SC&I Diversity Strategic Plan

SC&I Diversity Strategic Plan

In 2020, as the country was experiencing the “Great Awakening” following the death of George Floyd and many others, President Holloway began his tenure at Rutgers by challenging us to embrace diversity as a core institutional value. This led to a multi-year effort where each unit created a diversity strategic plan detailing how it would pursue inclusive excellence in alignment with 5 university-wide diversity priorities.

The School of Communication & Information (SC&I) has created a comprehensive plan with realistic goals that builds on existing strengths in the school and mobilizes all constituencies as contributors to the work of inclusive excellence.

Preview SC&I’s goals within each university diversity priority below.

View the full Diversity Strategic Plan. (Coming soon!)

SC&I's Goals

Diversity Priority 1: Recruit, Retain, and Develop Diverse Community
  • Increase the percentage of full-time faculty of color in SC&I from the current 22% to 30% in the next 3 years
  • Increase the percentage of full-time staff of color in SC&I from the current 24% to 30% in the next 3 years
  • Recruit and retain at least a third of Ph.D. students in each cohort from underrepresented groups
  • Provide community, support, and mentorship for students from underrepresented groups (at Undergraduate, Masters, and Doctoral levels)
  • Recruit Lecturers of color, including for professional and skills based courses in the industry
  • Strengthen ties with alumni of color
  • Cultivate a culture of belonging
Diversity Priority 2: Promote Inclusive Scholarship and Teaching
  • Review entire school curricula for DEI values
  • Incentivize faculty research focusing on DEI topics
  • Offer DEI-focused general education events in the school
  • Implement comprehensive teaching evaluation procedures to combat implicit bias in student evaluations
Diversity Priority 3: Define Sustainable and Substantive Community Engagement
  • Communicate our research and scholarship to communities 
  • Design projects with and for communities 
  • Advance internal processes for recognizing, mentoring, supporting, and evaluating engaged scholarship  
Diversity Priority 4: Build the Capacity of Leaders to Create an Inclusive Climate
  • Formally designate responsibility for DEI work to a high-level administrator
  • Encourage all Associate Deans, Assistant Deans, chairs and directors to actively support DEI within the school
  • Offer learning, development and networking opportunities around DEI to a pipeline of leaders
  • Build network opportunities within and outside of Rutgers with other DEI leaders at Rutgers’ schools, academic and professional associations.
Diversity Priority 5: Develop an Institutional Infrastructure to Drive Change
  • Review all school documentation and bylaws for alignment with diversity strategic priorities
  • Review the school’s diversity-related roles
  • Develop and maintain a DEI space on the school’s website in addition to threading such information within the entire website
  • Create a historical record of the School’s hiring of POC
  • Create DEI related awards and recognition
  • Maintain regular structures for education and growth in DEI area