Diversity Planning

Diversity Planning & Institutional Initiatives at Kent State University

In 1991, Kent State University began to lay a strong foundation for the first high-profile, university-wide diversity agenda. The agenda started with a series of institution-wide dialogues on diversity issues, followed by a cultural self-study, which culminated in the development of a Strategic Diversity Plan from 2000 to 2005. The plan outlined seven objectives that have guided the university diversity initiatives since 2000:

Develop a shared and inclusive understanding of diversity;
Create a welcoming campus climate for all individuals;
Recruit, retain and promote greater numbers of women and minorities into faculty, staff and administrative positions (including deans, chairs and vice presidents);
Recruit and retain a greater number of ethnic minority students and promote international understanding;
Provide incentives to academic and administrative support units for developing models of excellence for increasing diversity;
Collect and organize data in order to systematically and effectively assess progress and to align/realign programs intended to enhance diversity; and
Coordinate organizational change to achieve the progress envisioned in this plan.

Through the implementation of this plan and our collective resolve to social justice, democratic values and educational excellence, we imagine an institution that reflects the beautiful mosaic of humanity.

Institutional Diversity Initiatives

Institutional Leadership and Commitment
Vision, commitment and leadership (by example) are essential for systemic change at Kent State University. Diversity and democracy challenge us to move beyond our individual and institutional comfort zones of assimilation (cognitive, affective and behavioral) to engage, understand and respect differences and similarities among people and cultures. An inclusive institutional vision encourages a nurturing and challenging intellectual and social climate for all members of the campus community.
Faculty and Staff Involvement
Examples of faculty or staff involvement include opportunities designed to support faculty or staff in the areas of pedagogical change, curriculum transformation, sexual harassment, anti-racism, and anti-homophobia.
Curriculum Transformation
Campuses are changing their curricula to address issues of diversity. This initiative focuses on American Pluralism "across-the-curriculum", special studies programs on designated communal traditions, new interdisciplinary programs, traditional disciplinary majors that have systematically addressed diversity in their course offerings or requirements, with additional focus on diversity requirements, credit-bearing service learning programs, and special institutes.
Student Development and Experience
Student experience and development is a priority focusing on students as a diverse group at the center of the classroom, the campus, and the community. These are activities designed to address residential life, programs to work on inter- and intra-group relations on campus and programs designed to attend to students' transitions among their own communities and within the campus community.
Campus-Community Connections
The campus-community connections priority is about campus-community partnerships. These partnerships include active commitments from staff and students who recognize their responsibilities for participating in multiple communities (including, but not limited to, on-campus communities), and efforts to work with local community leaders and groups in solving particular problems and/or conducting community-based research. This priority aims to address disparate perceptions of the nature and meaning of U.S. diversity on campus and in the community.