ILLUSTRATION INTERACTION INSTITUTE FOR SOCIAL CHANGE | ARTIST ANGUS MAGUIRE FINDING HELP THROUGH THE EQUITY ADVOCATES COUNCIL Kim Loeffert’s position as the Faculty Fellow for Diversity and Equity includes a two-year appointment on the CAS Leadership Team. She and the rest of the eight-person group regularly discuss ways to increase diversity, equity and inclusion across the college. “Everyone on the leadership team is really equity-minded,” Loeffert said. “In most of the cases where you might expect my position could be needed, the Leadership Team is already asking the right questions. Having my position specifically tasked with being an advocate for diversity and equity is as much about the message that it sends, that this matters to us.” Another way the leadership shows that equity matters is by designating half of the College of Arts and Sciences Community Engagement Grants for equity-focused projects. This funding supports faculty members’ community-engaged research and scholarly activities. One of Loeffert’s tasks is to lead the Equity Advocates Council, a group of 29 CAS faculty and staff members engaged in implicit bias training. They work to support diversity, equity and inclusion efforts through educational workshop facilitation, resource compilation and the creation, update and review of pertinent policies and procedures. They act as repositories of campus and community resources and seek to listen to and learn from under-represented groups and to amplify marginalized voices. One way Equity Advocates address their goals is by ensuring the college’s hiring process is as fair as possible. That includes examining job descriptions to create a diverse, qualified applicant pool, rather than crafting them with certain people in mind. “We all have biases that we are often unaware of,” Krutz said. “That leads to mental shortcuts, and those tend to break toward people in the majority. That could be something as simple as where they went to school or other aspects. If you eliminate those, you give everyone a fairer chance to be considered. So we are working toward making everything as merit-based as possible.” One strategy to decrease bias is to have application materials without the name of the candidate so that they don’t provide a cue that leads to bias. “That’s quite a development,” Krutz said. “Before I came here last year, I wasn’t aware of such a well-organized approach. That really impressed me. … If you asked someone about inclusivity in hiring 10 or 15 years ago, they would talk specifically about who was being hired. That’s an important piece, but it’s also important to look at how people feel when they are hired. We want to make people feel welcome, and the search process is a big part of that.” The Equity Advocates Council serves the college in other ways, including being a resource for people within each department who have questions. “Having my position specifically tasked with being an advocate for diversity and equity is as much about the message that it sends, that this matters to us.” Kim Loeffert Faculty Fellow for Diversity and Equity 8 CONNECT 2020
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