Institutional Leadership that Reflects Higher Education’s Diversity: A Status Report

It is common knowledge among those who follow the demographics of positional leadership in higher education—and even among casual observers—that the upper ranks of faculty and administration fail to reflect the rich diversity of higher education’s student bodies. Drawing from research compiled for AAC&U’s recent report A Measure of Equity: Women’s Progress in Higher Education, this issue’s “Data Connection” explores the statistics behind that statement with a series of graphs depicting demographic distribution at each rung of the higher education ladder. Due to discrepancies in the available data and for the sake of comparison, the data below do not include persons of unidentified race and ethnicity or nonresident aliens (unless otherwise noted). Percentages cited here represent only the five racial/ethnic groups listed—white, black, Hispanic, Asian/Pacific Islander, and American Indian/Alaska Native—rather than the full diversity of the population at large. The legend for all graphs is:

Students

Women’s representation among undergraduate students is near 57 percent, both among the groups cited here and among the general population. Women of color represent 20 percent of undergraduate students, but only 17 percent of graduate students and 16 percent of first-professional students. Likewise, men of color saw smaller shares particularly at the graduate level, as they represented 13 percent of undergraduate students, 9 percent of graduate students, and 12 percent of first professional students. White women actually hold a higher share of graduate enrollment than undergraduate enrollment (46 percent versus 38 percent), but drop over 3 percentage points between undergraduate and first professional school (where they represent 34 percent of students). In contrast, white men see much higher shares of first professional enrollments (38 percent) than undergraduate (30 percent) or graduate enrollments (29 percent) (Snyder, Dillow, and Hoffman 2008).

Faculty

At the faculty level, women hold more than 50 percent of positions only at the lower ranks, among lecturers and instructors. Among full professors in the identity categories included here, women hold a mere 25 percent of positions (compared with 39 percent of associate professors and 47 percent of assistant professors). Women of color represent only 3 percent of full professors—an 11-percentage-point drop from their representation as graduate students, and a 7-point drop from their representation as assistant professors, where they are 10 percent of the population. Meanwhile, men of color represent 11 percent of assistant professors and 9 percent of full professors among the populations considered here. White men represent 41 percent of assistant professors and 65 percent of full professors (Snyder, Dillow, and Hoffman 2008).

Administrators

Although chief academic officers (CAOs) represent only a portion of higher education’s administrative force, according to the American Council on Education, they also represent the primary pathway to the president’s office. It is thus significant that women represent 40 percent of CAOs, both in the populations cited here and more generally—suggesting limits to parity, but great potential for women to move into the president’s office (Eckel, Cook, and King 2009). At the presidential level, however, women represent only 23 percent of office holders, both among the populations cited here and among the general population (American Council on Education 2007). Among the populations cited here, women of color represent 6 percent of CAOs and 4 percent of presidents, and men of color represent 7 percent of CAOs and 8 percent of presidents. White women represent 34 percent of CAOs and 19 percent of presidents, and white men represent 53 percent of CAOs and 69 percent of presidents (Eckel, Cook, and King 2009; American Council on Education 2007).

Conclusion

At the undergraduate level, American higher education is beginning to reflect the rich diversity that is characteristic of contemporary American society. Yet at higher rungs on the ladder, white women and women and men of color represent a smaller proportion of the higher education community. As the American Council on Education has repeatedly stressed, there is clear opportunity to bring greater diversity to the higher levels of positional leadership, particularly within administration, but in the faculty ranks as well. Leadership that is demographically diverse, however, will mean little without a commitment to leading in a manner that supports all of higher education’s diverse students. The distribution of students within the undergraduate student body suggests that students come to higher education with a wide range of experiences and needs, and it is up to higher education’s leaders, both positional and not, to provide leadership that is attentive to this diversity and the benefits it can provide American colleges and universities.

For a more in-depth review of the statistical representation of women in higher education, see A Measure of Equity: Women’s Progress in Higher Education, a new report released by the Program on the Status and Education of Women. Copies of the report are available for purchase at www.aacu.org/publications.

References

American Council on Education. 2007. The American college president: 2007 edition. Washington, DC: American Council on Education.

Eckel, P. D., B. J. Cook, and J. E. King. 2009. The CAO census: A national profile of chief academic officers. Washington, DC: American Council on Education.

Snyder, T. D., S. A. Dillow, and C. M. Hoffman. 2008. Digest of education statistics 2007. Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics, Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education. nces.ed.gov.