When it comes to recruiting diverse faculty members, many search committees report that they cannot find qualified women or people of color to apply for their open positions. Research has shown that committees succeed in hiring women and people of color when they transform the search process, are committed to diversity and are proactive about building a diverse applicant pool.
ACES has created a series of Faculty Search Committee supports that includes a three-part Toolkit of workshops and online tools to help you transform your process.
The toolkit objective is:
The consistent application of high standards, fairly applied;
To use best practices to avoid bias to the degree possible in one’s own decisions and contributions to committee deliberation and;
To help committees diversify their candidate pools.
The following three briefings can be presented in a single 1 ½ hour session, or individual sessions at the appropriate time during the search.
The toolkit briefings are a review of new protocols and guidelines, best practices for recruiting, and additional search strategies that may help you to reach your recruitment goal. The Diversity Specialist can recommend possible changes to enhance your search, as well as discuss new policies that may be important to your search or candidates.
The Case Western Reserve University Guidelines on how to conduct a sucessful search with tips on recruitment, advertising, and selection. Includes form procedures and record keeping requirements.
Research on Bias and Assumptions with examples of common social assumptions, biases that influence the evaluation of applications in academic job-related contexts. Information is included about how biases and assumptions can influence your search. "We all like to think that we are objective scholars who judge people based entirely on their experience and achievements, but copious research shows that every one of us brings a lifetime of experience and cultural history that shapes the review process."
This form offers a method for department faculty to provide evaluations on job candidates. It is meant to be a template for departments that they can modify as necessary for their own uses.
This chart is a guide to inquiries that are and are not permitted because they request or allow use of information that may lead to an unfair or biased decision.
A variety of questions that will help elicit useful information about candidates concern about issues that affect women and people of color. The questions, which focus mainly on women's issues, can easily be adapted to apply to minority and disabled persons.
These questions are to help your committee develop uniform questions that address what you woudl like to learn about a candiate. A jumping off point to spark discussion.
Developing a Structure and Reading to Avoid Bias. Creating a structure for the applicant to provide to those who are writing letters of recommendation can ensure a more uniform comparison of qualifications. Letters are often heavily weighted in the search process, but they can be systematically different depending on the gender of the candidate and the author. This can keep a diverse pool from becoming a diverse faculty. This shows how you are often judging the skill of the letter writer rather than the candidate.
"Exploring the color of glass: letters of recommendation for female and male medical faculty" PDF, by Frances Trix and Carolyn Psenka is the entire document. From the Abstract: "Letters written for female applicants were found to differ systematically from those written for male applicants... the most common semantically grouped possessive phrases referring to female and male applicants ('her teaching,' 'his research') reinforce gender schema that tend to portray women as teachers and students, and men as researchers and professionals."
Reading and Resources
Why So Slow?: The Advancement of Women, Virginia Valian.
Chosen by the National Science Foundation as recommended reading for NSF-ADVANCE grant recipients and participants. Dr. Valian is Professor of Psychology and Linguistics at Hunter College and the CUNY Graduate Center. The book is available for purchase through several online booksellers, and university bookstores. MIT Press 1999. PDF Chapter 1, "Gender Schemas at Work" PDF PDF Chapter 11, "Women in Academia" PDF "Research on Women in Academia". PDF a 4 page excerpt of Chapter 11
Published by the American Association of University Women Educational Foundation and American Association of University Women Legal Advocacy Fund in October 2004, and edited by Susan K. Dyer. This report "...presents evidence that ...gives a human voice to the concept of sex discrimination in academia. As this report makes clear, professors-turned-litigants are spurred by significantly more than an off-color joke or an occasional slight. Plaintiffs have risked and sometimes sacrificed promising, prestigious academic careers to seek justice for themselves and other women." Tenure Denied Overview, PDF a 3 page overview of the 115 page report.
Joan Williams, a professor of law at American University and director of its program on gender, work and family, discusses how academic women are disadvantaged in subtle ways by work and family roles. This article appeared in the Chronicle of Higher Education April 14, 2003.
Peggy McIntosh is associate director of the Wellesley College Center for Research on Women. This essay is excerpted from Working Paper 189. "White Privilege and Male Privilege: A Personal Account of Coming To See Correspondences through Work in Women's Studies" (1988), by Peggy McIntosh. This excerpted essay is reprinted from the Winter 1990 issue of Independent School.
Published by the University of Wisconsin-Wilwaukee in Sex Roles, Vol. 41, Numbers 7 and 8, 1999, this study shows "...some of the factors that influence outside reviewers and search committee members when they are reviewing curricula vitae, particularly with respect to the gender of the name on the vitae."
Jerry Jacobs is a professor of Sociology at the University of Pennsylvania. This speech was his presidential address to the Eastern Sociological Society in Philadelphia during February 2003. Jacobs examines "the time demands of academic life."
Dr. Bernice R. Sandler is a Senior Scholar at the Women's Research and Education Institute in Washington, DC, where she consults with institutions and others about achieving equity for women and is an Adjunct Associate Professor at Drexel University College of Medicine. She formerly wrote a quarterly newsletter, About Women on Campus. She has given over 2500 presentations, has written more than 100 articles and is well-known for her expertise in women's educational equity in general as well as in sexual harassment, the chilly classroom climate, and her knowledge of policies, programs and strategies concerning women on campus. She also serves as an expert witness in discrimination and sexual harassment cases. bernicesandler.com
