PUBLICATIONS Inside Illinois Vol. 20, No. 11, Dec. 7, 2000

Committee charged with developing plans to improve campus diversity

Becky Mabry , Assistant Editor
(217) 244-1072; mabry@uiuc.ed

Chancellor Michael Aiken and Provost Richard Herman have charged a new campuswide committee with developing plans for improving diversity on campus.

The committee comprises 27 members, including students, professors, deans, assistant deans and campus administrators.

"Any successful plan will require multiple actions on multiple fronts across the campus," Herman said. "It is important that we move forward to create a truly diverse community that enhances the campus educational environment. We want our graduates to be citizens of the world. As the demography of our state and nation changes, as the professions our students enter demand a greater understanding of world cultures, we must provide more diverse experiences for our students."

One purpose of the committee is to develop proposals that will increase the gender and ethnic diversity of faculty and staff members. Other proposals will offer students an educational and living experience that encourages them to understand their own limitations and what they and those of other backgrounds can bring to bear on societal issues.

The Diversity Initiatives Committee will start its work in the spring semester. Herman said he anticipates it being a standing committee, although membership may change through the years.

In a recent interview, Herman talked about some of the reasons why the committee is necessary and what he and the chancellor hope it can accomplish.

Why is this Diversity Initiative necessary?
I’d like to see this committee create an atmosphere in which diversity is something that is part of our everyday conversation and experience. This means incorporation into issues of student life and education. It means that everyone is dedicated toward making the campus a more diverse place – more racially diverse, with more gender diversity and with a greater international focus.

And while I’m pleased with the progress we’ve made in terms of hiring minority faculty – not just African-Americans but Latino/Latina and Asian faculty members – there is much more work to be done.

Your charge to the committee mentions an ‘action plan.’ Are you asking the committee to come up with specific suggestions to act upon?
Yes, the fact that both the chancellor and I endorse this concept is testament to the fact that we’re asking some very wise people on this campus to develop a plan of action, which in turn we are promising to implement.

Do you mean you’re willing to put money into these efforts and make their recommendations happen?
Exactly. To be fair, I think an enormous amount of progress has taken place in a very, very constrained financial environment. I think that speaks well of the attention given to this issue on this campus.

What we’re saying in the formation of this committee is that we’re raising the priority of investment in diversity.

The focus is also on increasing diversity among the student population, right?
It’s on students and faculty. One does not go without the other. You’ll find that the presence of a significant number of minority students will bring more minority scholars or scholars who are interested in minority issues to our door. Likewise the presence of distinguished minority scholars will bring minority students here to study, both at the undergraduate and graduate level.

Do you think this committee can come up with anything that hasn’t been done before?
I think by virtue of our geography, we have to try a little harder. What we’re asking these individuals on the committee to do is point us in the right direction by coming up with specific plans of action. The fine words that appear in the ‘Framework for the Future’ form an important umbrella for us, but underneath the umbrella we need to have some very specific plans of action in the area of diversity.

Why such a large committee?
In a very real sense, it does represent the diverse nature of the campus. There are many viewpoints to be taken into account as we weave this tapestry.

Cynics may wonder how you can have a committee looking at diversity issues with such a controversial issue as Chief Illiniwek on campus. They may wonder if this is a sincere effort.
I suspect there will be a certain amount of cynicism associated with this. The alternative to me would be that because the issue of Chief Illiniwek is such a burning issue that we cannot have a committee of this nature. To me, that alternative is just flat-out unacceptable. We cannot let one issue stand in the way of us dealing with the broader concerns surrounding diversity. So we just need to go forward.

Are they being directed to put the Chief Illiniwek issue aside, out of their areas of concern?
In essence we expect this committee to develop its own charge and set of activities. Fundamentally, what the chancellor and I are saying is that we’re faced with a set of issues of how to make the campus more diverse and we are turning to the committee as a group of wise individuals to help us solve this problem.

Our promise to them in turn is that if they give us some things to act on, we guarantee we will act.

We don’t want a report that’s going to sit on the shelf.

Why was Professor James Anderson chosen to chair the committee?
Jim has played a key role in efforts at Illinois to create a diverse campus, through his actions both within his own department [educational policy studies] and through his enormous contributions to the Summer Research Opportunity program. He is a well respected scholar nationally and we’re very pleased to have him here just on that basis, but he also contributes greatly to the life of the campus in general. He has great values, and when he puts his mind to doing something, it always turns out well . Both the chancellor and I are grateful for his leadership.

Why is it important to a student’s education to have a university with a diverse population?
It’s important for an individual to have this broader experience with people because in all likelihood they’re going to be working with a broader set of individuals. Many of them will go out of state to work. And it is important to understand that there are other views on issues – often a function of individual backgrounds. Whether or not they are the same as their own views, it’s important for one to understand a variety of perspectives before formulating one’s own opinion.

Why did you want to include students in the committee?
We don’t want to do something for the students; we want to do something with the students. And we need to understand what the student point of view is.

Why is this issue an important one for the campus now?
The long-term demographics of the state are changing. For example, we know that the Latino/Latina population is on the rise. But that is just one point. The other is that we need to prepare students to work in a different environment than we did 10 or 15 years ago when this whole international-global movement started. Those are two particular reasons for moving forward.

We recognize these efforts have been made before, but we need to be more vigorous in seeking solutions. We see the formation of this committee and our promise to be responsive to suggestions as a reaffirmation of this university’s commitment to the concept of diversity.

Diversity Initiatives Committee
James D. Anderson*, professor, head of educational policy studies, history
Andrew G. Alleyne, professor, mechanical and industrial engineering
Patricia E. Askew, vice chancellor for student affairs
Cecilio R. Barrera, associate dean graduate college administration
William E. Berry, associate chancellor, ex officio
Karen M. Carney, assistant provost, ex officio
Leon M. Dash, professor, Swanlund endowed chair, journalism
Alice A. Deck, professor, acting head Afro-American studies, English, women’s studies
Louis DeSipio, acting director, Latina/Latino studies program, political science
David M. Dunson, child care resource specialist
Georgia E. Garcia, associate professor, curriculum and instruction, educational policy studies.
Frederick E. Hoxie, professor, Swanlund endowed chair, history
Lawrence R. Mann, associate chancellor, ex officio
Curtis B. McKay, assistant dean, library and information science, co-director gay, lesbian, bisexual task force
Gregory A. Miller, professor, Beckman Institute, psychology
Kathy A. Perkins, professor, theater
Philip W. Phillips, professor, physics, chemistry
Olga Soffer, professor, anthropology. slavic languages
Arlene Torres, assistant professor, anthropology
William T. Trent, professor, educational policy studies, sociology
Emily S. Watts, professor, campus honors program, English
George T. Yu, professor, director East Asian and Pacific Studies Center, political science
Celina Trujillo and three other students whose names were not available at press time.
* committee chair