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Administrators strive for diversified faculty

(This is the second article in a two-part series on faculty diversity.)

As the University continues to strive to recruit a more diverse faculty, administrators are finding their efforts thwarted by limited hiring pools and difficulties in retaining minority faculty.

The 1998 Equal Opportunity Plan, conducted annually by the Office of Institutional Assessment and Studies, stated that since 1994 the University has increased the number of women faculty in all areas of Arts and Sciences and Education while the number of women has remained unchanged or declined in Commerce, Law and Medicine.

According to 1998 figures from the Office of Institutional Assessment and Studies, women hold 33 percent of faculty positions at the University.

The number of blacks holding faculty positions, however, has stagnated or diminished since 1994, the EOP study shows. In 1998, minorities held 9 percent of faculty positions and blacks held 3 percent.

Faculty Senate Chairman David T. Gies said the statistics are not a surprise, but that the University is serious about hiring minorities and women.

"Each department hires the best candidate, but the pool of minorities is very small in some fields," Gies said. "As an example, how many African-Americans are there with PhD's in the Slavic languages?"

Education School Dean David W. Breneman said one must carefully consider the data when looking at the decline in women and minority faculty.

"We're often dealing with small numbers [of hired minority faculty] to begin with," Breneman said. "One person leaves and those numbers can bounce around two or three percentage points."

Although quotas are illegal and no officials can force a department to hire more diverse faculty, the Equal Opportunities Office and Alex M. Johnson, vice provost for Faculty Recruitment and Retention, work to ensure that all departments are recruiting adequately.

Johnson said the University has two funds, the loan line and recruitment fund, which help the University attract minorities.

The loan line enables departments to hire a professor that they do not have a position for currently, but for whom a position will soon be opening up. The loan line will cover their salary for up to three years, he said.

He added that the recruitment fund covers recruiting trips, advertisements, money to bring recruits to Charlottesville and temporary housing and moving expenses for hires.

Johnson also speaks one-on-one with recruits to address their concerns about living in a small Southern town "with all that entails -- both pro and con," he said. "Many prefer to live in large urban areas -- it's a hurdle we confront with every hire."

Karen E. Holt, director of Equal Opportunity Programs, said academic departments report to her office during their hiring searches for suggestions on where to advertise and how to phrase their advertisements.

Holt said only the Equal Opportunities Office receives the racial demographics of applicants that the department has decided to interview -- the academic departments are not given the demographic information prior to the interview process.

If the pool to be interviewed is not diverse, "we may go back to the department and suggest they take another look to see if there are other qualified applicants," she said.

Johnson said he is satisfied with the efforts being made in minority recruitment, but said the results have been less than he would expect.

"We have lost several [minority faculty members] in the last three years," he said. "Each was a unique situation --there's no pattern -- but it's still frustrating when they leave. I'd like to see that turn around."

Holt said hiring outcomes are not always the greatest concern.

"What I would like to see is effort, we don't necessarily just care about numbers, we want to see people thinking about it," she said. "Results are only part, not a full measure of success."

Although no punitive measures exist for departments that fail to hire diverse faculty, Johnson said the provost and the deans hold a retreat each year to discuss their recruitment efforts.

"We don't take them back to the woodshed, but a dean that does not engage in recruitment is evaluated in terms of their job performance -- recruitment is a part of their job description," he said.

English Prof. Tejumola Olaniyan said the primary question is whether the University truly is willing to hire minority faculty.

"The best minds, whether in administration or teaching, are on this campus. So the question of how to recruit minorities is a secondary one. I am yet to see an obstacle defeat a determined will," Olaniyan said.

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