(calm music)
- [John] Welcome to another EDUCAUSE,
community conversation.
I'm excited today to be joined by two NASPA professionals.
Alexa Wesley, the director of research
and strategy at NASPA,
and Jill Dunlap, the senior director of policy
and civic engagement.
I'm excited to dig into this report,
moving from words to action,
the influence of racial justice statements
on campus equity efforts.
So this is a deep dive into the racial justice statements
that were made by campuses in 2020.
Really looking at key findings from those statements,
looking at the kinds of follow-up actions
and changes that followed the statements,
let's get started.
So I think this is a really important report,
given the work done literally by all of our associations,
organizations, colleges, and universities,
literally around the world.
What was the inspiration for this research?
- So what we saw was that there was a flurry of public
statements made by college and university presidents
following the murder of George Floyd, and Breonna Taylor,
and Ahmaud Arbery shortly before him.
And while making those statements on racial justice
is not a new practice.
The widespread response that we saw by students and other
communities last year, paired with the backdrop
of a global pandemic disproportionately affecting
black and brown communities,
really seemed to present a new context in which,
to better understand the decision making process behind
making those meaningful statements and ways institutions may
or may not be falling out those commitments with action.
- I thought it was really interesting to see,
especially how higher education specifically responded
to the events of May 2020,
given that institutions have a history of issuing
statements during times of national crisis.
So it's not the first time that institutions
have weighed in on this subject,
but I think it's important to note that this time around,
I think part of what our research found is that
many students, faculty, and staff,
now really see these statements
as the first step in a process, rather than the only thing
that institutions should be doing.
So these stakeholders are saying to campus leadership that
they appreciate that they recognize the problem,
but that they also want campus leaders to recognize
how those institutions are part of the same problem,
especially with regard to systemic racism
and that those campus leaders have the power to address it.
- What would you say are some of the top findings
that you'd highlight most of all from this report?
- Sure.
So I can start by giving a little review
of the methodology for context,
and then I'll turn it over to Jill to dive more into that.
So we first conducted a content analysis of statements
from 230 institutions,
and we took the perspective that there is not necessarily
a perfect formula for how to make a statement,
but that there are certain elements that can make
a statement seem stronger than others.
So we incorporated some of these elements into our analysis
to see how frequently they came up.
And some of those elements included with our statements,
explicitly named George Floyd,
or the issue of institutional racism,
whether they not only express solidarity,
but they also articulated and communicated plans for
actions that the institution was going to take.
So we built upon these findings to inform
a national survey,
that in partnership with
National Association of Diversity Officers, to gather both
Vice-presidents for Student Affairs,
and Chief Diversity Officer's perspectives
about statement making and the timing,
and the range of actions that have been taken.
- And I might just add to the, you know,
part of the findings that we had, we were really careful to,
and this is, I think entirely due to Alexis' insight,
but that we were really careful to ask about
action statements that followed our action efforts that
followed the statements that institutions issued.
But we asked about the timing of them,
because we didn't want to come in and do a survey,
and say, oh, you know, everything that you're working on
with regard to racial justice on your campus
must be as a result
of the murder of George Floyd in May 2020.
Institutions have long been working
on racial justice efforts.
And so we wanted to recognize that some of the things that
we asked about, and the 45 different action items that we
asked institutions to assess,
whether they were tackling or not,
were in response to the incidents and national crisis
that followed the murder of George Floyd in May 2020,
or whether or not they were sort of ongoing.
And then also we realized that, you know,
our survey came out in May of 2021.
A lot of these things may not have been completed yet.
So we wanted to give respondents to the survey
an opportunity to say, yeah, we started this,
but it's not done yet because some of the work
that we're talking about, right?
Is not sort of a one and done kind of thing.
It involves lots of long-term assessment,
and work by multiple stakeholders on campus.
So I think, you know, some of the findings
that we found really interesting were
that most efforts prior to May 2020,
that institutions were involved with,
involved education and training for students,
and faculty, and staff.
New initiatives related to DEI
and hiring additional staff for DEI offices,
were things that were sort of shorter term.
So they happened between May 2020,
so the murder of George Floyd, and the statements
that were issued, and when we did the survey analysis.
And then, you know,
some of the things that the survey respondents indicated
were underway, but not yet completed
where longer-term things like looking at curriculum changes,
increasing the diversity of BIPOC faculty and staff,
as well as campus leaderships.
So some of the things that we asked about were things like
how diverse, you know, or are you trying to diversify
your senior leadership on campus, or your Board of Regents?
In addition to faculty and staff.
And so those are some of the things
that survey respondents indicated were underway,
if not yet complete, by the time they answered the survey.
- For those who want to read the full report,
where can they download it?
- Sure, so they can go to our website at naspa.org
and it should be under publications and resources.