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[acrimone]

There were some thoughtful comments posted in this thread while David D attempted to pull his head out of his a55. I'd be interested in hearing others' thoughts on this topic also.

Is that why he wasn't answering my calls?

[jobhire]

Woops. I meant when acrimone pulled his head out of his crack. My apologies. Back to the original topic.

[prytania3]

Don't mind Acrimone. He's been bitter ever since his family got forced off the plantation.

[case_insensitive]

(That's a good point, infopri, although I find it tiring that minorities feel they need to be around "people like them" to be happy, find love, etc.  While my good friend David Duke would probably disagree, I'm all for the mixing of the races.)

Didn't we fairly recently have a thread about how students tend to self-group with other students who look like them - racially, age, gender, whatever?  Why is it so "tiring" that folks tend to feel most comfortable around folks they perceive to be "like them."  This is not a minority issue, but a human issue.

So... let's get back to the question. How can we attract minority faculty?  In my discipline, it's virtually impossible as there are so few new PhDs who are minorities and there are a vast quantity of available jobs so the competition for every new PhD, minority or not, is ridiculously fierce.  More money doesn't necessarily buy you what you are looking for, either.  And, then, that results in the salary inversion issues that are pretty common in my field.

Do you want to be the first woman hired in an all-male faculty?  Do you want to be the first black person hired in an all-white faculty?  The first male professor of nursing at your school?  Think about it. Most of us academics are more flexible than the average person and don't mind being different, but being the ONLY whatever in a group of other folks that are perceived to be very different, can be exremely stressful.

I happen to be the only female non-admin, FT/TT faculty member in my department.  It doesn't bother me, but I've been out of my PhD for over 15 years and we have a small school here and other nearby depts have females and one dept head is female.  I probably would have thought very differently about this situation when I was a new PhD.

I'm afraid I'm not answering the OP's question with anything very useful.  If a dept or college or university wants to increase diversity in the faculty, they need to make it a wider effort that just one dept or depts working individually.

[case_insensitive]

I was thinking about that thread i mentioned above and it popped to the top!

here it is  http://chronicle.com/forums/index.php/topic,29083.0/topicseen.html

[infopri]

(That's a good point, infopri, although I find it tiring that minorities feel they need to be around "people like them" to be happy, find love, etc.  While my good friend David Duke would probably disagree, I'm all for the mixing of the races.)

Didn't we fairly recently have a thread about how students tend to self-group with other students who look like them - racially, age, gender, whatever?

Yes, it's still ongoing ("classroom self-segregation").   Thanks for the link, case_insensitive.

When it comes to the desire to be with people "like me," I can understand the minority faculty leaving the homogeneous community much more easily than the students who self-segregate in the classroom.  Classes are about learning, and learning about people who are different is part of that (or, depending on the course, an added bonus).  About 40 percent of my graduate school's student body were from other countries (and many were of other races), and I feel highly enriched for having known them.

But for faculty, we're talking about their living situations.  To be the only X-type minority in a town can be isolating, especially if there are prejudicial barriers between that person/family and the majority population.  Even without those barriers, there may be a lack of common experience, and we all need people in our daily lives who share our experiences and understandings of the world and ourselves.  And, of course, it's not enough that these people share our particular brand of minority status.  We must also connect with them as people.  Just because I'm short doesn't mean I feel comfortable or close to all short people.  I'm fortunate to live in a community with lots of short people, so I can pick out the ones with whom I feel some bond.

Then there is the matter of the single people who are ready to settle down, find a partner, perhaps start a family.  Acrimone, I'm with you on the mixing of the races (assuming this is what you meant by "mixing"), as well as religions, nationalities, and heights, but not everyone feels that way.  Some people fear that the "others" might not share their values.  Some want to please their parents.  Some may want children who look like them.  Whatever their reasons for not wanting to mix it up, they are going to have to leave the small homogeneous majority community to find what they're looking for.

