KNOXVILLE Tenn.— The chancellor at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville says there is slow progress diversifying the faculty, which is mostly made up of White men.
In 2005, about 15 percent of tenure-line faculty were nonwhite. That has risen to about 18 percent now. The percent of women faculty has risen from 29 percent to about 31 percent over the same period.
“When students come here to school, they want to see role models like them,” Chancellor Jimmy Cheek said. “So it’s our job to make sure our faculty are more reflective of the people of the state, and that might have more diversity than where they came from.”
Cheek told The Knoxville News Sentinel the issue is partly generational. The professors who have been in Knoxville the longest are mostly White men.
Cheek said he is working to make the university more diverse each year.
He said engineering is a bright spot: Of nine tenure-line faculty added this year, four are women and one is a Black woman.
On Thursday, he met with a search consultant for the vice chancellor of research position, and the two talked about creating a diverse pool of candidates. He also is asking department heads to increase diversity.
