Becoming A Diversity Leader On Campus

Illuminating the emerging importance of the diversity leader on college campuses, this book offers perspectives and narratives from diversity leaders at institutions of higher education. Becoming a Diversity Leader on Campus unpacks the tension of how diversity leadership is shaped by external factors and pressures that confront colleges and universities, as well as by the unique experiences and identities of the individuals appointed to diversity leadership positions. This book offers a better understanding of how diversity leaders make meaning and sense of their roles, desire, and passion for promoting diversity within their institutions. Chapter authors offer narratives that represent their realities regarding the concept of diversity leadership, how they came to be in their roles, and how diversity leaders do diversity work. This important resource provides practical strategies and guides faculty and higher education professionals in navigating the situational, contextual, and relational constructs within the social and cultural contexts of college and university campuses.

Illuminating the emerging importance of the diversity leader on college campuses, this book offers perspectives and narratives from diversity leaders at institutions of higher education. Becoming a Diversity Leader on Campus unpacks the tension of how diversity leadership is shaped by external factors and pressures that confront colleges and universities, as well as by the unique experiences and identities of the individuals appointed to diversity leadership positions. This book offers a better understanding of how diversity leaders make meaning and sense of their roles, desire, and passion for promoting diversity within their institutions. Chapter authors offer narratives that represent their realities regarding the concept of diversity leadership, how they came to be in their roles, and how diversity leaders do diversity work. This important resource provides practical strategies and guides faculty and higher education professionals in navigating the situational, contextual, and relational constructs within the social and cultural contexts of college and university campuses.

This volume addresses the role of chief diversity officers as coordinating and integrating diversity leaders in higher education and other sectors.Having established in a companion volume the parameters for an effective diversity strategy, the authors address such questions as: What is a chief diversity officer? How might we create dynamic chief diversity officer infrastructures? What models of CDO structure exist in the academy? What misperceptions often confound the work of officers and the institutions they work within? What key competencies are necessary to lead as a CDO? How does the CDO role compare across higher education, non-profit, and corporate sectors? And how might the role serve as an important contributor to a collaborative vision for change and transformation in the academy?This book begins by delineating the evolution of the chief diversity officer role in the academy. Drawing on extensive qualitative and quantitative research on CDOs conducted for the purposes of this volume, it describes how the scope and responsibilities are variously defined at the organizations where the position has been created, and offers insights into the complexities and challenges of the role.On the basis of this data and the literature on organizational design and change management, the authors define the requisite skills, knowledge and background to be effective, review the alternative organizational and governance structures under which CDOs operate, and in so doing present the Chief Diversity Officer Development Framework as a basis for recruiting candidates, for structuring the position to succeed, and for providing prospective and incumbent CDOs with a realistic sense of the scope of the role.This title is also available in a set with its companion volume, Strategic Diversity Leadership.

In today’s world – whether viewed through a lens of educational attainment, economic development, global competitiveness, leadership capacity, or social justice and equity – diversity is not just the right thing to do, it is the only thing to do! Following the era of civil rights in the 1960s and ‘70s, the 1990s and early 21st century have seen both retrenchment and backlash years, but also a growing recognition, particularly in business and the military, that we have to educate and develop the capacities of our citizens from all levels of society and all demographic and social groups to live fulfilling lives in an inter-connected globe.For higher education that means not only increasing the numbers of diverse students, faculty, and staff, but simultaneously pursuing excellence in student learning and development, as well as through research and scholarship – in other words pursuing what this book defines as strategic diversity leadership. The aim is to create systems that enable every student, faculty, and staff member to thrive and achieve to maximum potential within a diversity framework. This book is written from the perspective that diversity work is best approached as an intellectual endeavor with a pragmatic focus on achieving results that takes an evidence-based approach to operationalizing diversity. It offers an overarching conceptual framework for pursuing diversity in a national and international context; delineates and describes the competencies, knowledge and skills needed to take effective leadership in matters of diversity; offers new data about related practices in higher education; and presents and evaluates a range of strategies, organizational structures and models drawn from institutions of all types and sizes. It covers such issues as the reorganization of the existing diversity infrastructure, building accountability systems, assessing the diversity process, and addressing legal threats to implementation. Its purpose is to help strategic diversity leaders combine big-picture thinking with an on-the-ground understanding of organizational reality and work strategically with key stakeholders and allies. This book is intended for presidents, provosts, chief diversity officers or diversity professionals, and anyone who wants to champion diversity and embed its objectives on his or her campus, whether at the level of senior administration, as members of campus organizations or committees, or as faculty, student affairs professionals or students taking a leadership role in making and studying the process of change.This title is also available in a set with its companion volume, The Chief Diversity Officer.

Although leadership theories have evolved to reflect changing social contexts, many remain silent on issues of equity, diversity, and social justice. Diversity and Leadership, by Jean Lau Chin and Joseph E. Trimble, offers a new paradigm for examining leadership by bringing together two domains—research on leadership and research on diversity—to challenge existing notions of leadership and move toward a diverse and global view of society and its institutions. This compelling book delivers an approach to leadership that is inclusive, promotes access for diverse leaders, and addresses barriers that narrowly confine our perceptions and expectations of leaders. Redefining leadership as global and diverse, the authors impart new understanding of who our leaders are, the process of communication, exchange between leaders and their members, criteria for selecting, training, and evaluating leaders in the 21st century, and the organizational and societal contexts in which leadership is exercised.

Leading a Diversity Culture Shift in Higher Education offers a practical and timely guide for launching, implementing, and institutionalizing diversity organizational learning. The authors draw from extensive interviews with chief diversity officers and college and university leaders to reveal the prevailing models and best practices for strengthening diversity practices within the higher education community today. They complement this original research with an analysis of key contextual factors that shape the organizational learning process including administrative leadership, institutional mission and goals, historical legacy, geographic location, and campus structures and politics. Given the substantive challenge of engendering a cultural shift for diversity in a university setting, this book will serve as a concrete primer for institutions seeking to develop a systematic and progressive approach to diversity organizational learning. Readers will be able to engage with provocative case studies that grapple with the current pressures emanating from diversity training and learn effective strategies for creating more inclusive environments. This book is a perfect resource for institutional leaders, administrators, faculty members, and key campus constituencies who are seeking transformational change, institutional success, and stability in a rapidly diversifying national and global environment.

All too often, in a hurried attempt to “catch up,” diversity training can create division among staff or place undue burdens on a handful of employees. Instead, academic libraries need approaches to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) that position these priorities as ongoing institutional and professional goals. This book’s model programs will help academic libraries do exactly that, sharing a variety of initiatives that possess clear goals, demonstrable outcomes, and reproducible strategies. Librarians, administrators, and directors will all benefit from the programs detailed inside, which include such topics as a university library’s community of practice for interactions and learning around DEI; cultural competency training to create more welcoming instruction spaces; student workshops on literature searches that mitigate bias; overcoming the historic tendency to marginalize LGBTQ+ representation in archives; a curriculum and design workshop that moved from discussing social values to embedding them in actions; the founding of a library-led LGBT club for students at a rural community college; a liberal arts college’s retention-boosting program for first-generation students; tailoring a collection and library services to the unique needs of student veterans; and a framework for moving from diversity to equity and inclusion, toward a goal of social justice.