National Center for Institutional Diversity

Vision

Shortly after his appointment as the Founding Director of the NCID, Phil Bowman developed this extended vision statement. It is a working vision—one that is being revised and refined with NCID Steering Committee Members and other stakeholders, according to the emerging strategic agenda.

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A Strategic Vision: Refinement of Emerging Mission

Toward a Comprehensive Agenda: Bridging Basic Scholarship with Engaged Research, Education and Service

Recommendations and Programmatic Goals: Research, Education, and Service

• Goal 1—Research: Scholarship and Engaged Research Activities
  
• Goal 2—Education: Engaged Training and Pedagogical Activities
  
• Goal 3—Service: Engaged Collaboration and Social Change
  

Core Priorities and Alignment of Campus Partners

Organizational Considerations: Strategic Leadership Network and Strategic Partnerships

A STRATEGIC VISION

Given the unique context at The University of Michigan, the core vision for the National Center on Institutional Diversity (NCID) must be nothing less than national and international prominence. The primary foundations for further elaborating and developing this core vision for the NCID are grounded in the longstanding commitment of the U-M to diversity, its exceptional institutional strengths, and the leadership of the new Director and key campus stakeholders. Over the past year, with guidance from Vice Provost Lester Monts, NCID Interim Director Patricia Gurin has worked very closely with the campus-wide Steering Committee to coordinate two very successful planning conferences, consolidate an exceptional core staff and launch an impressive array of programmatic activities. In addition, Professor Barry Checkoway headed a national search for a new Director which resulted in the mid-August hiring of Phillip Bowman as the new Director of NCID. As the new Director, Dr. Bowman’s initial priority is to consult with key campus stakeholders to further refine the emerging NCID mission and lead a decentralized strategy planning and development process that is necessary to achieve the level of excellence commensurate with Michigan’s stellar reputation.

A strategic vision for the NCID is highlighted below including some initial thoughts regarding the emerging mission, a comprehensive agenda, core programmatic goals, core priority areas, organizational considerations, and the importance of developing a strong leadership team including strategic campus and external partners. Guided by the core vision, a strategic agenda for the NCID should build on the impressive progress made over the past two years through further refinement in these seven core areas. These strategic ideas are based on a careful review of available materials on NCID, program development principles for higher education, and unique strengths and opportunities at the U-M to move the Center further toward national and international prominence. Based on consultation with key stakeholders, further refinement in these seven areas should be guided by core university values, decentralized priorities, and strategic partnerships between NCID and a wide range of campus units. Related strategic planning should employ a modified S-W-O-T Analysis (SO-WT) that identify and refine programmatic priorities based primarily on analysis of institutional Strengths and external Opportunities. With an emphasis on Strengths and Opportunities, a focus should also be placed on building capacity to eliminate institutional Weaknesses and to develop creative responses to external Threats.

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Refinement of Emerging Mission

As indicated in the following sections, the refinement of the emerging NCID mission and ongoing strategic agenda setting activities should build on The May 17–18, 2005 “Futuring Diversity” Planning Conference and more recent planning activities with input from both campus and external stakeholders. For example, the basic mission of NCID as articulated for the “Futuring Diversity” conference emphasized several core practices. “Inspired by the overarching vision of higher education’s critical role in promoting knowledge, justice, and opportunity in a diverse democracy and global economy, the Center engages in several core practices:

1. Investigating the value of diversity though multiple perspectives;
2. Identifying, evaluating, and supporting best educational, institutional, and community practices for pursuing and benefiting from diversity;
3. Cultivating and moderating public and academic discourses on diversity, providing tools to help sustain connections across differences; and
4. Anticipating, preparing, and planning for an increasingly diverse and interconnected world.

“These practices are enacted by convening scholars, practitioners, and leaders to study, evaluate, and design programs and initiatives that are models of successful, robust diversity. The CID’s research and activities occur in a variety of contexts: K-12 education, industry, law, government, medicine, technology, public policy, arts, culture, and higher education.”

This working mission statement of the NCID includes bringing together researchers, practitioners, and activists to develop theories, and networks needed to engage the challenges and opportunities of diversity. The NCID will examine diversity in its richest, broadest sense, including diversity of thought and viewpoints. With an emphasis on research and programs that create concrete social changes, it will operate as a think-tank, incubator, venture fund, clearinghouse, and publisher.

