Twelve schools of Penn release individual plans for promoting faculty diversity

This summer, Penn’s 12 undergraduate and graduate schools released their individual plans under the University’s Action Plan for Faculty Diversity and Excellence.

Each of the plans outlines specific measures Penn’s schools will take to promote faculty diversity in the coming years.

As the School of Arts and Sciences noted in its plan for faculty diversity and excellence, “change will come slowly, but change must come.”

In this feature, The Daily Pennsylvanian takes a look at some of the specific ways in which Penn’s four undergraduate schools are aiming to recruit and retain a diverse faculty.

School of Arts and Sciences

The main way SAS plans to increase diversity is through strengthening the faculty search process, giving more weight to diversity. But since around 80 percent of the SAS faculty is tenured, new openings for minorities are dependent upon retirement and attrition.

SAS plans to hire two diversity search advisers to guide the school’s departments throughout the hiring process.

The school is also aiming to work on increasing its pools of faculty candidates by building pipelines that draw in minorities starting in high school and continuing throughout college and graduate school.

School of Engineering and Applied Science

In order to ensure that the Engineering School increases its diversity, a Faculty Diversity Committee will be appointed.

The school plans to raise funding to target certain teaching candidates in the next three years. Currently, only 6 percent of the school’s faculty is comprised of blacks, Latino and Native American professors.

To increase the likelihood of a minority candidate accepting an offer, the school will encourage the University to help spouses of candidates find employment in the Philadelphia area.

School of Nursing

The Nursing School plans to begin by targeting students from high school throughout graduate school to increase the diversity of the pool of faculty applicants.

It is also aiming to post job openings in a more diverse selection of journals that are read by more minorities in general.

The Penn Nursing faculty mentorship program, which began in 2005, will be used to retain and support standing minority faculty.

Wharton School

In order to broaden the pipeline of potential candidates, Wharton plans to develop a summer visitation program to increase interest in Penn among minority communities.

Wharton will monitor the workload associated with committee assignments as well as compensation to create a better environment for women and minorities.

The school will also develop a seminar to educate faculty about unconscious bias.

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