Archived Edition: October 19, 2005 | Back to Current	Jul 31, 2010

Williams ranked 18th in percentage of black faculty
Julia Kropp - STAFF WRITER

The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education JBHE recently released a report on the integration of black professors into the faculties at the nation’s top colleges and universities. Williams ranks 18th in the percentage of black faculty among top liberal arts colleges, reporting 3.3 percent of the faculty as black. In 2003, the College was recognized by JBHE as second (behind only Amherst) in the integration of black students into the community.

The ranking “doesn’t add much to the College’s own understanding of the situation since we undertake quite a bit of self-analysis, including most recently through the Diversity Initiatives’ self study,” said Jim Kolesar, director of public affairs and member of the Diversity Initiatives coordinating committee.

“The outside ranking certainly confirms what Williams has understood to be the case – that the College has made considerable progress in diversifying the student body, less so with faculty,” Kolesar said. “College efforts will continue in both areas in ways unaffected by the outside ranking.”

Thomas Kohut, dean of the faculty, also said that the College has long been aware of the results that the study confirmed. “The bottom line is that, although we’ve done reasonably well in increasing the number of minorities on the Williams faculty, we’ve done less well in hiring African Americans,” Kohut said. “Nevertheless, for various reasons (not least of which the fact that we’ve authorized two new positions in African-American Studies), I’m hopeful that we can improve in that area as well.”

The JBHE faculty ranking found that top liberal arts colleges generally were more successful in attracting and retaining black faculty than larger universities. Only four of the universities which responded to the survey had a faculty more than 5 percent black, whereas 11 top liberal arts colleges reached this benchmark. The study also showed that Williams had experienced modest growth (0.8 percent) in the percentage of black faculty over the past several years.

The 2003 student integration study was originally conceived to characterize the racial climate at top colleges and universities based on demographic information.

That year, the JBHE noted the College’s “strong record in attracting blacks to its campus,” pointing out specifically that “nearly 10 percent of the first-year class at Williams this year is black ... a major gain over the College’s performance in recent years.”