Critics Challenge Diversity Language in Virginia Tech's Tenure Policy

The Chronicle of Higher Education
By ROBIN WILSON
Thursday, March 26, 2009

Virginia Tech has come under criticism from some outside groups for a set of new guidelines that, the critics say, appear to require faculty members to show a commitment to diversity as part of their bids for tenure and promotion.
The critics, including the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, say the guidelines establish a “loyalty oath” that violates professors’ academic freedom.
The guidelines at issue govern faculty members in the university’s College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences. They say that a promotion and tenure committee “expects all dossiers to demonstrate the candidate’s active involvement in diversity.”
But the university’s provost, Mark G. McNamee, says not only is the language on diversity not really new, it is also merely intended to encourage faculty members to pursue activities related to diversity, not to require it.

Full Story: http://chronicle.com/daily/2009/03/14550n.htm?utm_source=at&utm_medium=en

Virginia Tech to Increase Investment in Diversity

From Diverse Online
Current News
Virginia Tech to Increase Investment in Diversity
By Associated Press
Sep 2, 2008, 00:16
BLACKSBURG, Va.

Virginia Tech plans to invest nearly $1 million over the next five years to increase ethnic diversity on campus.
A report said the school will spend $899,000 to implement task force recommendations that call for additional faculty, greater minority student recruitment efforts, outreach programs and curriculum changes.
Last fall, Virginia Tech's Black student enrollment was 4.6 percent, third-lowest among the state's 15 four-year public universities, according to the State Council of Higher Education. Hispanic enrollment ranked in the bottom half.
Tech Provost Mark McNamee formed the task force in the summer of 2006, in response to protests over the announced departure of Black political science professor Christopher Clement, who received a negative review in his tenure process.
The task force's action plan calls for ``cluster hires'' in the 2009-10 and 2010-11 academic years to bolster the complement of minority professors and provide mentors to faculty already at the schools.
Six would be hired next year, four of them senior positions in Africana studies and race and social policy.
Overall enrollment of Blacks at Virginia Tech has declined since 2003, when the board of visitors voted to end affirmative action in hiring and student enrollment. The board quickly reversed the decision, but Black freshmen enrollment plummeted and has been slow to recover. [To read the entire story, go to: http://diverseeducation.com/artman/publish/article_11626.shtml ]