My vision for NCID would include the further refinement of this mission through future strategic planning activities to include a core focus on bridging basic scholarship on diversity with more engaged research, education and service activities to facilitate concrete social change within multiple institutional contexts. A major research goal should be to promote, coordinate, and conduct innovative studies on pressing institutional diversity issues that encourage new lines of inquiry. This would increase the quantity, quality, and relevance of research on institutional diversity and help broaden its meaning and message. In addition to basic and applied research, the Center should also promote best practices through an expanding innovative array of engaged education and service initiatives at multiple levels—campus, local, state, national and international. A focus on the development of best practices in institutional diversity can help to prepare people for active engagement and leadership roles in a diverse society. A focus on such best practices as well as related public policy issues is also necessary to build more productive and inclusive communities at the U-M and beyond. In the broadest sense, the Center should represent a strategic commitment by U-M to better address complex diversity issues within the university itself, other major social institutions, the nation, and the world.

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TOWARD A COMPREHENSIVE AGENDA: Bridging Basic Scholarship with Engaged Research, Education, and Service

A comprehensive NCID agenda should be further organized around a unique research model, three major goals and a set of strategic priorities. As illustrated in Figure 1, the NCID integrative research model should combine: (a) policy-relevant scholarship within the social sciences and humanities on diversity challenges and opportunities; with (b) more engaged policy research in various institutional or intervention settings. With a focus on social change, such engaged research can better address pressing diversity issues within professional fields as well as best practices within major institutional and community contexts. The NCID basic scholarship agenda should be similar to that of established research centers at major universities nationally; these centers promote external funding, basic research productivity, interdisciplinary collaboration, academic reputation, and quality research among undergraduates, graduate and students, and postdoctoral scholars. In addition, the NCID’s engaged research agenda is consistent with national “think-tanks” and other research centers committed to “social change” and “policy” relevant studies; these centers often promote collaboration between external partners and university-based experts in a range of professional fields (education, health, social work, business, law, urban planning, public policy studies, etc.).

This integrative NCID research model would promote interdisciplinary collaboration to systematically bridge innovative scholarship within “basic” academic disciplines with more “applied” or “engaged” policy research within a range of professional fields and institutional settings. As illustrated in Figure 1, the integrative NCID model seeks to expand the sources of theory-based knowledge. A focus on multiple perspectives goes beyond university-based scholarship to also include new people engaged in innovative activities at the local, state, national, and international levels into a conversation about the challenges and opportunities of diversity. This should include broader debates about institutional strategies to address persistent racial/ethnic inequalities as well as the value of different types of diversity within multiple institutional contexts. Building on this integrative model, a central NCID strategy should be to efficiently mobilize resources both within and outside the U-M campus around a set of core priority areas. Next, some strategic ideas are briefly highlighted regarding a possible set of core NCID programmatic goals, priority areas, leadership teams, and partnerships.

Integrative Scholarship-Engagement Model
Bridging Exemplary Diversity Scholarship with Multilevel Engagement and Innovation

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RECOMMENDATIONS AND CORE GOALS: Research, Education, and Service

The May 17–18, 2005 “Futuring Diversity” Planning Conference provided a set of excellent recommendations that should be translated into more focused NCID programmatic objectives as part of an ongoing strategic agenda setting and planning process. In general, conference recommendations for the Center emphasized the importance of continuing to wrestle with the role of race, while also developing a more comprehensive agenda that defines diversity much more broadly. Moreover, three other general recommendations should also guide future strategic planning and program development:

• Be sure to develop a realistic, manageable agenda, rather than trying to cover too many issues. Narrow down the foci.
• Pick projects carefully to ensure success early on, drawing upon existing strengths at U-M. Develop a plan for measuring success.
• Include as many diverse perspectives as possible in the decision-making processes, including young people.

