The Darwinian process associated with hiring at LSU is transitioning this semester from a “survival of the fittest” method to a more all-inclusive technique, giving minority prospects — such as Latinos and African Americans — a fair shot at faculty positions.
LSU Interim Executive Vice President and Provost Richard Koubek recently launched an opportunity hire program to ensure equity in hiring opportunities for minority faculty applicants.
Koubek is dedicating funds toward promoting hiring minority colleagues at no cost to the hiring of non-minority applicants. The shared cost of the program will be funded by the Office of Academic Affairs in decreasing percentages each year.
Faculty Senate President Kevin Cope said the opportunity hire pilot program will allow departments to hire two candidates for a job in situations in which both applicants — one of whom happens to be a minority — are equally qualified for the position.
The program would give departments leeway in the decision-making process, Cope said.
“The Faculty Senate is very pleased with the initiative of Provost Koubek in coming up with a program that at once serves the need of social justice and advances the intellectual purposes of the academy,” he said.
As defined by the constraints of the initiative, minorities would include underrepresented racial and ethnic groups, said Office of Diversity Vice Provost Dereck Rovaris.
Koubek’s timing falls in line with another honor directed to LSU involving minority growth.
This month LSU received the Higher Education Excellence in Diversity award for the fourth year in a row. The honorary distinction reflects the recruitment and retention rates of students and employees, as well as continued leadership support for diversity.
In 2014, LSU employed a total of 136 Asians, 51 African Americans and 46 Hispanics/Latinos as instructional faculty members, compared to the 966 white faculty members hired.
Rovaris said approximately 19 percent of LSU’s faculty comes from underrepresented groups. He said about 4 percent are African American, and roughly the same percentage applies to Hispanics and Latinos.
He said LSU’s numbers compare to the national average of nearly 6 percent for African American faculty members and slightly less for Latinos.
“We should do better than other states who don’t have as many levels of diversity,” Rovaris said.
The opportunity hire program, though not a “brand new project,” seeks to amend this disparity, he said.
“The last few years [diversity] has improved on our student side, but on our faculty side, we had not made the improvements that we needed,” Rovaris said. “This initiative would give us a chance to at least begin steps in that right direction, bringing new folks to campus.”
He said the concept has been tested at other universities, and LSU started planning the project last year around the time Rovaris joined the Office of Diversity.
Though there is not a firm date for opportunity hires to take effect, Rovaris said it will most likely launch at the start of the spring 2016 semester.
Rovaris said he hopes the program will allow LSU to obtain candidates they may not have otherwise gotten because department heads were forced to choose one applicant over the other.
“I also hope that we can get the whole campus thinking about diversity in new ways … and excite others outside of the institution to do the same,” Rovaris said.
Cope said the opportunity hire program should be successful because it works in everyone’s favor.
“[Faculty Senate] regards [Koubek] as something of a genius for going one step beyond the usual equal opportunities procedures by creating a program that benefits everyone,” Cope said. “It’s past the old feeling of competition for spaces.”