Study after study has found that diversity, equity, and inclusion programs in higher education and in the corporate world build a workforce better suited to solving global problems. Yet DEI programs — also referred to as DEIB programs, with the B standing for belonging — are under increasing legislative attack. Since 2023, 86 bills dismantling or limiting them have been introduced in 28 states and as of August 30, 14 have passed, according to the Chronicle of Higher Education. These new and pending laws are deeply affecting public university systems in states such as Texas, Florida, Alabama, Utah, Tennessee, and North Carolina.
A June Ipsos poll published by The Washington Post found that 57% of Americans overall said DEI programs neither help nor hurt them personally, while 25% said they benefit from such efforts and 14% said DEI personally hurts them. Overall, 63% of Americans said DEI programs help workers with disabilities, 58% said they help Black workers, and 55% said they help Hispanic workers. Another 54% said DEI helps LGBTQ+ workers, and a little more than half said DEI helps women workers.
A clear majority of the public approves of DEI programs, yet backlash from some state legislatures is persistent and growing. If that weren’t bad enough, DEI has become a political dog whistle, even a slur. Vice President Kamala Harris, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, and former U.S. Secret Service director Kimberly Cheatle — all women in powerful leadership roles — have been called “diversity hires” by Republican members of Congress and prominent political operatives. All are women; Jean-Pierre is Black and a member of the LGBTQ+ community, and Harris is Black and South Asian.
It’s easy to empathize with the woman who marched against the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade with a sign reading: “I can’t believe I have to do this AGAIN.”
Irene Mulvey, Ph.D., the immediate past president of the American Association of University Professors, or AAUP, knows that feeling. “We’re being pushed back decades,” she said. “How many times do we have to prove DEI works?”
“This is a backlash against progress that we’ve seen before.”
– Irene Mulvey, Ph.D.
Drilling down, fighting back
In a blistering takedown of one bill banning DEI programs in public universities, Texas State Senate Bill 17, Dr. Mulvey brought the full weight and authority of the 109-year-old AAUP to a Texas Senate hearing. “By dismantling the framework that underpins all of American higher education,” she said, “by dismantling DEI efforts and continuing to so brazenly undermine the role of faculty, SB 17 will lead to diminished educational quality that will show up before you know it in measurable ways, with faculty leaving, in rankings, in accreditation, in applications, in enrollment, and in donations.”
Despite her warning, lawmakers passed SB 17, and it went into effect on Jan. 1, rippling through Texas’ many public universities. The law bans all DEI offices, programs, and training along with preferential hiring and diversity statements. It includes exceptions for student groups, research, teaching, and admissions, but a chilling effect is predictable.
“We’re up against something very big right now,” Dr. Mulvey said. “This is a well-funded, decades-long, highly coordinated effort to undermine public confidence in higher education. It sets us back decades in our efforts to promote underrepresented groups, to help them thrive and succeed in engineering and science.”
Dr. Mulvey explained that these actions are just one part of a larger plan. “Before that, there were attacks on critical race theory and faculty tenure, and the Supreme Court’s overturning of affirmative action. It’s aimed at diminishing the role of higher education, which is a pillar of democracy. It is vitally important to have an autonomous and independent system of higher education, so that you have experts, especially in engineering, who can call out policymakers and corruption in business and the government. That is what’s being attacked.
“Women engineers need to know that certain groups aren’t underrepresented in engineering because of inherent differences in ability,” she continued. “It’s because systemic barriers make it more difficult to succeed. Cutting these programs means fewer resources for students that need support. It’s devastating for women, students of color, and all the groups that are underrepresented.”
Another far-reaching consequence of banning DEI is amplifying inequality. “Cutting programs has a devastating effect on recruitment and retention of the best teachers. Many faculty are fleeing those states, and students are losing mentors,” Dr. Mulvey said. “It’s utterly predictable that faculty are going to leave, talent searches will fail. Wait three years for data and a study? You really don’t need to. It’s already happening.”
“Opponents of DEI think we’re treating women and underrepresented groups differently at the expense of others, but we are actually treating each student as an individual.”
— Bevlee Watford, Ph.D.
Taking action
Dr. Mulvey’s words go hand in hand with a recent statement from the American Civil Liberties Union that reads: “In its attacks on DEI, the far right undermines not only racial justice efforts but also violates our right to free speech and free association. Today, the ACLU is determined to push back on anti-DEI efforts just as we fought efforts to censor instruction on systemic racism and sexism from schools.”
