DOI: 10.5061/dryad.cfxpnvxbb
title: Data for: A path forward: creating an academic culture of justice, equity, diversity and inclusion

description: Institutions of higher education (IHE) throughout the United States have a
 long history of acting out various levels of commitment to diversity
 advancement, equity, and inclusion (DEI). Despite decades of DEI
 “efforts,” the academy is fraught with legacies of racism that uphold
 white supremacy and prevent marginalized populations from full
 participation. Furthermore, politicians have not only weaponized education
 but passed legislation to actively ban DEI programs and censor general
 education curricula (https://tinyurl.com/antiDEI). Ironically, systems of
 oppression are particularly apparent in the fields of Ecology, Evolution,
 and Conservation Biology (EECB)–which recognize biological diversity as
 essential for ecological integrity and resilience. Yet, amongst EECB
 faculty, people who do not identify as cis-heterosexual, non-disabled,
 affluent white males are poorly represented. Furthermore, IHE lack metrics
 to quantify DEI as a priority. Here we show that only 30.3% of US-faculty
 positions advertised in EECB from Jan 2019-May 2020 required a diversity
 statement; diversity statement requirements did not correspond with
 state-level diversity metrics. Though many announcements “encourage women
 and minorities to apply,” empirical evidence demonstrates that hiring
 committees at most institutions did not prioritize an applicant’s DEI
 advancement potential. We suggest a model for change and call on
 administrators and faculty to implement SMART (i.e., Specific, Measurable,
 Achievable, Realistic, and Timely) strategies for DEI advancement across
 IHE throughout the United States. We anticipate our quantification of
 diversity statement requirements relative to other application materials
 will motivate institutional change in both policy and practice when
 evaluating a candidate’s potential “fit”. IHE must embrace a leadership
 role to not only shift the academic culture to one that upholds DEI, but
 to educate and include people who represent the full diversity of our
 society. In the current context of political censure of education
 including book banning and backlash aimed at Critical Race Theory, which
 further reinforce systemic white supremacy, academic integrity and justice
 are more critical than ever. 
description: Here we investigated the (lack of) process in faculty searches at
 IHE for evaluating candidates’ ability to advance DEI objectives. We
 quantified the prevalence of required diversity statements relative to
 research and/or teaching statements for all faculty positions posted to
 the Eco-Evo Jobs Board (http://ecoevojobs.net) from January 2019 - May 2020 as a proxy for institutional DEI prioritization (Supplement). We also mapped the job posts that required diversity statements geographically to gauge whether and where diversity is valued in higher education across the US. Data analysis We pulled all faculty jobs posted on Eco-Evo jobs board (http://ecoevojobs.net) from Jan 1, 2019, to May 31, 2020. For each position, we recorded the Location (i.e., state), Subject Area, Closing Date, Rank, whether or not the position is Tenure Track, and individual application materials (i.e., Research statement, Teaching statement, combined Teaching and Research statement, Diversity statement, Mentorship statement). Of the 543 faculty positions posted during this time, we eliminated 299 posts because the web links were broken or application information was no longer available (i.e., “NA”), leaving 244 faculty job posts. For each of the retained posts, we coded the requirement of teaching, research, diversity, and/or mentorship statements as follows: "Yes” = statement required  “No” = statement not required  “Other” = application materials did not explicitly require a Diversity Statement (i.e., option or suggested that applicants include a statement on diversity and inclusion as a component of their teaching and/or research statement or in their cover letter) Data visualization We created a Sankey diagram using Sankey Flow Show (THORTEC Software GmbH: www.sankeyflowshow.com) to compare diversity and representation from the general population, through (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) STEM academia (a career hierarchy often referred to as the “leaky pipeline”). We procured population data from the US Census Bureau (US Department of Commerce: https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045219) and quantified the diversity/representation in Conservation Biology (https://datausa.io/profile/cip/ecology-evolution-systematics-population-biology#demographics) and Ecology (https://datausa.io/profile/cip/conservation-biology) using Data USA (developed by Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited and Datawheel). We used the 2015 Diversity Index (produced by PolicyLink and the USC Program for Environmental and Regional Equity: https://nationalequityatlas.org/indicators/Diversity_index/Ranking:33271/United_States/false/Year(s):2015/) to quantify relative ethnic diversity per state, and graphed Figure 2B using the <em>tidyverse</em>, <em>rgdal</em>, <em>broom</em>, and <em>rgeos</em> packages in R (see Base code used to produce Figure 2 in R, below). The Diversity index measures the representation of White, Black, Latino, Asian/Pacific Islander, Native American, and Mixed/other race in a given population. A maximum possible diversity score (1.79) would indicate even representation of all ethnic/racial groups. We checked all figures using the Color Blindness Simulator (ColBlindor: https://www.color-blindness.com/coblis-color-blindness-simulator/) to maintain inclusivity.
description: Google Sheets or Excel is required to open Lafferty
 et al. Data_File.xlsx Sankey Flow Show (THORTEC
 Software GmbH: www.sankeyflowshow.com) used to create the Sankey diagram Figure 2 produced in R
description: Reference Information === Provenance for this README --- * File name:
 README\_Dataset-Academic-JEDI.txt * Authors: Erin A. McKenney * Other
 contributors: Diana J. R. Lafferty, Tru Hubbard, Sarah Trujillo, DeAnna
 Beasley * Date created: 2023-06-08 * Date modified: 2023-10-18 Dataset
 Attribution and Usage --- * Dataset Title: Data for the article “A path
 forward: creating an academic culture of justice, equity, diversity and
 inclusion” * Persistent identifier: DOI:10.5061/dryad.cfxpnvxbb * License:
 Use of these data is covered by the following license: * Title: CC0 1.0
 Universal (CC0 1.0) * Specification:
 https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/; the authors
 respectfully request to be contacted by researchers interested in the
 re-use of these data so that the possibility of collaboration can be
 discussed. *** Methodological Information === * All data were collected by
 the authors. * Methods of data collection/generation: see manuscript and
 Supplemental Materials for details *** Data and File Overview === Summary
 Metrics --- * File count: 4 * Total file size: 352.12 KB * Range of
 individual file sizes: 2.82 KB - 222.60 KB * File formats: .xlsx, .R,
 .doc, .md *** Table of Contents --- * Lafferty et al. Data\_File.xlsx *
 Lafferty et al. Base\_Code.R * Lafferty et al.
 Supplementary\_Materials.docx * README.md *** File/Folder Details ===
 Description of the Data and file structure --- * Data are provided in xlsx
 format. * Supplementary Materials including R code are provided in .Docx
 format. Details for: Lafferty et al. Data\_File.xlsx --- * Description: An
 Excel spreadsheet with 4 tabs: * Raw = raw job data including job post ID,
 Institution, location, subject area, closing date, rank, tenure track,
 contributor, notes; whether research statement, teaching statement,
 combined teaching and research statement, diversity statement, mentoring
 philosophy statement, and/or other statement was required. * Clean = same
 headers as Raw, but some data entries were recoded for consistent format.
 * Fig2A\_BarChart = data used to produce the barchart in Figure 2A *
 Fig2B\_MapData = data used to produce the map in Figure 2B * Size: 123.51
 KB Details for: Lafferty et al. Base\_Code.R --- * Description: Base code
 used to create Figure 2 in R. * Size: 2.82 KB Details for: Lafferty et al.
 Supplementary Materials.docx --- * Description: A Word document containing
 detailed Materials and Methods and compiled resources that already promote
 diversity advancement * Size: 222.60 KB Details for: README.md --- * Size:
 3.10 KB *** END OF README