Resource Library

STEM disciplines are believed to be founded on the idea of meritocracy; recognition earned by the value of the data, which is objective. Such disciplinary cultures resist concerns about implicit or structural biases, and yet, year after year, scientists observe persistent gender and racial inequalities in their labs, departments, and programs. In Equity in Science, Julie Posselt makes the case that understanding how field-specific cultures develop is a crucial step for bringing about real change. She does this by examining existing equity, diversity, and inclusion efforts across astronomy, physics, chemistry, geology, and psychology. These ethnographic case studies reveal the subtle ways that exclusion and power operate in scientific organizations and, sometimes, within change efforts themselves. Posselt argues that accelerating the movement for inclusion in science requires more effective collaboration across boundaries that typically separate people and scholars—across the social and natural sciences, across the faculty-student-administrator roles, and across race, gender, and other social identities. Ultimately this book is a call for academia to place equal value on expertise, and on those who do the work of cultural translation. Posselt closes with targeted recommendations for individuals, departments, and disciplinary societies for creating systemic, sustainable change.

Our IGEN Project Quarterly Report highlights the work being done by our alliance members and partners.

Featured in this issue:

• The Vision and Goals of NSF Includes: IGEN
• Building the IGEN Community (Goal 4)
• Catalyzing the Adoption of Inclusive Practices (Goal 2)
• Conducting Research and Propagating Results (Goal 3)
• Increasing Participation of UREM Students (Goal 1)
• IGEN Project Summary

Our IGEN Project Quarterly Report highlights the work being done by our alliance members and partners.

Featured in this issue:

• Building the IGEN Community (Goal 4)
• Catalyzing the Adoption of Inclusive Practices (Goal 2)
• Conducting Research and Propagating Results (Goal 3)
• Increasing Participation of UREM Students (Goal 1)
• IGEN Project Summary
• Avenues for Collaboration between IGEN and Aspire

Our IGEN Project Quarterly Report highlights the work being done by our alliance members and partners.  

Featured in this issue:

• Building the IGEN Community (Goal 4)
• Catalyzing the Adoption of Inclusive Practices (Goal 2)
• Conducting Research and Propagating Results (Goal 3)
• Increasing Participation of UREM Students (Goal 1)
• IGEN Project Summary

The Pullias Center’s Julie Posselt serves as a member of The National Academies of Science "Panel on the State of the Profession and Societal Impacts" in Astronomy and Astrophysics that generate a comprehensive strategy and vision for the next decade of science in astronomy and astrophysics. 

What are the hidden rules and practices that affect who gets respect and opportunities in higher education? How can we reconstruct these rules to encourage equity in the system? A new chapter in the Higher Education: Handbook of Theory and Research book series by Julie Posselt and a team at the Pullias Center takes a hard look at these fundamental questions and suggests how evaluation and decision making can be leveraged for equity.

The Pullias Center’s Julie Posselt, Steve Desir, and Román Liera are leading an effort to shine a light on this typically unrecognized source of bias that has the power to shape the careers of graduates and other applicants looking to enter or advance in the workforce. Letters of recommendation are used in admissions and hiring to glean information and qualities which may go unnoticed in the review of an applicant’s file. However, they are also one of the most common places that bias is written into applicant records– sometimes in subtle ways. 

Our IGEN Project Quarterly Newsletter highlights the work being done by our alliance members and partners.

Featured in this issue:

• A preview to the 2019 IGEN National Meeting
• Growing Academic Partnerships!
• Research & Inclusive Practices

Our IGEN Project Quarterly Newsletter highlights the work being done by our alliance members and partners.

Featured in this issue:

• New Professional Networking Group
• Workshops and Resources for Equity in Graduate Admissions
• Disciplinary Partner Updates

Selected research curated to foster learning and adoption of inclusive practices in graduate education.

The APS Bridge Program Student Induction Manual documents effective practices for inducting new students into graduate programs, as identified and described by APS Bridge Sites. It also includes specific strategies for developing a solid foundation for students before and well after their arrival on campus.

These quarterly gatherings break down research studies and social theories that are relevant to equity in graduate education, with attention to practical implications.  

OVERVIEW & GOALS

• Preparing higher education change agents to facilitate interactive workshops on holistic graduate admissions.
• Faculty and administrators with an interest in improving graduate education in STEM, and without competing financial interests, are welcome to apply.
• Preference will be given to applicants who are faculty in the physical or social sciences and who have with demonstrated effort increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion in doctoral education.

ChemIDP is an Individual Development Plan designed specifically for graduate students and postdoctoral scholars in the chemical sciences. Through immersive, self-paced activities, users explore potential careers, determine specific skills needed for success, and develop plans to achieve professional goals. ChemIDP tracks user progress and input, providing tips and strategies to complete goals and guide career exploration.

