Mentoring: One Way to Remedy Disadvantages Experienced by Minority Faculty

A recent interview has shed light on how being a part of a minority group can negatively impact faculty and what can be done about it. While assistance for minority students is discussed often in university settings, it is often assumed that faculty are on an equal playing field regardless of race, which is sometimes simply untrue.

Professor Olympia Duhart, J.D. (pictured) is the President of the Society of American Law Teachers and had several important points regarding the current state of minority faculty in large university environments. Minority faculty seem to benefit more than non-minority faculty from mentoring and guidance from other, more established faculty members, regardless of the race of their mentor. Mentorship helps to decrease the isolation and pressure to be more qualified than their non-minority peers that minority faculty often feel, by offering support, guidance, camaraderie, and validation. This relationship, as well as other forms of faculty community, can serve as a buffer to the negative effects of subtle, institutional racism and other forms of prejudice and help all faculty members thrive in their academic community.

The Commission on Diversity and Inclusion at UNF has established a mentoring network for minority faculty called "Noodles and Networking." Check out the list of upcoming events.

Noodles & Networking Event on Being a Proactive Mentee

Being a Proactive Mentee
Presenter: Radha Pyati, Chair/Professor, Chemistry
Monday, October 26, 2015, 3:00-4:15 p.m.,
President's Conference Room, JJ Daniel Hall, Building 1, Room 2800
RSVP to codi@unf.edu

Noodles and Networking: A Minority Faculty Learning Community is a pilot faculty community building initiative for tenure-earning underrepresented and ethnic minority faculty led by tenured minority faculty. The goal of this initiative is to create a network that supports the smooth transition of minority faculty at UNF and serve as an outlet for social, professional and community interactions. The President’s Office and Academic Affairs’ Office of Faculty Enhancement are sponsoring this initiative.

At this Noodles and Networking event, Radha Pyati, Professor and Chair of the Department of Chemistry will address how being a proactive mentee helps faculty get the most out of  mentoring relationships. Come and join the conversation.

Being a Proactive Mentee
Monday, October 26, 2015, 3:00-4:15 p.m.,
President's Conference Room, JJ Daniel Hall, Building 1, Room 2800
Please RSVP to codi@unf.edu, or contact Dedra Harris in the President’s Office at 620-2500

Frankly Fridays Event - Can we talk about race?

Frank Conversation about Faculty Issues

Topic: Can we talk about race?

Friday, March 7^th, 9:30-10:30 AM, Osprey Commons Faculty Lounge (Building 16, 4^th Floor)

Let us know you will be there: ofe@unf.edu

Despite efforts by Higher Education to bring diversity to college campuses, faculty of Color continue to be underrepresented among faculty ranks. A recent post in the Chronicle of Higher Education by an Associate Professor of African-American studies highlights the growing tensions around race bias in higher education and the attitudes of White Americans nationally. Recent research by the Harvard Business School suggests that as perceptions of race bias have decreased, perceptions of anti-White race bias have increased among Whites. Recent conversations among faculty on the UNF campus have highlighted the challenges faculty of Color face in feeling welcomed and supported by the UNF community.  

Come discuss how these issues impact UNF and faculty across the nation.

We will meet in the Faculty Lounge on the 4^th floor of the Osprey Commons.

OFE will provide the coffee and pastries.

Let us know you will be there: ofe@unf.edu

Project Kaleidoscope Funding Available to Increase Diversity in STEM Fields

Project Kaleidoscope (PKAL) is seeking proposals to increase the learning outcomes and retention of students historically underrepresented in the computer/information sciences and related STEM disciplines.

The Teaching to Increase Diversity and Equity in STEM (TIDES) initiative will provide up to $300,000/3years for institutions of higher education to develop and/or redesign evidence-based and culturally competent courses related to the computer/information science disciplines.  Predominantly undergraduate institutions, minority serving institutions and community colleges are strongly encouraged to apply.

A letter of intent is due on January 10, 2014.
Full proposals (not to exceed 10 pages) are due on February 18, 2014.

More information is available at http://www.aacu.org/pkal/tides/index.cfm.
If you have any questions, please, feel free to contact me at any time at pkal@aacu.org.

IARSLCE Research on Community Engagement Conference

Please see the call for proposals below for a conference on community-engagement. 

The International Association for Research on Service-Learning and Community Engagement (IARSLCE) is pleased to announce that proposals are now being accepted for the 2013 conference in Omaha, Nebraska. The conference will take place November 6-8, 2013 and is hosted by the University of Nebraska at Omaha. Conference program co-chairs are Julie Dierberger and Paul Sather.

The theme of this year's conference is Reinvigorating our Process of Discovery: Research Informing Practice in Service-Learning and Community Engagement.

See the call for proposals here: http://www.researchslce.org/conferences/call-for-proposals/  
Proposals may be submitted here from February 25, 2013 to April 12, 2013.

For more information about the 2013 conference, to view the call, or to submit a proposal, please visit www.researchslce.org/conferences.


