Actualizing Equity in Faculty Searches and Hiring

Dr. Damani White-Lewis

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF HIGHER EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA

What matters in faculty hiring? In this FAN Institute prologue on advancing campus diversity through faculty searches and hiring, we meet Dr. Damani White-Lewis (U. Pennsylvania), whose rigorous mixed-methods research is helping the academy better understand the determinants of faculty hiring. Prof. White-Lewis has detailed the ways faculty search committees preserve the status quo and the ways they can be more equitable. For faculty leaders seeking to overcome the real and perceived obstacles to diversity, Prof. White-Lewis talks about focusing on the people, the interventions, and the contexts that shape the professoriate.

This is a production of the Ivy+ Faculty Advancement Network, with technical expertise provided by eCornell.

Discourse Guide

BEFORE THE MEETING

First, make a list of several equity-minded or de-biasing tools or interventions you have used or have considered in faculty searches and hiring. For ideas, see Prof. White-Lewis’ publications below and resources from your own faculty development office.

Next, take out a blank sheet of paper and draw an intersecting “X” and “Y” axis (like the “+” symbol). Label the X and Y axes as follows:

• The X axis represents the type of solution or best practice, ranging from (at the left) highly tangible (e.g., using a rubric, reading a diversity statement) to (at the right) highly intangible (e.g., creating and sustaining committee norms that support all search committee members’ agency during deliberations). 

• The Y axis represents the scale of the solution, ranging from (at the top) “pie in the sky” requiring lots of stakeholders and effort, to (at the bottom) "low hanging fruit," that is, the most accessible and immediately implementable.

Plot items from your list onto your chart. Consider, for example:

1. “Acknowledging and addressing systemic disadvantage during candidate review”

2. “System-level collaborations to create and sustain postdoctoral pathway partnerships between institutions.”

Both require efforts beyond what one person acting in a single search can sustain (intangible), but would in fact vary in the scope of personnel required to make the change. As for scope, although responding to larger societal inequities, the first is primarily located at the committee level, whereas the second absolutely requires concerted effort from multiple universities (high-hanging fruit).

The point of this exercise is to think creatively and expansively about the terrain of possibilities in faculty hiring, so we can engage each other in active discussion about how possible some solutions are--and then why and where those possibilities exist.

In completing your personal map, please keep the following in mind: 

1. Think systemically. Imagine each idea you plot as a “gear.” What are the gears to the left and right of that idea (e.g., personnel, meetings, resources, timing, admissions standards, etc.) that help that initial gear function successfully? If something is "pie in the sky", what is needed to support it, either at your current institution, between institutions, or more largely within higher education? If something is considered "low-hanging fruit", why hasn’t it happened yet? Is it not as low as some would suggest, or is there a latent dimension (e.g., the X and Y axes) or gear (e.g., the above supports) we are not currently considering? 

2. Be creative. Think of the biggest big idea you can imagine. Think of something “hyper micro” that may feel incremental but can be scaled. Is this something that occurs “in the everyday?” Is it norm-setting, preparing the conditions for better faculty searches over time? Are your ideas introduced one time before, during, or after the search? Or, ideally, somewhere in between? In all cases, remember #1 -- to think systemically -- about what needs to happen around this idea to make it work. 

3. Don’t Know? If you have a really cool idea but don’t know where to locate it, write the idea off to the side and bring it to the discussion. The fact that you couldn’t locate a home for your idea may make it interesting for discussion. Or perhaps somebody else had a similar idea and they were able to place it. You will discuss these ideas as well. 

Once you create your map, save it somewhere and bring it to discuss with colleagues.

AT THE MEETING

Share your struggles, your revelations, or a snapshot of your map. During the conversation as you talk about practices and solutions, try mapping everyone’s points onto an aggregate visual display (e.g., on a whiteboard), so together you can discuss the range of solutions in hiring faculty. You will discuss (and possibly debate!) where practices and solutions exist on the coordinate plane. For example:

1. Look first for consensus. Which tools are generally viewed as low-hanging fruit that you could work toward implementing this year? Which may require more sustained and prolonged work? Why?

2. Then look for dissensus. Where do people vary widely on their impressions of what is tangible vs. intangible, or low-hanging vs. pie-in-the-sky? What can those who see something as “do-able” teach those who see it as a big undertaking?
   

ALTERNATIVE DIALOGUES

1. Read The Role of Administrative and Academic Leadership in Advancing Faculty Diversity and reflect: what's your prevailing theory of change — are you an incrementalist, a pragmatist, or a progressive? How does your frame impact the faculty hiring process in your unit? Next, use this worksheet to map the leadership terrain in your own department/unit.

2. List, for each stage of the faculty hiring process in your department, ways that you in your current position can directly or indirectly/abstractly impact the process. What are those areas of opportunity where you might have influence? For each area of opportunity you note, mark whether it's one where you have felt comfortable or uncomfortable showing up and influencing. Finally, for those areas where you feel most uncomfortable, write down how you might show up differently, based on what you took away from the reading.

for further inquiry:

• White-Lewis, D.K., O’Meara, K., Wessel, J. et al. Making the Band: Constructing Competitiveness in Faculty Hiring Decisions. Res High Educ 65, 1137–1162 (2024). [LINK]

• White-Lewis, D., Culpepper, D. K., O’Meara, K., Templeton, L., & Anderson, J. (2024). One Foot Out the Door: Interrogating the Risky Hire Narrative in STEM Faculty Careers. Journal of Women and Minorities in Science and Engineering, 30(3). [LINK]

• O’Meara, K., Templeton, L. L., White-Lewis, D. K., Culpepper, D., & Anderson, J. (2023). The Safest Bet: Identifying and Assessing Risk in Faculty Selection. American Educational Research Journal, First published online February 1, 2023. [PDF]

• Culpepper, D., White-Lewis, D. K., O’Meara, K., Templeton, L. L. & Anderson, J. (2023). Do Rubrics Live up to Their Promise? Examining How Rubrics Mitigate Bias in Faculty Hiring, The Journal of Higher Education. [PDF]

• White-Lewis, D. K. (2022). The Role of Administrative and Academic Leadership in Advancing Faculty Diversity. The Review of Higher Education, 45(3), 337–364. [LINK}

• White-Lewis, D. (2021). Before the ad: How departments generate hiring priorities that support or avert faculty diversity. Teachers College Record, 123(1). [PDF] [Video]

• White-Lewis, D. (2020). The facade of fit in faculty search processes. The Journal of Higher Education, 91(6), 833-857. [PDF]

• Fries-Britt, S., & White-Lewis, D. (2020). In pursuit of meaningful relationships: How Black males perceive faculty interactions in STEM. The Urban Review, 52(3), 521-540. [PDF]

• O’Meara, K., Fink, J., White-Lewis, D. (2017). Who’s looking? Examining the role of gender and rank in faculty outside offers. NASPA Journal about Women in Higher Education, 10(1), 64-79. [PDF]

• Liera R., Ching C. (2019). Reconceptualizing “merit” and “fit”: An equity-minded approach to hiring. In Kezar A., Posselt J. (Eds.), Administration for social justice and equity in higher education: Critical perspectives for leadership and decision-making. New York, NY: Routledge. [LINK]