Diversity UPDATE
Autumn 2003
Vice Provost for Minority Affairs
Autumn 2003
Message from Mac
Dear Friends of Ohio State,
I am happy to report that our efforts to attract and retain academically talented students continue to show progress, according the university's latest enrollment report. More importantly, the report shows that enrollment of minority students across all Ohio State campuses improved for the third straight year.
The freshman class of 2003 is the best academically prepared incoming class at Ohio State. The number of first-quarter freshmen attending the Columbus campus is 6,258, representing a 6.3 percent increase above the previous year. Fifty percent of these first year students scored between 23 and 28 on their ACT's, improving the entering class ACT average to a record 25.4, compared to 25.2 the past two years.
In terms of minority enrollment, we have made gains, despite some decreases among minority freshmen. Record enrollment was noted among African Americans, now at 3,959, up from 3,941. The number of Asian and Pacific Islander students increased to 2,745, a 3.5 percent rise from 2,652, while Hispanic students increased 12.1 percent from 1,034 to 1,159.
In addition to these gains, I am also very pleased with the degree to which our minority students have prepared themselves for the academic rigors of Ohio State, and I have every reason to believe that they will help move the university toward even stronger retention and graduation rates in future years.
Please take a moment to review this publication and share it with your colleagues. I think you'll be impressed with the breadth and depth of initiatives, programs, and activities occurring, which help foster a diverse learning environment at Ohio State.
Mac A. Stewart
Vice Provost
Minority Investment Firm to Oversee $233.8 Million Package
A minority investment firm has been awarded the management of a $233.8 million bond package, the largest in the history of Ohio higher education financing. SBK-Brooks Investment Corp. of Cleveland will serve as senior account manager for 24 separate Ohio State projects, marking the first time a minority investment firm will serve in that role for the university.
The projects include construction of the Richard M. Ross Heart Hospital and the renovation and expansion of Larkins Hall and various academic buildings. Outstanding notes and bonds also will be refunded.
University Treasurer Jim Nichols said the bond issue, recently approved by the university's Board of Trustees, is just one result of Ohio State's long-term commitment to include minority-owned companies in university business operations. Identifying companies that could provide financial services was a key initiative, he said. "Building business relationships that result in such partnerships has been a key part of our effort,"
Nichols said. "We have worked with SBK-Brooks in the past and found that the company provided excellent service to Ohio State." Since 1990, minority firms have helped issue 86 percent of six bond issues totaling $697 million. A minority firm has been the top-performing fixed income manager for Ohio State's endowment for three of the past four years.
Minority firms manage the investment of more than one-fourth of the actively managed portion of the university's $1.3 billion endowment fund. Nearly one-third of the $3.7 billion of securities purchased by Ohio State during the past four fiscal years were bought from minority brokers or dealers. Nichols said that continued progress is dependent on the active recruitment of minority firms. "We will continue to recruit minority-owned companies to ensure that they are provided with the necessary information and resources to participate in the business operations conducted here at Ohio State," Nichols said. "It is critically important to the overall goals and mission of the university."
Faculty and Staff Recruitment
President Karen Holbrook has named Barbara Snyder as interim executive vice president and provost. Snyder is filling the position until a permanent replacement is named for Ed Ray, who left the university to become president of Oregon State University. For the interim position, Holbrook said she wanted to select an individual with leadership ability; an understanding of operations in the Office of Academic Affairs; the respect of faculty, staff, students, deans, vice presidents, and a strong working relationship with each group; an understanding about the university and its Academic and Diversity plans; and an effective working relationship with the Board of Trustees, the University Senate and the student governments. Snyder is a vice provost in the Office of Academic Affairs and professor in the Moritz College of Law. A 1976 Ohio State graduate, she earned her law degree from the University of Chicago and practiced law in Chicago. She has been a member of the law faculty here since 1988, and currently holds the Joanne W. Murphy/Class of 1965 Professorship in the Moritz College of Law. From 2000 to 2001, she served as the college's associate dean for academic affairs.
