Bridging the Divide: The Uphill Climb to Faculty Diversity
April 14, 2015 by Ricardo Azziz, MD, MPH, MBA
Last fall, for the first time in our history, America’s public school students were likely NOT majority white. If U.S. Department of Education projections are accurate, white students numbered 24.8 million and non-white students 25 million.
So the college student pipeline is now majority nonwhite.
In an earlier blog post, I explored some of the ramifications to higher education of our changing student body. Today, I’d like to discuss the faculty side of the equation.
Full-time college faculty, in contrast to students, were nearly 80 percent white in 2011, the latest data available. Full-time professors were even more homogeneous at 84 percent white.
So the college faculty pipeline is overwhelmingly white.
Ricardo Azziz, MD, MPH, MBA
A educator-scientist-executive with over 20 years of leadership experience in higher education, research, and healthcare, Dr. Azziz currently serves as Regents’ Professor, Augusta University; Senior Fellow, American Association of State Colleges & Universities; Visiting Scholar, Pullias Center for Higher Education, University of Southern California; and former founding CEO, Georgia Regents Health System.