Penn State University still has “more rivers to cross” to improve the status of its Black faculty, according to a recent report by two of its professors who spent more than eight months researching the subject in an effort to highlight diversity issues at the institution.
“More Rivers to Cross: A Report on the Status of African American Professors at Penn State University” examined the 13 academic colleges on the University Park campus. Written by Dr. Gary King, a professor of biobehavioral health, and Dr. Darryl Thomas, an associate professor of African American studies, the 97-page report most notably found a decline in tenured and tenure-track Black faculty in recent years.
According to their study, in 2004, there were 83 tenured or tenure-track Black faculty at Penn State. By 2018, the number had dropped to 68. By percentages, the tenured and tenure-track African American faculty declined from 76.1% in 2004 to 60.7% in 2018.
There were 30 Black associate professors in 2018, down from 37 in 2004; and there were 23 Black full professors in 2018, the same number as 10 years prior in 2008.
The study, which was published on the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education website and presented to faculty and administrators at Penn State, also raised questions about the institution’s official diversity data.
For example, King and Thomas point out that “the actual count of Black faculty is artificially inflated and misleading, because according to the Office of Planning and Assessment, ‘for 2018, with the implementation of a new human resource information system, post-doctoral scholars and fellows were reclassified from part-time to full-time.’”
The professors contend that the new system “statistically and pragmatically” misrepresents the number of Black professors on the University Park campus in 2018. They note that “post-doctoral scholars and fellows are temporal and unlikely to have a major impact on classroom teaching, mentoring or be substantively involved in departmental affairs and service to the university.”