Jacqueline Jones Royster has been named interim dean of the College of Humanities, replacing Michael Hogan, who has been named executive dean of the newly combined Colleges of the Arts and Sciences. Royster is a professor of English and serves as senior associate dean for research and faculty affairs in the College of Humanities. Before her appointment as associate dean, Royster served as director of the University Writing Center and vice chair for rhetoric and composition in the Department of English. She earned her bachelor's at Spelman College in Atlanta, and both her M.A. and D.A. at the University of Michigan. Among her many honors, Royster is this year's University Distinguished Lecturer. She recently completed a book, Profiles of Ohio Women 1803-2003, which was supported by the Ohio Women's Hall of Fame. The book's introduction was written by Hope Taft.
Dr. Alex Ortega, a leading authority on Latino mental health research and pediatric health care disparities, has joined the College of Medicine and Public Health as an associate professor in the division of health behavior and health promotion. Ortega's research interests also include health and health care disparities by ethnicity and class, and the co-existence of asthma and mental illness in children. Before joining Ohio State, Ortega was an assistant professor of health policy and administration at Yale University. He holds a master's degree in public health in epidemiology and biostatistics from Boston University and a doctorate in epidemiologic science from the University of Michigan. He earned his B.S. from the University of New Mexico. John Roberts, professor of English, was recently appointed associate dean in the College of Humanities. He is the former deputy chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities and also was chair of the Department of African American and African Studies. He is responsible for research and faculty affairs, undergraduate initiatives, and curricular and instructional oversight within the college. Roberts also served as director of the Afro- American Studies Program at the University of Pennsylvania.
Hugo Melgar-Qui˜onez has joined the College of Human Ecology as a state specialist with OSU Extension Family and Consumer Sciences and an assistant professor in the Department of Human Nutrition. With an M.D. and Ph.D. in medicine from Friedrich Schiller University in Germany, he has worked with the National Institute for Public Health in Mexico, and as a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Nutrition at the University of California-Davis. He will be working with Latinos, other minority groups and low-income families to assess dietary and eating patterns and determine how teaching and research can improve diet and health.
Student Recruitment and Retention Glenda P. La Rue has been named director of the Women in Engineering Program in the College of Engineering. She will focus her efforts in recruiting and retaining high-quality women undergraduate and graduate students for the engineering program, establishing close relationships with industry, and strengthening community outreach activities. La Rue earned a bachelor's and master's degree in civil engineering from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech).
Allies for Diversity is a new student-run, campuswide organization in the residence halls that is designed to encourage awareness of diversity issues through educational programs and service projects. This living-learning program, with 600 volunteers this fall, provides an in-depth leadership opportunity for students while they explore issues of difference. The program is coordinated through the Residence Education Office.
The Office of Minority Affairs, in collaboration with the Graduate School and the Professional Colleges, hosted the 33rd Annual Graduate and Professional Student Visitation Day. Faculty, staff and students shared information about Ohio State's programs to undergraduates from schools around the country. The program addressed various topics, including financial aid, international programs and diversity initiatives. Rodney Slater, formerly U.S. Secretary of Transportation, gave the keynote speech.
The Office of Minority Affairs and Student Affairs cosponsored a two-day retreat for African American male freshmen. The event was designed to help freshmen transition more easily from high school to college, and featured group exercises and a speaker's panel to help these students identify resources and develop skills that would enhance their opportunity for success. Speakers included university administrators, students and community leaders.
Academic and Research Programs
A $7.5 million grant from the National Cancer Institute will support the creation of a Center for Population Health and Health Disparities to study why some people have a higher cancer risk than others. Initial studies in the new center will focus on the unusually high incidence and mortality from cervical cancer in Ohio's Appalachian region. Dr. Electra Paskett, associate director for population sciences in the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center and co-director of the diversity enhancement program at the Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute, is the principal investigator of the grant.
In October, four American Indian dancers from two areas in the United States spent a week working with the Advanced Computing Center for the Arts and Design and the Multicultural Center in documenting dances through motion capture technology and video. This project was funded through a BETHA grant for the purpose of exploring the value of this process for Native people and nations, as well as for helping non- Natives to understand the dances beyond a sociocultural perspective.
