Drivers that Motivate Faith-Based Institutions to Seek Change in the Area of Diversity by Joel Perez
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Drivers that Motivate Faith-Based Institutions to Seek Change in the Area of Diversity by Joel Perez
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All four institutions demonstrated some level of progress in the area of diversity within all four of the dimensions, as noted by the researcher prior to the campus visits. This progress was the reason these institutions were chosen for this study. This study was undertaken to discover what drives these four Christian colleges that appear to be making progress. The findings indicate that one of these drivers was the institutional belief that trying to make change in the area of diversity was a biblical mandate. Although these institutions believed they had a biblical mandate to become more diverse, none of the schools had a formal theology. This is something that is essential to making progress. Schools should start their efforts by analyzing their mission to evaluate whether they are truly committed to making progress and officially stating the theology behind these efforts. This coincides with Smith’s (2009) conclusions in Diversity’s Promise for Higher Education: Making it Work. If the institution is not going to start with these efforts, it should abandon them, for if they do not see it as part of their mission, their efforts will be moderately successful at best.
In addition to starting with mission to sustain diversity efforts, institutions need to add to the diversity of their employees and trustees. Not only is this important in sustaining efforts, it also will assist institutions in achieving their educational outcomes. Having faculty from ethnic minority groups will add to the educational experience of students from ethnic minority groups as well as white students. The only institution that has made significant strides in this area is Unity College. In the case of trustees, Inclusive University and Peace College have been effective in diversifying their boards. This diversification is seen as vital to sustaining efforts.
Even if an institution starts with mission and diversifies its employees and trustees, efforts cannot be sustained unless it is monitoring progress and coordinating efforts. All four institutions were not doing these things effectively. At best, each institution was just using enrollment data to monitor progress. No other data was being gathered and evaluated to determine where the gaps existed and potential strategies to decrease the gaps. In regards to coordinating efforts, all institutions were using a committee approach, which was not very successful for any of these institutions. Additionally, none of the institutions was using a framework to guide efforts. The only institution that was in the process of appointing a chief diversity officer position in order to coordinate efforts was Intercultural University.
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