Students Ask Carnesale For a Diverse Faculty

A coalition of students at the Kennedy School of Government is asking newly-appointed dean Albert Carnesale to make a serious commitment to increasing diversity on the school's faculty.

Representatives of the Kennedy School's Coalition for Diversity and several minority groups handed Carnesale a joint petition outlining hiring goals on Tuesday night, just moments after President Neil L. Rudenstine named him the school's new dean.

"Our first goal is the creation of an affirmative action committee to bring minority professors to the school," said David S. Medina, a student in the Master of Public Policy program and member of the Coalition for Diversity steering committee.

Medina said an affirmative action committee was in place at the school last year but has been "neglected" since the resignation of former dean Robert D. Putnam.

The petition also asked Carnesale to give special consideration to minority candidates for a vacant junior faculty position in the field of race and politics and to make sure the number of minority profesosrs does not drop beneath its current level.

Sabrina S. Gee, a second-year student and co-chair of the Asian Student Caucus, said the affirmative action committee could be an effective tool in identifying strong minority candidates.

"Searches [for Kennedy school professors and lecturers] are often limited in their scope in terms of connections who are contacted," Gee said. "The searches may not include a representative pool of minority candidates."

The petition was signed by the co-chairs of the Asian Student Caucus; the Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Caucus; the Women's Caucus; the Hispanic Caucus; the Jewish Caucus and other members of the Coalition for Diversity.

The petition was a follow-up to a letter written to Carnesale earlier this year in anticipation of his appointment to the deanship. The letter, dated November 15, asked Carnesale to commit resources to creating a faculty which is diverse in terms of race, sex and sexual orientation.