Leadership/Recognition
The Kirwan Institute for Race and Ethnicity hosted a symposium that examined diversity and affirmative action in the United States and Latin America. john powell, executive director of the institute, moderated sessions that included the attorney who defended the University of Michigan's affirmative action policies before the U.S. Supreme Court. In addition, the International Human Rights Law Group, which works with affirmative action proponents in Brazil and Uruguay, participated in a panel discussion. Staff from the Office of Minority Affairs presented at the American Council on Education's National Conference on Diversity and Improving Inclusiveness in Higher Education. Representatives from the Young Scholars Program discussed how early intervention can improve retention of low-income minority students.
Cynthia A. Tyson, professor of education, was an invited speaker and one of more than 180 representatives who met in New York City last summer in the first-ever national Human Rights Education Summit, sponsored by Amnesty International USA. She highlighted the challenges and opportunities for teaching and conducting research in today's political climate. She also discussed how a continued consideration of institutional racism should be at the center of future work to transform the world into a place where human rights are universally understood and respected.
A Fisher College case team comprised of secondyear MBA students was recently selected as one of six finalists in the National Black MBA Case Competition. Since 1992, the NBMBA Case Competition has given students an opportunity to interact and participate at the organization's annual conference. Corporate representatives judge competition participants in areas such as problem-solving skills and analytical proficiency.
Access for the Disabled
Peter V. Paul, director of the School of Teaching and Learning, was invited to make a presentation via video-link to Birmingham, England, for a seminar on the early literacy development of children with deafness, visual impairment or deafness and blindness. Paul's topic was "Literacy, Literate Thought, and Deafness." The School of Education at the University of Birmingham sponsored the event. Teaching With and About Disability was the topic of workshop moderated by Scott Lissner, Ohio State ADA Coordinator. Faculty members Stephen Kuusisto and Brenda Brueggemann (professors of English) and Massimo Morelli (professor of economics) served on a panel that explored key issues for instructors with disabilities at major research universities. Their discussion included issues related to access, accommodations and attitudes in higher education, as well as ways to integrate disability as a subject in the university curriculum.
Awareness
The university launched another year of the President and Provost's Diversity Lecture Series with a presentation by Gerald Torres, professor of law and vice provost at University of Texas, Austin. The lecture series will feature 16 presentations throughout the academic year, and will include such speakers as Mahnaz Afkhami, president of the Women's Learning Partnership; Wilson Cruz, Latino actor; Eric Liu, founder of the How We Teach Initiative; Beverly Tatum, president of Spelman College; Christopher Edley, founding co-director of the Civil Rights Project; and a performance by the Trinidad Tripoli Steel Band.
Ohio State's Office of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Student Services sponsored a National Coming Out Day in October. The day was created in 1988 to encourage GLBT individuals to disclose their sexual or gender identity to others to increase the community's visibility, and to educate society about experiences of GLBT people.
The College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences (FAES) is sponsoring a year-long series titled, "United in Diversity." Originally developed to provide professional development opportunities to faculty, students and staff within the college, FAES opened the training to the university this fall. Sessions will examine such topics as heterosexism and homophobia, communication differences among men and women, disability as an aspect of diversity, and Appalachian culture.
Outreach Activities
The Health Partnerships Group, in collaboration with the African American and African Studies Community Extension Center and the College of Nursing, sponsored a "Fall into Good Health Day" in October. The event provided free flu vaccines and tetanus/diphtheria shots to qualified adults, and free blood pressure screening, blood glucose screening and cholesterol screening also were available. Nursing students worked with health planners, public health nurses and dietitians from the Columbus Health Department to plan the event.
The College of Dentistry has been awarded a $650,000 grant to provide dental treatment and oral hygiene education to children attending the Columbus Public Schools. The grant will help provide on-site dental care at various elementary schools. Canise Bean, assistant professor of dentistry and director of the OHIO Project, a statewide oral health care outreach initiative, said that access to dental care remains the Number1 unmet health care need in Ohio.
