McKelvey Engineering EDI Action Plan

EDI Action Plan McKelvey School of Engineering Washington University in St. Louis

EDI Action Plan | 2024

Overview:

Marcus B. Foston Associate Professor and Director of Diversity Initiatives

We will enact the inaugural McKelvey Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Action Plan (“EDI Action Plan”) which includes meaningful infrastructure, including investments in our community, support systems, and structures, to achieve inclusion and belonging for all at McKelvey. The EDI Action Plan will advance equity, diversity, and inclusion for the entire McKelvey community. It recommends both general activities and targeted investments in specific areas of our community where we seek to — and know we can — enhance inclusion and move toward a place of belonging for all.

The McKelvey community recognizes that diversity — of backgrounds, lived experiences, and social identities — is a strength that we must foster. The Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) Committee developed this EDI Action plan in pursuit of a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive environment that empowers our students, postdoctoral researchers and scholars, staff, and faculty to be their best and fullest selves. This plan reflects the need to create and enhance dedicated systems and structures within our School whose primary objective is making it possible to embed principles of EDI into everything we do, including but not limited to teaching, learning, innovation, research, and service.

Previous strategic planning processes helped us to recognize that meaningful progress in EDI is challenging without a concerted and strategic effort; dedicated personnel, infrastructure, and resources; and initiatives and investments that evolve based on thorough assessments. Having a weak EDI infrastructure is a core reason many organizations struggle to make systematic change and sustain lasting progress. This plan articulates a commitment to develop an infrastructure that drives and sustains data-driven decisionmaking and investment around EDI. Infrastructural development is not our goal, but rather a phase to be simultaneously and subsequently leveraged to enable positive culture change. Thus, as a roadmap for future EDI strategic planning, resource allocation, and implementation, the EDI Action Plan provides a clear vision for EDI with specific near-term investments and also affords flexibility for longer-term investments that will help positively shape our culture over time.

As with the overarching strategic plan, the commitment to this EDI action plan involves our entire McKelvey community, starting with McKelvey leadership. This means that the Dean, department chairs, and McKelvey senior leaders must not only support this plan with resources but also play an active role in its implementation both as community gatekeepers and members. We all have a stake in creating the environment we want for McKelvey. I am excited for the work ahead that will continue shaping our school into a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive engineering community.

EDI Action Plan Mission & Vision Our EDI Committee has worked diligently to develop an EDI mission, vision, and strategy. Input from the EDI Committee, strategic planning Steering Committee and Subcommittees, McKelvey Staff Council, department chairs, and other community members helped us to shape the EDI Action Plan you see here.

Mission: Advance McKelvey’s ability to pursue its mission as a school by creating and sustaining an infrastructure that fosters accountability, engagement, and leadership commitment toward a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive environment that respects and accommodates all.

Vision: Equity and inclusion will be inextricably interwoven into the fabric of the McKelvey culture through our systems, structures, policies, practices, relationships, community, and decision-making. To have recognized our opportunities and shortcomings and taken actions that build the equitable, diverse, and inclusive culture we want to experience.

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Key Concepts To support the development of the next generation of engineers in teaching, scholarship, and research, we must be grounded in a shared language for EDI. Below we provide some common EDI definitions. We are not telling our people how to think about these concepts, but rather providing a common language with which our faculty, staff, researchers, and students can communicate.

I.

Equity Equity promotes equal outcomes by prioritizing justice and fairness. In McKelvey, our goal is to provide everyone the opportunity to become their best and fullest selves regardless of background and privilege. We recognize that this sometimes requires investments tailored to the needs of different populations.

II.

Diversity Diversity is representation of the range of backgrounds, experiences, and identities held by members of the McKelvey community. We will create a community in which members of diverse races, ethnicities, nationalities, abilities, genders, sexual orientations, ages, and socioeconomic status want to engage.

III.

Inclusion Inclusion ensures that all are invited to contribute to the development and direction of McKelvey. A key element of inclusion is the perception of belonging, safety, and membership.

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Snapshot of the McKelvey Community McKelvey’s students, postdoctoral researchers and scholars, faculty, and staff are the heartbeat of our school. We have a moral and operational imperative to build an environment in which our community members feel welcomed, included, and empowered. Our community members will not be passive spectators in our strategic priorities and initiatives, rather, they will be the key executors of those priorities and realizing our vision. This EDI Action Plan is a commitment by McKelvey and its leadership to build a rich and vibrant community.

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Looking back Since the 2018 strategic plan, we have made significant investments in undergraduate and graduate student services to enhance student success and equity.

