Many colleges and universities across the United States have committed to recruiting more faculty of color. In some cases, they are facing pressure from students to do so. Recent student protests at institutions like the University of Missouri centered around the dearth of faculty of color on campus, among other issues.
Yet, despite intentional efforts on the part of many institutions, they are running up against a stark demographic reality: the mismatch between the numbers of faculty of color and students of color. The disparity between Hispanic faculty and students is particularly stark. As of 2013, Hispanic professors comprised approximately 4 percent of all full-time faculty, up from 2 percent in 2003.
In an effort to cultivate future professors of color, the Penn Center for Minority Serving Institutions (CMSI) will initiate the HSI Pathways to the Professoriate program this summer. HSIs (Hispanic-serving institutions) are colleges and universities that serve a student population that is more than 25 percent Hispanic. At least 435 institutions in the United States are categorized as an HSI.
“I’m constantly telling people — if you want to change things, then you’ve got to go where people are,” Dr. Marybeth Gasman, professor of higher education in the Graduate School of Education at the University of Pennsylvania and CMSI director, told Diverse.
Demographic surveys indicate that the United States is well on its way to becoming a majority-minority country. Amid the demographic shift, Hispanics have emerged as one of the fastest-growing population groups in the United States.
Hispanic students now represent 12 percent of all college students, and according to a recent report from Excelencia in Education, 62 percent of Hispanic students attended an HIS in 2014-15. Excelencia in Education is a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit organization that has been tracking the educational landscape of Hispanic students since 2004.
“When you look at the trends over time, the percent of faculty who are Hispanic hasn’t changed significantly in almost 20 years,” said Deborah Santiago, Excelencia co-founder, COO, and vice president for policy. “This is despite big increases in access and completion at the undergraduate level by Latinos over that same time period.”
