Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences will stop requiring a diversity, inclusion and belonging statement as part of its faculty recruitment process, Dean of Faculty Affairs and Planning Nina announced Zipser, in an email Monday morning.
Zipser wrote that she and FAS Dean Hopi E. Hoekstra “made this change in response to comments from many faculty members” who expressed concern that the existing requirements were “too narrow in information they were trying to collect” and potentially confusing for international applicants.
Instead, FAS – the University’s largest faculty – will require an applicant’s service statement on the applicant’s “efforts to strengthen academic communities” and a teaching and advising statement on how the candidate will foster a “learning environment in which students are encouraged to ask questions and share their ideas.” »
While the FAS previously required all applicants to submit a statement describing their “efforts to encourage diversity, inclusion, and belonging, including past, current, and anticipated future contributions in these areas,” the two new statements do not will only be required of candidates who are finalists in the search process.
The updated requirements apply to the FAS’s internal promotion and evaluation procedures as well as external recruitment. Although applicants for certain promotions were previously asked to describe their contributions to diversity, inclusion, and belonging in “service/citizenship” statements, the manual’s new language on service statements no longer requires for candidates to discuss diversity efforts.
Harvard’s decision comes as universities face growing internal and external pressure to abandon diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. MIT announced a similar move last month, saying it would stop requiring diversity disclosures for positions within the university.
Criticism of DEI efforts at Harvard came to a head when former Harvard President Claudine Gay resigned in January following backlash over her handling of anti-Semitism on campus and allegations of plagiarism in his academic work.
Many right-wing political leaders and activists who led the campaign to oust Gay, including former Harvard donor Bill A. Ackman ’88 and Rep. Elise M. Stefanik ’06 (R-N.Y.), have transformed their critiques towards Gay’s leadership in the attacks against the DEI.
These criticisms were part of a political backlash against DEI – and against diversity statements in particular. Since 2023, at least nine states have passed laws limiting colleges’ use of diversity statements in recruiting and promotion, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education’s tracker.
But the push to get rid of diversity statements hasn’t been limited to Gay’s right-wing critics or Republican-controlled state legislatures. In recent months, a number of Harvard professors have urged the university to stop using these statements.
Critics have argued that DIB statements force potential faculty members to declare their support for an institutional point of view instead of sparking real thought.
Psychology professor Steven A. Pinker, co-chair of the Council on Academic Freedom at Harvard, criticized the diversity statements in a December 2023 Boston Globe opinion piece, arguing that they “purge the next generation of academics of anyone who is not a woke ideologue or a skilled liar.
In April, CAFH devoted an article from its regular column published in The Crimson – which presents conflicting views on controversial topics – to the subject. Randall L. Kennedy, a professor at Harvard Law School, spoke against the diversity statements, while philosophy professor Edward J. “Ned” Hall – co-president of CAFH – wrote in favor.
Hall defended the diversity statements as a way to understand how job candidates would educate classes of diverse students. But he criticized institutions’ expectations that applicants declare their commitment to “equity-based teaching” as a “horribly distorted view” of what such statements should contain.
In her email, Zipser wrote that she and Hoekstra made the changes in consultation with the Academic Planning Group, an advisory body made up of FAS’s most powerful deans. Zipser and Hoekstra also discussed the changes with FAS diversity officers and solicited feedback from two FAS committees: the Appointments and Promotions Committee and the new Classroom Social Compact Committee.
Although language from DIB statements was removed from the Appointment and Promotion Manual, Zipser presented the changes as a way to balance the facilitation of diversity and inclusion with other priorities.
“This broader perspective recognizes the many ways faculty contribute to strengthening their academic communities, including efforts to increase diversity, inclusion, and belonging,” she wrote.
—Editor Tilly R. Robinson can be reached at tilly.robinson@thecrimson.com. Follow her on @tillyrobin.
—Editor Neil H. Shah can be reached at neil.shah@thecrimson.com. Follow him on @neilhshah15.
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