The school claims it will double the faculty’s diversity. In about ten years.

Inside Higher Ed reports.

Does Faculty Diversity Need Targets?

Brown University made a bold promise at its inaugural National Diversity Summit last month: to double its proportion of underrepresented minority faculty by 2025. The announcement, to which the faculty was already privy, drew praise on campus and off, but also questions about how Brown would achieve such a goal. It sparked a larger discussion about the best way for institutions to aggressively diversify faculties, too, especially at elite institutions, when candidate pools remain relatively small.

Currently, 9 percent of Brown’s faculty is underrepresented minority (an additional 11 percent is Asian-American). That’s relatively high among Ivy League colleges, but still far below the percentage that would mirror Brown’s proportion of underrepresented minority undergraduates, which is about 20 percent (another 13 percent is Asian-American; Brown also hopes to increase that figure and the overall climate for minority students and faculty as part of a broader strategic plan emphasizing diversity).

So how can Brown enact such change? Liza Cariaga-Lo, vice president for academic development, diversity and inclusion, described in an interview a multipronged approach that relies heavily on “developing the young talent of scholars from diverse backgrounds, to identify individuals who will be competitive for faculty positions here at Brown.”