As suggested in Figure 1, the general recommendations emphasize the importance of focusing on racial/ethnic disparities as well as the inclusion of multiple inter-group interests, ideologies, and perspectives (gender, social class, urbanicity, age, disability, etc.). In addition, an initial idea for discussion would be to also build on more specific recommendations from the “Futuring Diversity” planning conference through a systematic focus on a core set of NCID research, education, and service goals. These more specific recommendations are noted below as a basis to further specify NCID core goals and related objectives to guide future strategic planning with input from both campus and external partners. Guided by the integrative model, such NCID programmatic goals can help to bridge innovative research (basic and applied) with related education and service activities. This integrative focus reflects the Center’s commitment to innovative research, a broad range of programmatic initiatives, and concrete social change. Moreover, the interrelated goals of integrating the research agenda with innovative pedagogical and service activities are also at the heart of the university’s core values and mission. Preliminary thoughts regarding the three major goals and related objectives that might guide the Center’s core activities are as follows:

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Goal 1—Research: Scholarship and Engaged Research Activities

Specific Research Recommendations and Goal

• Be action- and practice-oriented.
  • Integrate knowledge and action, rather than exclusively falling into contemplation and intellectualizing.
  • Center should serve as a hub for applied work, not only a repository of data
• Conduct research with the purpose of educating broader society.
  • Please educate the public further on the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative and anti-affirmative action groups in general.
  • Don’t remain solely in the realm of higher education, where many people are already “in the know” about diversity. Instead, take diversity research to the general public in a way that does not alienate opponents.
  • Publicize the issues and effects resulting from the lack of equality for all in our nation.
• Be a clearinghouse and connection point.
  • Bring together diversity leaders for collaboration.
  • Offer a website or library of diversity resources.
  • Consolidate and disseminate information strategically, via astute use of the media.

At the core of its mission, NCID should be strongly committed to promoting, coordinating, and conducting both basic and applied research on the challenges and opportunities of diversity in multiple institutional contexts. The integrative research focus should include both policy-relevant studies in the social sciences and humanities as well as engaged studies relevant to professional fields (education, health, social work, business, law, urban planning, and public policy, etc.). In collaboration with campus and external partners, NCID should play the central role in the U-M’s efforts to address the complexities of diversity through three related research objectives.

Three Related Objectives

A. Increase the quantity, quality, and policy-relevance of both basic scholarship as well as engaged research on diversity in core priority areas.

B. Increase interdisciplinary exchanges among scholars, students, and other stakeholders through research conferences, symposia, and presentations in core priority areas.

C. Increase research proposals, coordinate collaborative working groups to develop new innovative research projects and programs in core priority areas.

D. Increase research funding, and widen the dissemination of research in core priority areas—to other stakeholders including practitioners, government officials, community leaders and the public.

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Goal 2—Education: Engaged Training and Pedagogical Activities

Specific Education Recommendations and Goal

• Concentrate on diversity challenges within higher education.
  • Closely examine the multicultural climate at the U-M and within higher education, looking for ways that we reinforce elitism and structures of inequality.
  • Provide cultural competency training for faculty and administrators. Provide mentoring to junior faculty members with the potential for diversity leadership.
  • Develop sustainability methods for departments and schools to have strong diversity programs. Provide models for diversity policy and self-assessment.
• Assign top priority to diversity challenges in PK-12 education.
  • Forge deeper partnerships between higher education and PK-12 education, tackling school reform, pipeline issues, and educational inequalities.
  • Strengthen diversity curriculum in PK-12 education, providing models for dialogue.
• Foster dialogue and reshape public discourse.
  • Move the discourse away from volatile issues on which groups cannot achieve consensus (affirmative action, merit) toward issues that can potentially gain broad-based support (equal opportunity, equity, inclusion as a means for improving society).
  • Foster conversations that welcome reluctant and doubtful people and their viewpoints.
  • Keep diversity conversations focused on inclusiveness, rather than group vs. group issues.

To complement core research activities, NCID should also be committed to related education and training innovation. This goal focuses on both: (a) building collaborative partnerships with U-M instructional programs interested in improving research capacity, curricula offerings, and other innovative educational activities on the challenges and opportunities of diversity; and (b) developing more specialized training and development activities to increase the quantity, quality and policy-relevance of research and education on institutional diversity issues.

Three Related Objectives

A. Develop specialized NCID-based training and development activities for faculty, post-doctoral scholars, graduate students, undergraduates and others interested in research and educational activities on the challenges and opportunities of diversity.

