Collegiate Times

A specialized group has been working behind the scenes for the past few years to set aggressive goals to diversify the Virginia Tech community. The task force on race and the institution released a series of reports suggesting key ways Tech could improve campus diversity.

In late 2006, Tech became the center of controversy when the political science department chose not to renew the contract of Christopher Clement, a black political science professor. This task force answered the demands of the community to look into the matter.

Some prominent members of Tech's community, including some prominent minority faculty, are members of the task force. Wayne Scales, an electrical and computer engineering professor, is leading the task force's diversity initiative.

The task force was asked to devise a plan diversify the university in six categories. They include faculty and staff, undergraduates, graduate students, alumni and community engagement, the administrative structure, and academic programs, according to a university press release.

One of the initiatives that gained momentum through this initiative was the Mosaic Program, headed by Ray Plaza, director of Diversity Initiatives at Virginia Tech and member of the racial task force.

"The Mosaic Program is a racially diverse program that is housed in Slusher Tower, and has since last year almost doubled in size," Plaza said.

Tech created the "Presidential Scholarship Initiative" in order to offer a competitive financial aid program to attract a more diverse student body.

"This will be almost like Virginia Tech's version of a full-ride scholarship," Plaza said.  "It will state that the university will only match the amount of financial aid along with other scholarships that you are given, in order to bring in a more diverse student base."

The maintenance of a high GPA will be necessary to keep this scholarship, but it will be renewable for over four years.

After the goals were set by the task force, an implementation team set out to determine which of these goals could feasibly achieved by Tech.

"I am very happy with the way the implementation team has taken the task force's goals and selected things to focus on ... they set down concrete things and focused on getting them done ... We will be building on existing capacities as well as creating new outlets for racial diversity," said University Provost Mark McNamee.

Tech will also be focusing on hiring a more diverse faculty, along with focusing on "expanding and strengthening" the already existing Africana Studies program.

"We are in the process of putting a search committee together to help us find more faculty members to bring in ... It will be a blanket search all over the country," McNamee said. "It's a deliberate process to recruit new faculty, but the sooner we get this started, the better."

This program is set to span over five years, with a formal review of the workings of the program after each year.

"This will allow for us to check our progress ... We will use a diversity scorecard to asses our strategies and make sure we are getting the most 'bang for your buck,' if you will," Plaza said.

The latest report was sent April 2007.

"I believe that the report from the task force was set aside a bit considering the tragedy of April 16, so not many people realized that it was released," Plaza said.

Over the next five years, Virginia Tech will be looking to put the focus on expanding diversity, bringing in more students from different backgrounds and cultures, and expanding the cultural and racial diversity of the faculty.

"If we all work together, we can really make some progress," McNamee said.