April 2005

Faculty and librarians are centrally concerned with issues of diversity on campus, a concern that we express both as individuals and through our collective voice, the Massachusetts Society of Professors. Like any union, we are determined to ensure that the campus provides a welcoming atmosphere for all our members, very much including ALANA and international faculty and librarians. But we are equally concerned that the processes of hiring and recruitment actively seek out ALANA candidates, both for faculty and for graduate students. And we seek to guarantee a supportive learning environment for all our students, both graduate and undergraduate, in a campus that provides students opportunities and resources for an independent voice. As faculty and librarians, our response focuses primarily on academic issues, although we can't neglect student concerns.

We therefore call for the following steps:

HIRING

1. As we have argued all year, the university needs to dramatically increase its hiring of tenure-track faculty. Specifically, the university should commit itself that within three years it will achieve a 250-person increase in the number of tenure-track faculty on the Amherst campus. Such a commitment will make it much more possible to substantially increase the number of ALANA faculty.

2. In order to increase the probability that our searches will give fair and adequate consideration to ALANA candidates, we call for:

A. A dramatic increase in pre-recruitment efforts, including a variety of forms of support for departmental efforts to identify ALANA candidates and to make efforts to get those candidates to apply.

B. An active effort to train deans, department chairs, personnel and recruitment committees in ways to conduct more effective searches. That includes education and training both about practices that may unintentionally restrict the pool of applicants, and about ways to increase the pool of ALANA candidates.

C. A thorough re-examination of the ways faculty and administrative positions are advertised, for example to make possible increased flexibility in searches.

D. A re-examination of the distribution of resources. Some on-campus programs that are currently starved for resources (Latin American, Asian American and Native American Studies) could and should be expanded, and doing so would increase the likelihood of attracting ALANA faculty and students.

We should also examine our processes, and increase the resources for, efforts to recruit a pool of ALANA applicants among graduate and undergraduate students. All these efforts are inter-related: it is much easier to attract ALANA faculty if the department and campus also contain significant numbers of ALANA students.

The MSP is not only willing, but eager, in fact insistent, on being involved in all of these efforts. None of this activity should be privatized to external firms. We have the expertise and the energy to do it on campus if we are provided with sufficient resources, and if it is done by people on campus these efforts will receive more support and be more likely to lead to the desired outcomes.

The university should set specific goals for recruitment of ALANA faculty, staff, and students, should publicize these goals widely, and should demonstrate commitment to achieving them by concrete actions.

RETENTION

3. Successful recruitment is only the first step toward increasing the proportion of ALANA faculty AND STAFF (and students). Special efforts must be made toward retaining this faculty group. This is an especially challenging task when ALANA faculty are few in number. Without a critical mass of minority colleagues, minority professors often feel isolated and alienated and are more likely to leave. To prevent a “revolving door” phenomenon, recruitment and retention efforts need to be implemented simultaneously.

Statistics on retention rate of ALANA faculty (and women) compared to other faculty are urgently needed. Accurate data will identify the scope of the problem and the obstacles to retention. At present, there is no office on campus that gathers and disseminates this data. An office must be authorized and provided resources to track this information and make it available to the campus community to ensure accountability, transparency and a genuine commitment to creating a diverse faculty body.

Data on tenure and promotion rates, salary parity, fellowships, grants and contracts and career progression of ALANA faculty compared to other faculty are needed to identify possible patterns of discrimination and provide targeted remedies.

Data should be disaggregated by department and school to identify areas of concern and cases of successful retention.

Ongoing efforts of the Community Diversity Social Justice Committees at the School level to monitor retention of ALANA faculty in their departments and implement recommendations must be supported and monitored. Through these committees faculty, staff and student are likely to take more ownership of this issue and thereby improve our success rate.

FUNDING, ADMINISTRATION AND ACCOUNTABILITY

All budgeting decisions on campus should consider diversity issues; $1.6 million should be allocated specifically for the infrastructure of diversity initiatives. These are minimum commitments, and this does not include the fact that we hope and expect that a substantial proportion of the faculty hired will be ALANA faculty. We oppose the use of the term “tax” as applied to diversity initiatives but not to other campus funding.

In the spirit of the commission report, the University should recognize the need for a centralized office whose primary responsibility would be to enhance communication between the various sections of campus, collect and distribute "best practices," provide necessary diversity-related data upon request, support initiatives and prevent unnecessary duplication of efforts, make sure funds allocated for diversity efforts are efficiently used, provide strategic direction to individuals and departments seeking help implementing goals, and provide ongoing assessment of the University's progress. Such activities are beyond the scope of the Chancellor's proposed ad hoc, yearly appointed, advisory committee.

STUDENT AFFAIRS

6. The MSP supports the spirit of the Community Action Plan developed by the two student members of the Diversity Commission, rather than the spirit or specifics of the Chancellor's Plan. We oppose any effort to reduce the autonomy, resources, or integrity of Student Government and student organizations.

INTERNAL EDUCATION

The MSP recognizes that rhetoric, plans, and proposals will not be enough to change the atmosphere or practices on campus. In order to make this a more diverse campus it will be necessary to engage in active educational processes. Those processes must begin first of all among our own members. We pledge ourselves to conduct an active campaign to initiate discussion, debate, and internal education about diversity issues. Those efforts might include a forum or forums, working groups, statements or materials, or meetings.