B. Build internal partnerships with interested academic units that share a strong commitment to innovative education and training activities to address specific priority areas related to the challenges and opportunities of diversity.

C. Provide curricula innovation and coordinate working groups to develop proposals for new education, training and development programs throughout the U-M campus to improve the quantity, quality and policy-relevance of research and educational initiatives on institutional diversity issues.

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Goal 3—Service: Engaged Collaboration and Social Change

Specific Service Recommendations and Goal

• Inspire and empower diversity leaders.
  • Be a leader, beacon, and think-tank that energizes leaders in other fields.
  • Help beleaguered institutions and communities to fight challenges to their diversity endeavors—by providing information, strategies, and moral support.
• Develop an extensive community engagement component.
  • Encourage action research in local communities.
  • Involve diverse community leaders in every stage of the planning of the Center, forming partnerships with grassroots and community-based organizations.
  • Involve faculty with expertise in both research and outreach.
• Assume a major role in advocacy/policy.
• Have a political arm or legal defense fund.
• Be a force for change.

The Center should be committed to a range of engaged service and outreach activities to further increase the educational and policy-relevance of research on diversity issues within multiple institutional contexts. Through both campus and external networks, such activities can promote social change and innovative public policies to address the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities of diversity.

Three Related Objectives

A. Consultation with internal partners on pressing institutional diversity issues and co-sponsor innovative leadership development and service activities.

B. Consultation with external partners for research dissemination and collaboration with institutional diversity forums, agenda setting meetings, best practice workshops and related outreach or social change activities.

C. Active participation, leadership, and advocacy in policy-relevant campus, local, state, national and international activities; promote the utilization of innovative research on challenges and opportunities of diversity in multiple institutional sectors.

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CORE PRIORITIES AND ALIGNMENT OF CAMPUS PARTNERS

To guide progress toward the three major goals and related objectives a set of core priority areas should be strategically identified, specified and promoted. Therefore, a central leadership role for the new NCID Director should be to work with key campus stakeholders: (1) to systematically organize around internal U-M strengths and external opportunities; (2) to build on the initial planning process by consolidating and further expanding the Center’s core research, education, and service initiatives; and (3) to guide the collective work of core Center staff and to mobilize subgroups of stakeholders toward the NCID mission, goals, and objectives. Most important, a set of NCID priority areas must be identified as a foundation to mobilize existing U-M strengths and resources around the shared interest of particular groups of stakeholders. For example, NCID priority areas should guide the development of strategic partnerships with all U-M colleges/schools/departments as well as relevant academic affairs units, student affairs offices, and other campus units that share an interest in particular institutional diversity issues.

I. Diversity Issues in Higher Education and Social Change

To bridge innovative scholarship with engaged research, education and service activities to promote the pivotal role of universities to address pressing institutional diversity challenges in higher education, PK-14 educational inequalities, and related social policy.

Campus Partners:

Student Affairs, Academic Affairs, School of Education and other campus stakeholders committed to addressing pressing diversity issues in higher education as well as PK-14 pipeline, educational inequality, and related social policy issues that are consistent with the NCID mission, goals, and objectives.

II. Diversity Issues in Basic Scholarship and Social Justice

To bridge innovative scholarship in the social sciences, humanities, and natural sciences with engaged research, education, and service activities to promote institutional diversity and social justice within a more inclusive multiracial, multiethnic, and multicultural society.

Campus Partners:

College of Literature, Science, and the Arts, and Rackham Graduate School, including the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, and multidisciplinary units (African American Studies, Asian American Studies, Latino Studies, Native American Studies, International Studies, Women’s Studies, etc.) as well as other campus stakeholders committed to bridging basic scholarship with more engaged research, education and service activities consistent with the NCID mission, goals, and objectives.

III. Diversity Issues in Law and Public Policy

To bridge innovative scholarship with engaged research, education, and service activities to address institutional diversity challenges and opportunities in critical legal, governmental, and public policy debates within a more inclusive multiracial, multiethnic, and multicultural society.

Campus Partners:

Law School, School of Public Policy, and other campus stakeholders committed to addressing legal, governmental, and public policy issues that are consistent with the NCID mission, goals, and objectives.

