On Increasing Minority Faculty

Editor’s Note: The following article is reprinted with permission from the Council of Graduate Schools. It first appeared in their newsletter.

So you have been trying for quite some time to increase the number of minority faculty on your campus without success. Moreover, you have seen the numbers decrease in the face of all your efforts. Well here are some questions which will help in evaluating your effort, especially if you are at a predominantly white institution. Your reactions to this partial list of some of the methods which have been employed by some institutions may provide some insight on how to move your program forward.

1. Do you have minority graduate students at your institution? If yes: How many have received PhDs in the last five years? This is a “track record” ques­tion as well as a test of whether you are contributing to the pool.
2. Does your institution offer minority postdoctoral fellowships? How many have you had in the last five years? If you have an inactive program you might revive it.
3. How many minority faculty have you had as “visiting faculty” to your campus? Programs to promote visiting minority faculty, either for a quarter, a semester, a year, or the summer, are one way to let these persons see your campus. Perhaps both of you will like what you see.
4. What kind of minority faculty sup­port systems do you have in place at your institution for the minority faculty you now have? Do you offer lab and other research support? How about summer research support, or release time to compensate for the number of other institutional functions they are asked to perform? Do you have a way of evaluating and rewarding their effort, especially as it relates to minority issues? This last question is reported as a tough one. Not many institutions have been able to answer in the affirmative, but many are “working on it.”
5. How is your recruitment plan pro­gressing? Have you been successful in attracting new minority PhDs to your campus? Despite what you may hear, some excellent minority PhDs are be­ing produced each year. In the last four years some forty Danforth-Compton Fellows have graduated in the arts, humanities, and social services. And each year MIT, Ohio State, Howard Univer­sity, Atlanta University, and others add to the pool in “hard to find” disciplines.
6. Does your administration have ad­ditional resources on which you can draw if you wish to hire minority faculty you uncover in the course of your search to fill a vacant position? Some­ times the position is described is such a way that the minority you find, al­though qualified, is not “the perfect fit.” Can you hire this candidate anyway us­ing this “reserve fund”? If you do not have such a fund, look into it. You’d be surprised how competitive your institu­tion could become if you are free to do the “warm body” hiring.
7. Have you thought about “growing your own”? It’s a good plan, but not perfect. You may be cultivating a gar­ den for someone else. Many depart­ments do not support the hiring of their own PhDs except in extraordinary cir­cumstances. Do you think these circum­stances are extraordinary enough?
8. Are you in a consortium with other institutions working on this and similar problems? Working with other institu­tions provides an excellent source of ideas and can be a sound basis for approaching funding agencies for fi­nancial support if you have a good plan.
9. Have you developed a mutually beneficial “working relationship” with any of the historically black colleges and universities? HBCUs are still the largest producers of black undergraduates in the country, and have prepared the bulk of the nation’s black scholars and leaders.
10. Is it your institution that started that Presidential Minority Faculty Lec­ture Series which brings outstanding minority scholars to your campus to give a series of lectures? No? It might be a good idea.
11. Finally, what is the nature of the environment into which you are trying to recruit these faculty and students? Is it supportive, friendly, or hostile? Is it likely to foster their growth and devel­opment, or have you not planned be­ yond recruitment? If you haven’t, you still have a lot of work to do.

These questions are designed to stim­ulate thought and to assist you in devel­oping your plans for increasing the number of minority faculty at your insti­tution. They are the result of hundreds of conversations, an equally large num­ber of phone calls, and some opportuni­ties to evaluate what is working and what is not at many of our nation’s academic institutions. It is not intended to be a definitive list nor to exhaust or trivialize the issues involved.

One of the recommendations of the Council on Graduate Schools Commit­tee on Minorities was to prepare a docu­ment on successful programs. Such a document is in preparation and will treat some of these issues more fully. In the meantime let’s keep doing what we can to improve the situation.