[kaysixteen]

The 'associate professor squeeze' referred to above is bad and problematic enough when it comes to just any new assistant being paid more than the vets-- this is not normal in most fields, and the associates have due cause to complain.  If a newbie, OTOH, is being paid a big bucks salary to show up just owing to the color of his skin or his ethnic credentials (i.e., that's why he was hired, in a specific 'minority' faculty recruitment campaign), then he probably isn't even the best possible candidate for the assistant professor position in the first place, and paying him grandiose compensation will only add to the justified senior faculty resentment at his presence.  Put simply-- hiring people on the basis of race is, well, 'racist'.

[drsyn]

The 'associate professor squeeze' referred to above is bad and problematic enough when it comes to just any new assistant being paid more than the vets-- this is not normal in most fields, and the associates have due cause to complain.  If a newbie, OTOH, is being paid a big bucks salary to show up just owing to the color of his skin or his ethnic credentials (i.e., that's why he was hired, in a specific 'minority' faculty recruitment campaign), then he probably isn't even the best possible candidate for the assistant professor position in the first place, and paying him grandiose compensation will only add to the justified senior faculty resentment at his presence.  Put simply-- hiring people on the basis of race is, well, 'racist'.

So how did we end up with all these white male faculties?

[case_insensitive]

The 'associate professor squeeze' referred to above is bad and problematic enough when it comes to just any new assistant being paid more than the vets-- this is not normal in most fields, and the associates have due cause to complain. 

Probably not normal in most fields, but normal in mine and in related fields (we are taking about supply and demand here, folks, some fields do not have enough PhDs coming out of school - think about that before you get your PhD in a field that can't guarantee you'll ever have a TT job - ok, i'll get off that dead horse and move on). 

Not only normal, but probably nearly universal in my field and up to a dozen related fields.  If you want to make as much as a new PhD (assuming you aren't a superstar already and make more than the new PhDs) in his/her first assistant professor position, then you move. Of course, you have to be publishing regularly to move to a nice place, but you don't have to be a superstar. It's as simple as that.

New PhDs in my field last year got $120k (even at non-RIs and such) and up and I guarantee that most associate profs and full profs in this field in most schools aren't making anywhere near that.

[infopri]

New PhDs in my field last year got $120k (even at non-RIs and such) and up and I guarantee that most associate profs and full profs in this field in most schools aren't making anywhere near that.

Is it too late for me to do another Ph.D.??

[larryc]

Jobhire, it was you who started the personal attacks and derailed this thread.  Also, as Acrimone is a person of color, it is highly unlikely that he has David Duke on speed dial.  People can disagree with you and not be racist.

To the OP--yes paying any new person more is likely to cause some resentment.  However, it happens at most campuses for reasons having nothing to do with race.  In fact the phenomena of new faculty getting more money than their seniors is so common it has a name, "leap frogging." Some of your faculty will b*tch and moan but those people would find something to complain about anyway.  Most will realize that life isn't fair and be grown ups about it.

[acrimone]

Jobhire, it was you who started the personal attacks and derailed this thread.  Also, as Acrimone is a person of color, it is highly unlikely that he has David Duke on speed dial.  People can disagree with you and not be racist.

Why ya gots ta go and spoil all my fun?  Now jobhire's not going to be allowed to attack me!

[menotti]

Also, as Acrimone is a person of color...

Or a college sophomore.

[infopri]

Why ya gots ta go and spoil all my fun?  Now jobhire's not going to be allowed to attack me!

I'll allow jobhire to attack you, acrimone.  It's worth it just to see your entertaining responses!  :)

[jobhire]

Well since I'm ok with attacking acrimone, and since acrimone is ok with it too, I think Larryc is the odd man out.

On a serious note, I really do think that an earlier poster who stated that an institution wide movement is the positive step to take. of course, this involves mobilizing the faculty masses and this inevitably leads to a vocal few who absolutely will not have it. This tends to lead to a political stalemate and inaction.

These are conservative times, so any debate on this issue at all is actually quite welcome. I'm not really of the mind to say, however: it's a difficult situation, so let's forget about it. I say instead: the greater the adversity, the more frustrated you get. The more frustrated you get, the greater your desire to act in order to produce change. The opposite of acrimone's conclusion. You either grow or die. You choose.