jan. 15 or April 15 for review.
John Margolis, associate provost for faculty affairs, said the problems facing NU in recruiting minority faculty are the same challenges confronting other universities. Because so few minority scholars seek doctorate degrees, NU’s diversity selection is automatically limited, he said.
“The funding set forth in the report demonstrates the administration’s readiness to support initiatives that hold real promise of helping us achieve our goals,” Margolis said. “This is a challenge facing all colleges. It isn’t a matter of a lack of will, it’s an issue, in part, of very limited availability.”
Doctoral programs are offered at more than 3,000 higher-level educational institutions, but only 791 women have doctorates in engineering, while 3,819 received doctorates in social sciences and 2,658 have doctorates in literature.
For blacks and Latinos, the nationwide numbers are even lower: Only 96 blacks have doctorates in engineering, 334 in social sciences and 60 in literature. There were just 82 Latino engineering doctoral degrees, 300 social science doctorates and 112 literature doctorates.
“We need to make universities be seen throughout many communities as places that are important, relevant and welcoming to come and do work at,” said committee member Mary Ann Weston, a Medill associate dean. “Historically that has not been true for people of color. We need to change what we’ve been handed by history.”
Re-launched in September 2000, the diversity committee is chaired by Provost Lawrence Dumas. In a January interview with The Daily, Dumas said he was dissatisfied with NU’s level of faculty diversity.
“The number is just too low,” he said. “Being in the middle of the pack isn’t good enough. We want to be a leader in attracting minority faculty. I want to see some real momentum here.”
But the report’s statistics show there is work to be done in the recruiting of minorities. Since the fall of 1987, the number of female tenured and tenure-track faculty has increased from 207 to 264, but still accounts for only 22 percent of faculty members. NU has about 1,200 faculty members on its payroll.
The number of black tenured faculty members nearly doubled from 14, or 1.1 percent of faculty, in 1987 to 27 in 1997, but has since fallen back down to 22. Of these, the report lists eight as full professors, five as associate professors and nine as assistant professors.
The Latino faculty figures mirror the black statistics, as modest progress throughout the early 1990s peaked in 1997 and has since eroded. In 1987, there were nine tenured or tenure-track Latino professors, or less than 1 percent of faculty.
That number rose to 28 in the fall of 1997, but is now at only 25, with 14 full professors, three associate professors and eight assistant professors.
In his January interview, Dumas said he thinks a diverse educational environment will improve the learning experience at NU.
“Northwestern believes very strongly in the value of having a diverse faculty and student body that reflects the population of the society in which we live,” he said.
The complete report can be downloaded at www.northwestern.edu/provost/FDC_Report_Final.pdf.