IV. Diversity, Urban Revitalization, and Community Development

To bridge innovative scholarship with engaged research, education and service activities to address institutional diversity challenges and opportunities in urban revitalization, family poverty, and community development within a more inclusive multiracial, multiethnic, and multicultural society.

Campus Partners:

School of Social Work, College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Natural Resources and Environment, Graham Environmental Sustainability Institute, and other campus stakeholders committed to addressing critical urban poverty, family wellbeing, and community development issues that are consistent with the NCID mission, goals, and objectives.

V. Diversity Issues in Business and Technology

To bridge innovative scholarship with engaged research, teaching and service activities to address institutional diversity challenges and opportunities in business strategy, information technology, and economic development within a more inclusive multiracial, multiethnic, and multicultural society.

Campus Academic Partners:

School of Business, College of Engineering, School of Information, and other campus stakeholders committed to addressing corporate strategy, economic development, information technology issues that are consistent with the NCID mission, goals, and objectives.

VI. Diversity Issues in Health Disparities and Urban Poverty

To bridge innovative scholarship with engaged research, education and service activities to address institutional diversity challenges and opportunities in health equity and disparities within the context of urban poverty and related challenges within a multiracial, multiethnic, and multicultural society.

Campus Academic Partners:

School of Public Health, Medical School, School of Nursing, School of Dentistry, School of Pharmacy, Kinesiology, and other campus stakeholders committed to addressing institutional diversity challenges and opportunities critical health disparities and equity consistent with the NCID mission, goals, and objectives.

VII. Diversity Issues in Expressive Culture, the Arts, & Media

To bridge innovative scholarship with engaged research, education, and service activities to address institutional diversity challenges and opportunities in expressive culture, the arts, and media within a more inclusive multiracial, multiethnic, and multicultural society.

Campus Academic Partners:

School of Music, Art and Design, Information, and other campus stakeholders committed to addressing institutional diversity challenges and opportunities critical expressive culture, the arts and media consistent with the NCID mission, goals, and objectives.

These seven possible NCID priority areas have been identified along with strategic alignments with specific academic units at U-M as a basis to guide strategic agenda setting activities, and the mobilization of institutional strengths. The development of shared institutional diversity priorities in consultation with key campus stakeholders can help move the NCID agenda forward in several specific ways. First, the seven priority areas provide a focus for strategic campus partnerships, administrative support, and faculty leadership for more coherent program development. Shared NCID priorities in each could also help to develop related external partnerships, networks, co-sponsorships or joint ventures, working groups, proposal writing teams, and collaborative projects. Further clarification of strategic diversity themes within each priority areas could also help specify outcomes associated with various objectives. For example, specific research, education, and service initiatives within each of the seven priority area could build on unique strengths within various campus units to advance the Center’s mission, goals and objectives.

MULTI-LEVEL ENGAGEMENT, RESEARCH, AND DEVELOPMENT

In addition, three additional priority areas can also be identified to support program development activities across all seven of the strategic priority areas: (A) MULTI-LEVEL ENGAGEMENT AND SOCIAL CHANGE, (B) COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH AND TRAINING INITIATIVES ON INSTITUTIONAL DIVERSITY ISSUES; AND (C) INSTITUTIONAL DIVERSITY FUND-RAISING AND DEVELOPMENT; Among the most important roles for the NCID, is to develop initiatives across all core priority areas to promote multi-level engagement, leadership, and social change in a diverse democracy. Toward this end, a major NCID priority area should focus on promoting active, multi-level engagement of students in a broad range of leadership development activities related in institutional diversity at the campus, local and metropolitan, state and regional, as well as the national and global levels. Collaborative NCID research and training activities on institutional diversity should also be jointly planned, developed, and implemented in conjunction with the Rackham School of Graduate Studies and other interdisciplinary research institutes, centers and units on campus (Institute for Social Research, Institute for Research on Women and Gender, Center for Afroamerican and African Studies, Center for Research on Ethnicity, Culture and Health, etc.). Across all seven priority areas, it is important to leverage core NCID support through work with the Development Office for additional institutional diversity fund-raising and development. Across all priority areas, a central aim for the NCID should be to develop specific institutional diversity initiatives to improve cross-campus collaboration, research productivity, funding, training, innovation, and capacity-building. This should also include improving the quantity, quality, and policy relevance of studies on institutional diversity issues conducted by NCID affiliates and collaborators from various schools and colleges. This should also include a range of innovative education and service activities to promote institutional diversity and related social change.