The AAUP is also pushing back and recently created the Center for Defense of Academic Freedom with a $1.5 million grant from the Mellon Foundation. One of the center’s first actions was to release a white paper identifying 11 organizations associated with the anti-DEI effort and the dark money involved. Among them are the Heritage Foundation, the Center for Renewing America, and the Texas Public Policy Foundation — all conservative think tanks. Two more, the Manhattan Institute and the Goldwater Institute, published a road map for state legislatures to “abolish DEI bureaucracies” in higher education.
The AAUP is amplifying its voice by forming alliances and partnerships with state chapters of the NAACP and growing the number of AAUP chapters on campuses. “Just because a bill passes doesn’t mean the fight’s over. Our efforts have made bills less bad even in Texas,” Dr. Mulvey said. “We’re not going to give up, and we’re getting stronger. We’ve started 16 new collective bargaining chapters, and 60 more non-collective bargaining chapters have formed in the last two years. That kind of organizational growth is unprecedented.”
Meanwhile, the continued targeting of DEI sends a message to some students that they don’t belong. Dr. Mulvey, who earned a Ph.D. in mathematics in the early 1980s and witnessed the women’s liberation movement and the subsequent languishing of the Equal Rights Amendment, takes a long view. “This is a backlash against progress that we’ve seen before,” she said. “To use an engineering metaphor, these things work like a pendulum. It swings back and forth.
“But we don’t give up; we keep fighting. It’s better now than it was before, and it will be better later than it is now. Stick with it, find mentors, and they will help you get the support you need.”
“We serve all of society as problem-solvers addressing the world’s most challenging problems in health, in the economy, in exploration of space. To do that, we need a diverse set of engineers that fits the diversity of the society that we serve.”
– Keith Molenaar, Ph.D.
Working within the law
Universities are finding ways to work within new limitations without jeopardizing the progress DEI efforts have made. Some have renamed programs and job titles to avoid crackdowns, while others plan inclusion efforts carefully, consulting with lawyers.
Bevlee Watford, Ph.D., associate dean of equity and engagement and executive director of the Center for the Enhancement of Engineering Diversity, or CEED, at Virginia Tech’s College of Engineering, shared her approach, which is grounded in what DEI represents. “We support all students,” she said. “When there are only one or two students from an underrepresented group, they need to feel like they belong. We’re not doing this because they’re women or because they’re Black. It’s just what that particular student needs to be successful. And we do that for all students. Every student.
“Opponents of DEI think we’re treating women and underrepresented groups differently at the expense of others, but we are actually treating each student as an individual,” she explained. “And we want each one to be successful. That’s why we need DEIB programs for women and other groups in engineering because the system was not designed with them in mind or for them to have community.
“How can you just turn around and say now women can come into a system that wasn’t designed for them and [let them] just figure it out by themselves?”
Dr. Watford doesn’t think CEED is threatened by any current Virginia law but points out that avoiding problems took careful planning and expert legal counsel. “Back in 2000, we were flat-out told we could not have programs targeting specific groups along gender and racial lines,” she said. “So, we designed programs to support any student that comes into the College of Engineering. We have a Living-Learning Community that helps women, but we also have one for men. There’s a peer-mentoring program for Black students, but we also have one for women, for Hispanic students, for any student. We make sure that every support mechanism is open to all students.”
Dr. Watford notes that this strategy offers good protection from lawsuits but that it’s very expensive protection. “Instead of working with 500-600 women and a couple of hundred students of color, I have to work with the entire freshman class,” she said.
CEED has three flagship programs — Women Learning, Summer Bridge, and Peer Mentoring. Dr. Watford highlights Peer Mentoring, which dates to the center’s founding in 1992 and gets significant participation from all students.
“In the first 10 weeks of the spring or fall semester, freshmen can informally meet upper-class students who help them figure out how to be successful,” Dr. Watford said. “It’s very low-key and doesn’t strike the students as ‘targeted support’ or some kind of crutch. It’s community and making friends, a place where students of color and women students can find each other in the crowd.”
To avoid lawsuits, CEED stopped asking certain questions on applications. “With our girls summer camp, we don’t ask about gender, so we can’t be accused of selecting students based on that,” she said. “Instead, we advertise a summer camp that focuses on issues related to women in engineering. Boys are not barred from applying, but why would they want to? It’s the same with our Black Engineering Excellence program. We make it clear that the camp addresses issues related to Black students’ pursuit of engineering degrees. It’s perfectly legal because anyone can apply and be admitted.
“We work really hard at being clear about the intent and content of the program. Then we cross our fingers and hope we can follow through,” she said. “For the most part, we haven’t had problems legally or from individuals.”