 For more information, contact:

Tara Luparello

Administrative Director, IARSLCE

Tulane University, Alcee Fortier Hall

6823 St. Charles Avenue

New Orleans, LA 70118

(504) 862-3366

(504) 862-8061 (fax)

tluparel@tulane.edu

www.researchslce.org

Community Partnerships and Health Disparities Conference

See the announcement below from Community Campus Partnerships for Health (CCPH). CCPH is a multidisciplinary organization focused on community health in the broadest sense. The conference below will be of interest to faculty who conduct research on community engagement, social justice, race, community health, and policies that affect local communities.

Applications are due October 12, 2012 for the 2nd National Community Partner Forum on Community-Engaged Health Disparities Research, December 5-7, 2012 in Washington DC. 
Click here for the Call for Applications.


The 2nd National Community Partner Forum seeks to advance community-engaged research as a tool for eliminating health disparities by:
1. Deepening the knowledge and skills needed by community partners to successfully conduct community-engaged research, negotiate community-academic research partnerships and serve in national leadership roles;
2. Disseminating innovative work of community partners that others can learn from and build on;
3. Engaging in constructive dialogue between community partners and key stakeholders in academic, government and philanthropic sectors to foster mutual understanding and supportive action; and
4. Growing and deepening a national network of community partners that facilitates professional development and has a significant voice in decisions about research practice and policy.

Making Tenure and Promotion More Transparent for Underrepresented Faculty

The promotion and tenure process can be a challenge to navigate for many faculty. In a recent article in the American Association of Colleges & Universities (AAC&U) publication "On Campus with Women," Stephanie Luster addresses the need to have greater clarity in the promotion and tenure process, especially for faculty from underrepresented groups. Among the solutions she offers are faculty development seminars and sincere conversations regarding expectations for promotion and tenure. Read the entire article on the publications website.
http://www.aacu.org/ocww/volume41_1/fromwhereisit.cfm?section=1 

International Conference on Diversity

Please see the announcement below regarding an upcoming interdisciplinary conference on diversity. Faculty in the areas of Sociology, Psychology, History, English, Education, Political Science, and other areas may be interested in this conference. The deadline to submit proposals is October 6, 2011.

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON DIVERSITY IN ORGANISATIONS, COMMUNITIES AND NATIONS     

University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada

11-13 June 2012      

http://ondiversity.com/conference-2012/

               

The Diversity Conference has a history of bringing together scholarly, government and practice-based participants with an interest in the issues of diversity and community. The conference examines the concept of diversity as a positive aspect of a global world and globalised society. Diversity is in many ways reflective of our present world order, but there are ways of taking this further without necessary engendering its alternatives: racism, conflict, discrimination and inequity. Diversity as a mode of social existence can be projected in ways that deepen the range of human experience. The conference will seek to explore the full range of what diversity means and explore modes of diversity in real-life situations of living together in community. The conference supports a move away from simple affirmations that 'diversity is good' to a much more nuanced account of the effects and uses of diversity on differently situated communities in the context of our current epoch of globalization.

The International Diversity Conference will take place in Vancouver, a city both with a past marked by racial conflict and a rich heritage of diversity.

As well as impressive line-up of international plenary speakers, the conference will also include numerous paper, workshop and colloquium presentations by practitioners, teachers and researchers. We would particularly like to invite you to respond to the conference Call-for-Papers. Presenters may choose to submit written papers for publication in The International Journal of Diversity in Organizations, Communities and Nations. If you are unable to attend the conference in person, virtual registrations are also available which allow you to submit a paper for refereeing and possible publication.

In addition to organizing the Diversity Conference, Common Ground publishes papers from the conference and we do encourage all conference participants to submit a paper based on their conference presentation for peer review and possible publication in the journal. Whether you are a virtual or in-person presenter at this conference, we also encourage you to present on the conference YouTube Channel. In addition, we publish books at http://www.ondiversity.com in both print and electronic formats. We would like to invite conference participants to develop publishing proposals for original works, or for edited collections of papers drawn from the journal which address an identified theme. Finally, please join our online conversation by subscribing to our monthly email newsletter, and subscribe to our Facebook, RSS, or Twitter feeds at http://www.ondiversity.com .

The deadline for the next round in the call for papers (a title and short abstract) is 6 October 2011. Future deadlines will be announced on the conference website after this date.  Proposals are reviewed within two weeks of submission. Full details of the conference, including an online proposal submission form, are to be found at the conference website - http://ondiversity.com/conference-2012/.

Prof. Jock Collins

University of Technology, Sydney, Australia For the Advisory Board, International Conference on Diversity in Organizations, Communities and Nations and The International Journal of Diversity in Organizations, Communities and Nations

Disrespect in the Academy

In my role as Faculty Enhancement Director, I have had the privilege to speak with many faculty from across disciplines. I have heard many stories of disrespect, from faculty with a variety of ethnic backgrounds, mostly describing students' lack of respect for minority faculty.

In a recent commentary in the Chronicle by John Jackson, Jr., the author suggests that a culture of disrespect predominates the experiences of senior African-American men, typically from their colleagues in the form of disrespect for their scholarly work.

I have not heard such stories at UNF, but perhaps this is because of my position with the ethnic milieu. If you feel comfortable doing so, please use this forum (including options for posting anonymous comments) to express  your experiences of those of others you have heard (with consideration for the sensitive nature of these comments and the desire for many not to have their identity forward in negative examples).