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ORGANIZATIONAL CONSIDERATIONS

The Center’s organizational structure needs to be further elaborated based on the refinements in the ten possible programmatic priorities presented earlier. Within each of the ten priority areas, the emphasis is on building campus-wide capacity through strategic campus and external partnerships, faculty and staff leadership, and three types of strategic priority area groups—Interest Groups, Working Groups, and Funded Project Groups. Therefore, within each of the ten priority areas, a central leadership role for the new NCID Director should be: (a) to lead a strategic planning process to systematically build on internal U-M strengths and external opportunities; (b) to work closely with the Steering/Executive Committee and other key campus partners to further specify, refine and promote the strategic priorities; (c) to guide the collective work of Center faculty, staff, and the mobilization of other campus and external stakeholders within the three types of strategic groups; and (d) to develop a more coherent framework for bridging basic scholarship with more engaged research, education and service activities to better achieve the Center’s programmatic goals, and objectives.

To further enhance national and international prominence, it is critical that the new NCID Director develop a strategic leadership network including the Steering/Executive Committee, core Center personnel, a range of faculty affiliates, and a broader network of strategic campus and external partnerships. The Steering/Executive Committee should include a sufficient number of senior faculty, administrators, and other key stakeholders with a strong commitment to all ten of the NCID priority areas. These campus leaders would also help to develop both internal and external partnerships to ensure that strategic decisions are made with input from relevant constituencies. Strategic campus partnerships represent a critical resource for mobilizing collaborative networks, promoting research around the core priority areas, and building greater capacity both within the Center and a range of other campus units for related education and service activities.

Strategic Partnerships and Expanding Leadership Network

To move toward national and international prominence, it is critical that the new NCID Director develop a strategic leadership network including core Center personnel, faculty affiliates, a Steering/Executive Committee, and a broader network of internal and external partnerships. At the core, Center personnel should be talented, diverse and include both graduate and undergraduate students. Faculty affiliates would make significant contributions to the core research, education and service functions of the Center. Faculty affiliates would hold regular appointments in relevant instructional units of the university, while research faculty may also be appointed for designated periods to work on externally funded projects. In addition to intrinsic interest, special arrangements may be developed to provide incentives for more engaged faculty involvement in the Center’s priority areas and core activities. For example, Faculty Fellows might be awarded a course reduction from their campus units during a particular semester for their work with the Center. Moreover, Faculty Scholars may be provided with seed fund awards to support more specific projects. Various NCID faculty affiliates would make significant contributions to the core research, education and service functions of the Center.

The Steering/Executive Committee would provide critical support to the NCID Director in matters related to strategic research, academic and substantive development. In support of core priorities, selected Committee members would include senior faculty, administrators and key personnel from various campus units with a strong commitment to the Center’s mission. These campus leaders would help to develop both internal and external partnerships to ensure that strategic decisions are made with input from relevant constituencies. Campus partnerships represent a critical resource for mobilizing collaborative networks, promoting research around core priority areas, and building greater capacity within a range of units for related education and service activities. The Steering/Executive Committee would also help to identify strategic working group and external advisory committee members and partners. External advisory committee members represent a critical source of input in ongoing efforts to make Center’s core activities responsive to shifting challenges and opportunities. Similarly, external partnerships can help to guide research as well as related education and service activities that are more responsive to policy-makers, practitioners, community leaders, and others engaged in innovative diversity interventions within multiple institutional contexts. Therefore, NCID affiliates would be encouraged to consult, to collaborate and to help form partnerships with educational institutions, corporations, community organizations, governmental bodies as well as other national and international organizations. Together, these evolving external relationships represent a powerful mechanism for making the Center’s comprehensive agenda more policy-relevant and effective in promoting social change. Those customarily left out of the discourse about diversity can more effectively participate in the development, implementation, and dissemination of policy-relevant research products through a range of external research, education and service activities.