The Facilitator Workshop: Learn to Implement Mentor Training is a two-day workshop designed to increase the capacity for research mentor trainings offered at colleges and universities, research institutes, and organizations.

During this workshop, participants are introduced to the Entering Mentoring curricula, which addresses the following themes: aligning expectations, addressing equity and inclusion, articulating your mentoring philosophy and plan, assessing understanding, cultivating ethical behavior, enhancing work-life integration, fostering independence, maintaining effective communication, and promoting professional development. Workshop participants become familiar with the curricula, practice facilitating training components, and develop a plan for implementing the training at their institution or organization.

Presentation on how Physical Sciences Bridge Programs affected the participation rates of Underrepresented Minority (URM) in graduate degree programs.

Biases, conscious or unconscious, are learned social stereotypes that have real effects in the workplace. This series explores individual, organizational and societal factors that influence the intersection of diversity, equity and inclusion. Participants will be challenged to examine their actions and inactions. This series is designed to provide practical tools and resources that interrupt bias and promote workplace inclusion.

Stories and statistics abound about the struggles of graduate education and the risks for wellbeing that it poses to students. In this plenary, we’ll explore both root causes of mental illness among today’s generation of graduate students, the unique barriers experienced by members of minoritized communities, as well as the proactive steps that faculty, friends, and family can take to provide support and challenge toxic norms within academia. Posselt will present research completed through a two year National Academy of Education fellowship on graduate student mental health, sharing findings from two studies: 1) A large-scale national analysis of 20,000 students’ views on competition, discrimination, and support in relation to depression and anxiety, and 2) A qualitative study of the ways that doctoral students of color within STEM conceptualize faculty support.

Frequently asked questions regarding GRE and Graduate Admissions Like you, I’ve struggled with what to use for graduate admission criteria in the Geosciences. A little over a year ago, I intended to write about why we should use the GRE for admissions, but the more I read, the more I decided it was a flawed measure. Since writing my post, To GRE or not to GRE, I’ve received several questions that I’d like to respond to here, publicly. Given that COVID -19 has drastically changed testing, I also discuss that.

The Genentech Foundation has provided support to the ACS Bridge Program.

In its first year, 20% of the 250 active Earth and space science graduate programs in the United States applied for partnership with the program.

Underrepresented minority students make up a third of college-age US citizens and earn roughly 18% of US chemistry bachelor’s degrees and 11% of chemistry PhDs, according to data from the National Center for Education Statistics’ Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System.

Even if wealthy parents don't resort to the kind of illegal tactics in the recent college cheating scandal revealed by the FBI, the college admission process still favors the rich, scholars argue.

...The data shows that the GRE gives us no predictive information on who will succeed in graduate school (even among men) and simultaneously acts to weed out people of color and underrepresented minorities and, as a whole, doesn’t help women applicants either.

© 2019 SPEAKING OF GEOSCIENCE

...AGU is one of five scientific societies that have formed the Inclusive Graduate Education Network (IGEN), which will increase the participation of women and underrepresented racial and ethnic minorities in graduate studies in the physical sciences. 

Abstract

The University of Georgia has operated under a voluntary “race-neutral” admission policy for the past 2 decades. Using frame analysis theory, we examine university documents and interview data from 11 campus administrators responsible for diversity efforts to understand how diversity is framed at the institutional and individual levels post-affirmative action. We compare our findings to the broader sociolegal discourses around diversity to present points of convergence and divergence among frames. We find official university framing of diversity has broadened over time to include numerous characteristics, while administrators hold divergent frames depending on their functional area, philosophy, and personal experience. We conclude that divergent frames may reflect and contribute to the challenge of advancing a coherent set of diversity efforts in a post-affirmative action context, where the place of race in institutional policy is muted. As more institutions consider admissions policy devoid of race to avoid protracted legal struggles, it may be especially important for institutions and administrators responsible for diversity efforts to be explicit with one another and with those whom they hire about how they will continue seeking racial equity.

Abstract

Higher Education Administration for Social Justice and Equity empowers all administrators in higher education to engage in their work—to make decisions, hire, mentor, budget, create plans, and carry out other day-to-day operations—with a clear commitment to justice, sensitivity to power and privilege, and capacity to facilitate equitable outcomes. Grounding administration for social justice as a matter of daily work, this book translates abstract concepts and theory into the work of hiring, socialization, budgeting, and decision-making. Contributed chapters by renowned scholars and current practitioners examine the way higher education administration is organized, and will help readers both question existing structures and practices, and consider new and different ways of organizing campuses based on equity and social justice. Rich with case studies and pedagogical tools, this book connects theory to practice, and is an invaluable resource for current and aspiring administrators.

