There has been quite a bit of discussion about the University’s diversity-related expenditures lately. The logic, principle and effectiveness of spending money to support faculty, staff and students of color have been increasingly challenged, and there is every reason to believe that they will continue to be challenged, despite the Provost’s statement that “diversity funding represents less than 1 percent of the general budget” (“Professor’s alternative diversity plan merits look,” ODE May 8). Because my decision to accept a position at the University of Texas has been invoked as evidence that spending aimed at the recruitment and retention of minority faculty is ineffectual, I would like to take this opportunity to address the continued critical need for the Underrepresented Minority Recruitment Plan (UMRP).
The UMRP certainly has some recruitment value. Providing a substantial research package is one way Oregon can compete with other universities to attract highly sought-after scholars of color. But the UMRP also has a significant retention value. By retention value, I do not solely mean as a monetary incentive for faculty of color who may be vulnerable to recruitment by other universities. I also mean retention value in the sense that the UMRP provides support for faculty of color in their efforts to attain tenure and promotion to associate professor and promotion to full professor. One of the consequences of the lack of “critical mass” of faculty of color is that the few of us here have an inordinate service burden placed upon us – such as serving on multiple search committees, selection committees and program committees as junior faculty; mentoring students of color and participating in recruitment efforts aimed at increasing the number of students of color on campus; and contributing in various ways to our respective communities.
Junior faculty of color (and the few senior faculty of color on campus) are routinely tapped to serve on committees. This is particularly the case when departments or programs conduct searches in the area of race and ethnicity. Because many of the scholars of color have research interests in these areas, we are frequently asked to participate in searches (either as members of committees or as consultants).
Shari Huhndorf, associate professor of English, for instance, served on seven search committees in her first six years on campus. Compare this to white faculty, who are often protected from this kind of service until they have at least gone through their third-year review. Because of the dearth of senior faculty of color, junior faculty of color are also asked to undertake even more long-term administrative responsibilities. Huhndorf was asked to take over as Director of the Ethnic Studies Program in her fifth year as an assistant professor. Similarly, I was asked to take over the directorship after only three years here – one year before I came up for tenure. Granted, the administration may have considered Huhndorf and me appropriate choices given the progress that we had made on our first books; however, the administration is often reluctant to appoint white associate professors as heads of departments, including smaller programs comparable to Ethnic Studies, unless they have made substantial progress on their second book. I realize that there are some junior faculty of color who do not take on many service responsibilities and that there are white junior faculty who do. Some may argue that we do not have the quantitative data to support the assertion that service falls disproportionately on junior faculty of color. Well then, let the University conduct a comprehensive survey and analysis of faculty service. I am sure that my claim will bear itself out.
I also realize that this bureaucratic minutia may be meaningless to many readers so let me try to cut to the chase. The upshot is that junior faculty of color are not afforded the kind of protection that our white counterparts are. I am certainly not suggesting that junior faculty of color are intentionally left hanging out to dry. The administration has as an equal investment in the promotion and tenure of all faculty members. The disproportionate service is really more a function of the lack of senior faculty of color.
Protection from service is needed to advance our research agenda so that we can go forward with a strong tenure case in our sixth year and, subsequently, come up for promotion to full within a reasonable time frame. The UMRP is critical because it allows us to occasionally buy ourselves out of a class for a quarter so that we can work on our scholarship. Or it provides us a summer stipend so that we can opt not to teach summer school and, instead, devote the time to our research. Without the UMRP, faculty of color would have a much more difficult time juggling research, teaching, and higher than normal service loads.
But while the UMRP is necessary, it is not sufficient. I am leaving for the University of Texas after committing six years to this institution, not because Texas has offered me more money. The University of Oregon’s counter-offer was, in fact, competitive in terms of salary. I decided to take Texas’ offer because it has made diversity and the development and maintenance of “critical mass” of faculty of color an institutional priority. I am heading to a university that has a Center for African and African American Studies, a Center for
Mexican American Studies, a Center for Asian American Studies, a Center for Women’s and Gender Studies and a host of other area studies. I have an opportunity to further my development as an academic because of the kinds of intellectual conversations that I will have with dozens of scholars who share my broad, and particular, research interests. This is undoubtedly what animates the decisions of other faculty of color who have left, or will be leaving, for (or are currently being recruited by) institutions such as Brown, Columbia, New York University, Swarthmore College, and University of California, San Diego.
So while Professor Harbaugh’s recommendation that we address the “pipeline” issue is laudable, it must not be in lieu of the current efforts to recruit and retain scholars of color. The University must make a commitment to doing both. To do anything otherwise will perpetuate the revolving door effect.
Martin Summers is an associate professor of history and the director of the Ethnic Studies Program at the University