Report tracks progress on goals to recruit and retain diverse faculty

The Office of the Provost has shared the results of its second Report on Faculty Composition, which provides detailed data from November 2017 on the gender, minority, and underrepresented minority status of faculty throughout the university. As part of the university's commitment to foster an academic environment that supports diverse people, experiences, and thoughts, the report provides data snapshots of diversity among faculty, results by division and department, and comparisons against the previous report, published in September, 2016.

This year's report also highlights, for the first time, female, minority, and underrepresented minority, or URM, faculty representation in academic leadership, and how the university's faculty composition compares to that of peer institutions.

University leaders say they recognize the significant work ahead, but they are glad to see the universitywide increase in female faculty (from 42% to 44%), minority faculty (from 30% to 32%), and URM faculty (from 8% to 9%). They are also encouraged that the overall faculty growth rate (5%) was surpassed by the growth rate in female professorial faculty (13%), minority professorial faculty (11%), and URM professorial faculty (18%).

"Johns Hopkins is at its best when we bring together a diversity of backgrounds, ideas, and experiences," says Provost and Senior Vice President Sunil Kumar. "We are pleased that this new report demonstrates progress toward a more diverse faculty, but there is still room for improvement. We must continue and even increase our current momentum so that we can recruit and retain the very best faculty and foster a culture of free and open exchange at Johns Hopkins."

Along with a universitywide increase in the percentage of female faculty, the report notes that the Whiting School of Engineering made a substantial jump from 19% female faculty in 2015 to 26% in 2017 (a 37% increase). Three divisions—the School of Education, School of Nursing, and Bloomberg School of Public Health—have a majority of female faculty.

The largest growth of percentage of URM faculty was seen in Nursing, which grew from 10 percent to 18 percent URM—an 80% increase.

Recruitment and retention of a diverse faculty is supported by the five-year, $25 million Faculty Diversity Initiative. According to the report, the initiative has been enhanced by:

• A new platform for posting faculty searches, called Interfolio
• Diversity action plans created by each of the divisions
• The creation of a position focused on supporting dual-career faculty couples

Deans and the vice provost for faculty affairs have also been developing new plans that emphasize providing groups of mentors to support and guide junior faculty.

Faculty diversity is a cornerstone of the university's Roadmap on Diversity and Inclusion.

"This biennial report underscores the Roadmap's themes of transparency and accountability to our university community," the faculty composition report states. "We firmly believe that this kind of detailed data will advance our efforts to measure our progress in faculty diversity over time, to better assess our opportunities for growth, and to be more strategic about faculty recruitment and retention."