Providing proof
University of Colorado Boulder, also called CU Boulder, is a shining example of DEI success, where 41% of students at its College of Engineering and Applied Science are women, up from 27% 20 years ago. Dean Keith Molenaar, Ph.D., said getting there took persistent precollege outreach, follow-through on recruiting, building a welcoming community for students, and creating a strong alumni network to keep the engineering pipeline full and robust.
“Speaking broadly, engineering is a profession of caring,” Dr. Molenaar said. “We serve all of society as problem-solvers addressing the world’s most challenging problems in health, in the economy, in exploration of space. To do that, we need a diverse set of engineers that fits the diversity of the society that we serve.”
The college’s Broadening Opportunities Through Leadership and Diversity Center, or BOLD Center, was founded 15 years ago. “It’s a place where all students can find a home and a place of mattering, especially our first-generation college students and underrepresented students,” Dr. Molenaar said.
The BOLD Center also serves as a springboard for identity-based organizations like the Society of Women Engineers, the National Society of Black Engineers, the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers, and Out in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. “We’ve created a space of welcoming for students who have been historically underrepresented in the engineering community,” he said.
Dr. Molenaar also points to the role of community colleges in DEI’s impact. “In Colorado, community colleges offer associate degrees in electrical, mechanical, architectural, and aerospace engineering, so we partner with them to create pathways, especially for those with financial needs and first-generation students, to transfer here for their final two years. We’re a state flagship that serves all of Colorado, so we’re working to make those pathways as seamless as we can.”
Though the College of Engineering doesn’t have its own chief diversity officer, it embraces the “shared equity leadership model” to address campus inequity through collective responsibility, thus keeping DEI from becoming marginalized. “We all have a DEI role, a personal journey, and objectives we’re trying to achieve. It really helps,” Dr. Molenaar said.
Even in a state where the law is fully supportive of DEI initiatives, Dr. Molenaar acknowledges that much more work needs to be done. “When I was a University of Colorado student in the late 1980s, I frequently had classes with very few women colleagues, and that’s just in my lifetime,” he said. “We still have so far to go to create an engineering workforce that reflects the population we serve.”
A Turbulent Timeline
Texas State Senate Bill 17, which bans diversity, equity, and inclusion offices and divisions in Texas’ public universities, became law in January. Ever since, it has sown confusion, faculty reassignments, and firings as administrators struggle to comply. The turmoil at The University of Texas at Austin is just one example of what laws like this can do:
January: SB 17’s lead author, Republican Sen. Brandon Creighton, warned, “Colleges that violate the law could have their funding frozen and face legal ramifications.” Scrambling, to comply, UT Austin rebranded its Division of Diversity and Communication as the Division of Campus and Community Engagement, or DCCE, eliminating some positions and reassigning others. The university also closed its 10-year-old Gender and Sexuality Center and opened its Women’s Community Center in the same space while announcing it was eliminating all training and workshops related to race, sexual orientation, and gender identity, including training for people seeking to be designated as allies. It also closed its Multicultural Engagement Center, which had served students for decades.
April: The Daily Texan reported the closure of the DCCE and subsequent layoffs (many of them on Zoom calls with human resources), leaving staff and students reeling. Programs previously housed under the DCCE, including the Women’s Community Center, were “dissolved.”
May: Creighton expressed concerns that colleges were not fully complying with the law and called a hearing. The Texas Tribune reported that “university system administrators explained to the Texas Senate subcommittee on higher education how they were complying with the state law. They said they have redirected millions of dollars away from their now-defunct DEI offices toward redoubling recruiting efforts and developing alternative student support programs.”
July: The Chronicle of Higher Education reported on the April closures after gaining access to public records: “Women make up more than half of the staff at the Austin campus but accounted for more than two-thirds of the DEI-related cuts,” the June 27 article stated. “Black people are 7% of the staff but absorbed almost a third of the cuts.”
Out of an abundance of caution, many Texas universities have ended programs that likely could have survived legal scrutiny. “A lot of institutions are relying on their general counsels to make these calls, and many are making them in a very conservative way,” Antonio L. Ingram II, a senior counsel with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, said in an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education. “Any ambiguities in SB 17 are being construed against populations that in some way are disfavored by those in power — immigrants, queer people, trans people — it’s almost like a carte blanche to attack them.”
Keep up with DEI legislation affecting universities in your state: https://www.chronicle.com/article/here-are-the-states-where-lawmakers-are-seeking-to-ban-colleges-dei-efforts
References
“Most Americans approve of DEI, according to Post-Ipsos poll,” The Washington Post, June 18, 2024.
