How Do You Define Diversity on Your Campus?

Seattle University created a task force to figure out how to define diversity, how it is part of the SU culture and ways they can expand their programs to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse student population.

Author Nick Gallo wrote a fantastic assessment of the project and it is well worth the full read. Here are some of the highlights:

The task force creation wasn't in reaction to an event or situation, but rather SU taking a proactive approach.

It was born not out of any real crisis but because SU wants to make a meaningful assessment of diversity, a hard-headed evaluation of how it's integrated into daily life at the university, says Robert Kelly, co-chair of the task force and vice president of Student Development. “When some people think about diversity, they stop at the numbers—the racial or ethnic makeup of people—but we're going beyond that to look at how diversity ties into the entire education enterprise,” he says. “There's a feeling we're not doing enough to use our diversity to benefit all students."

The diversity, or lack of diversity, of a campus can impact every aspect of the college.

In a 1993 study of 25,000 undergraduate students at 217 schools, education researcher Alexander Astin concluded that an environment that encourages diversity builds cultural awareness, strengthens commitment to racial understanding and boosts academic development.

Many schools only calculate diversity as numbers game. SU wants to go beyond just numbers but recognizes it's a starting point.

Such a societal imperative brings the topic of diversity back to composition as a starting point: How many black students attend SU? How many faculty members are Hispanic? What's the racial or ethnic profile of the administrative team?

Nationwide, 70 percent of undergrads in private universities and colleges are white, according to U.S. Department of Education statistics from 2005.

SU is also researching the diversity of the staff and administration. The task force's full report is due in December, and so far, SU would say their diversity is flourishing, but their is still more that can be done.

To me it seems obvious that the school that is proactive on the subject is the one that is most diverse. What about all the schools struggling with diversity issues everyday? It would be nice to see SU convert their findings into an action plan for other, less diverse, schools.