The University of Massachusetts Boston has dropped a requirement that potential professors pledge a commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) as part of their job application, but such requirements are growing at schools nationwide.
The college had required applicants for positions as assistant computer science professors to write a "diversity statement that reflects [their] commitment to diversity equity and inclusion," writes New York Post columnist Rikki Schlott in a Friday opinion piece.
Further, she said that applicants for a lecturer position in the Department of Health Science had to demonstrate a commitment "to support[ing] our goal of ensuring an inclusive, equitable, and diverse workplace and educational environment."
The school dropped the requirement after complaints from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), a First Amendment watchdog group that said the requirement encroached on the faculty's First Amendment right "not to adopt prescribed views."
"Their subjective criteria could easily also be abused to penalize applicants with minority, dissenting, or even simply nuanced views on DEI-related issues that may not dovetail perfectly with the university's goals," FIRE program officer Haley Gluhanich wrote to the university, said Schlott, adding that she agrees.
"Requiring professors to profess allegiance to vague and highly politicized concepts of 'equity' and 'inclusion' is undoubtedly an infringement upon their academic freedom," Schlott wrote.
She added that in her book, "The Canceling of the American Mind," she and co-author Greg Lukianoff argued that it's time for colleges to drop required DEI statements.
"To any sensible person, a statement requiring you to explain your commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion is a political litmus test," Lukianoff, the president and CEO of FIRE, told The Post. "There is literally no way that's not being abused as a way to evaluate someone's politics."
Meanwhile, surveys show that the use of DEI criteria is a growing movement in the nation's colleges and universities.
The American Association of University Professors found in a 2022 survey of large colleges that 46% use DEI criteria while granting tenure.
In another survey, by the University of California, Berkeley, it was revealed that 76% of those applying to become a life sciences professor were eliminated from the hiring pool because of their diversity statements.
"If only certain views on DEI are allowed, campuses — where merely 1 in 10 professors consider themselves conservative, according to recent numbers from the Higher Education Research Institute — will undoubtedly become even more insulated echo chambers than they already are," Schlott wrote.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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