Exploring Best Practices in Building and Retaining a Diverse Faculty

Higher education leaders say the pandemic has changed how institutions handle faculty recruitment. Zoom interviews or other virtual connections have become commonplace. The desire to build more diverse faculties has grown over the past two-and-a-half years as colleges and universities have come to understand the need to connect with students who have felt disconnected and to bring more complex and inclusive thought to higher education.

Dr. Lisa Hanasono“To successfully build greater faculty diversity, I recommend proactively creating a critical mass of minoritized scholars and cultivating broader communities of care,” says Dr. Lisa Hanasono, director of training and content at the National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity (NCFDD), a provider of professional development in higher education.

“From mentoring and campuswide affinity groups to faculty development training with pathway programs and equitable workload policies, colleges and universities can explore how they are creating and sustaining cultures and climates that attract and support the success of minoritized faculty,” Hanasono says.

Recruitment strategies

“Institutions might consider how they are proactively recruiting job candidates,” says Hanasono. “Colleges and universities can create job ads that go beyond basic templated language. Instead of simply informing the public about a job opening, we can transform a job ad into a strategic recruitment tool that aims to persuade candidates to apply.”

St. Francis College in Brooklyn, New York, has recently moved to a new campus. Dr. Jennifer Lancaster, vice president for academic affairs and academic dean, says transforming the campus involves more than just the new location and cutting edge technology.