Abstract

Change comes slowly in higher education, or so the best theory and evidence say. Yet there are exceptions to every rule, and exogenous shocks such as protests, wars, natural disasters and, as we are now seeing, a global pandemic can compel decisive, transformational changes that colleges, universities, and their members would otherwise resist. 

INCLUDES Alliance awards fund partnerships across higher education

The initiative brings together USC Rossier and more than two dozen other organizations.

Our IGEN Project Quarterly Newsletter highlights the work being done by our alliance members and partners.

Featured in this issue:

• Supporting Graduate Student Well-Being
• IGEN Bridge Application 
• Partner Updates
• Equity in Graduate Admissions

Our IGEN Project Quarterly Newsletter highlights the most impactful work being done by our alliance members and partners.

Featured in this issue:

• IGEN 2019 National Meeting
• Partner Spotlight
• Collective Activities

New programme aims to boost the number of women and underrepresented racial and ethnic minorities in science

This presentation will draw from a decade of research that 1) critically analyzes common systems of admission to doctoral programs and 2) develops a case for holistic review, including caveats about design and implementation. Dr. Posselt will present admissions from decision makers' point of view, including thought-provoking episodes of committees grappling with borderline cases. To promote equity, transparency, and legal safeguards, Posselt shares concrete strategies and places admissions within a system of practices that collectively shape student and program outcomes.

A set of role-play, avatar modules to educate faculty, staff, and students about mental health and suicide prevention.

Presentation addressing recruitment and admissions challenges facing graduate education in light of COVID-19.  The panelists will present research and institutional responses that, together, highlight paths for administrators and faculty toward equitable enrollment management. How should we communicate with incoming and prospective students given universities’ quickly changing policy landscape? How can we design holistic review processes that account for new variations in applicant grades, experiences, and obstacles during this time? 

Crises are moments for culture building. During this time we are learning that connections, communication, and critical conversations matter more than ever. As we think about preparing our institutions for annual graduate admissions and recruitment processes, awareness about our respective institutional contexts and individual identities matter. Context and identity matter on their own, and they matter in combination by affecting the resources likely available to us, the constraints and norms we are more likely to face, and the networks of which we are part.

Webinar and discussion session presenting data and research about the role of typical admissions criteria and practices in maintaining racial/ethnic inequalities in graduate education. Practical strategies for rethinking typical admissions criteria and processes are introduced, with a focus on equity-based holistic review and embedding attention to equity throughout the admissions and recruitment process. 

Current Data to support the charge of the IGEN Project and its measured success.

Presentation on how Physical Sciences Bridge Programs affected the participation rates of Underrepresented Minority (URM) in graduate degree programs.

Conference poster.  

Presentation on the benefits of diverse leadership in business and how IGEN goals look to increase the participation gap. 

Research and reports about transforming undergraduate STEM education highlight the need to implement research-based practices and to learn from that process, expanding the research base.

Presentation on how the APS Bridge program works to decrease the achievement gap in doctoral education for underrepresented minority students in Physics degrees.   

Presentation on the efforts to increase diversity in graduate education, and providing practical strategies for doing so by rethinking typical recruitment and admission processes. Including how common admissions mindsets and practices inhibit access for underrepresented groups, and concrete strategies to change admission processes to yield improved diversity and equity.

Presentation on IGEN at NSF Includes: Journey to an Alliance webinar, a series designed to introduce the network to the NSF INCLUDES Alliances and learn about the successes, challenges and lessons learned about launching their partnerships and backbone organizations. 

Workshop presentation by Dr. Melissa McDaniels from Michigan State University, graduate student and postdoctoral participants will be urged to think about the proactive roles they can play in ‘mentoring up’ – strategically and authentically negotiating their constellation of mentoring relationships. Using this lens, participants will be brought through a series of guided conversations and exercises to help them thing about how they might ‘map’ their mentoring networks, anchored by professional competencies, to empower themselves to optimize all mentoring relationships.

Presentation on project goals and activities of the NSF INCLUDES Alliance grant awarded to the Inclusive Graduate Education Network (IGEN). 

High quality mentoring is an important predictor of persistence for researchers pursuing careers in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields and can influence the confidence of historically underrepresented trainees' ability to successfully conduct research. Despite this, mentors typically do not receive any training on how to optimize their mentoring relationships. Stories from student mentees from historically underrepresented backgrounds will be shared to learn from their perspectives. Mentors will learn new approaches from each other as they work through mentoring challenges, reflect upon their mentoring experiences, and refine their individual approaches to mentoring. Workshop leaders will provide concrete tools and strategies mentors can incorporate into their practice and extrapolate to their own context. Participants are expected to gain confidence in proactively working with students from diverse backgrounds. See Key Strategies for Mentoring Parts I and II.