Undergraduate Student Services increased the size of and diversity within student support services and dedicated resources to supervising student affinity groups, the first-year experience, and summer/ bridge programs. McKelvey’s Graduate Student Services centralized efforts to enhance graduate student recruitment, admissions, and professional development. Graduate program advisor positions were created to act as a student’s first source of information about academic matters and support, including mental health and bias reporting. The Women & Engineering Center, led by a full-time staff member and supported by a part-time administrative staff member, was created to foster community through shared experiences, mentorship, and leadership development. Through advocacy and empowering individuals to overcome challenges, the center aims to develop a sense of belonging and support community members in their lifelong professional pursuits.

McKelvey also created the Vice Dean for Faculty Advancement position to work with the department chairs to assess and monitor faculty mentoring and career development, to develop faculty leadership training opportunities, and to coordinate nominations for faculty awards in support of the full range of faculty career progression. Outside of the strategic plan, we created the Director of Diversity Initiatives position to chair the McKelvey EDI Committee. Along with a fulltime staff member and part-time administrative staff member, this group considers all EDI issues relevant to student, staff, faculty, and postdoctoral researchers and scholars, and develops and implements McKelvey’s EDI strategies, programs, and initiatives.

Since 2018, McKelvey has increased the number of first-year Pell-eligible undergraduate students from 14% to 28%; first-generation undergraduate students from 8% to 19%; undergraduate students who identify as women from 27% to 39%; and undergraduate underrepresented students of color from 17% to 28%.

Over a similar period in McKelvey, the retention rate increased for first-year Pell-eligible undergraduate students from 80% to 91%; women undergraduate students from 83% to 93%; and undergraduate underrepresented students of color from 75% to 88% with first-generation undergraduate students remaining at or near 85%. While these numbers are quite strong compared to national averages, we know we can do more to further increase our undergraduate student diversity while boosting rates of retention and matriculation, especially among historically underserved populations.

There are several areas cited in the 2018 plan in which we have fallen short. These include providing opportunities for students, faculty and staff to learn and practice the skills needed on their journey toward equity and inclusion; making strong efforts to increase the number of women and underrepresented faculty and graduate students; adding robust mentoring program designed for historically underserved populations; and adding support for international students and student veterans.

We have learned two valuable lessons. First, although data and assessment may reveal damaging revelations, they are critical tools that provide insights and benchmarks into how students, staff, faculty, and postdoctoral researchers experience McKelvey’s culture and uncover critical information to create datadriven EDI strategies. Second, strategic investments in infrastructure and systems, guided by a clear mission and vision, are required for positive culture change.

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Looking forward Our racial demographic data only reflect domestic faculty and students. Of those, 56%, 18%, and 43%, of the McKelvey faculty, graduate students, and undergraduate students respectively, identify as white; 39%, 7%, and 21% as Asian; 3%, 2%, and 8% as Black. Additionally, 67% and 9% of the graduate students and undergraduate students, respectively, are non-resident aliens, where the vast majority of those would also identify as Asian. With respect to gender, 15%, 32%, and 33% of the McKelvey faculty, graduate students, and undergraduate students respectively identify as women.

In the past several years — particularly since the events nationwide in 2020, including the death of George Floyd — there has been a concerted effort among our staff and faculty to focus more on EDI. We have held several Engineering, Education & Race seminars open to all to promote discussion and communication.

However, more than half of McKelvey staff have worked in the school for five years or less, emphasizing that we need to ensure that the focus on EDI is continuous and woven into the culture, not just acknowledged at a few events each year.

Recent surveys asking staff about the climate in McKelvey Engineering were mostly positive, however, there were some areas of concern, including only 60% agreement that people with different ideas are valued in the school; 65% agreement that people from diverse backgrounds are valued in the school; and 66% agreement that the school does enough to attract, develop and retain people with diverse backgrounds.

In a 2021 survey of staff about diversity, most respondents provided a neutral response on whether leadership handles diversity matters satisfactorily and communicates to those who use offensive language, jokes or behavior that this is unacceptable in the school. Open-ended responses called on leadership to “ask and act,” “walk their talk,” and to indicate more clearly their intent to “make a real change.”

This EDI action plan is intended as a recognition of our diverse community. We know that the experiences, backgrounds, and needs of our faculty, of which men are the significant majority, are not always the same as those of our staff, of which women are the majority. Our increasingly diverse community includes groups with different goals and challenges. Our hope is that this plan celebrates that diversity and fosters it as a strength.

racial demographic data

b+5639+3 b+6718+72 b+4321+98 Non-resident alien: 67%

faculty

White: 56% Asian: 39% Black: 3%

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graduate students

White: 18% Asian: 7%

Black: 2%

undergrad students

White: 43% Asian: 21% Non-resident alien: 9% Black: 8%

1.

Schoolwide EDI Infrastructure McKelvey will invest resources in establishing mechanisms that drive and assess positive culture change, embed EDI into all aspects of the school’s operations, and enhance our collective ability to act in equitable and inclusive ways. We will be a stronger community because of these investments that empower every McKelvey student, staff, faculty, and postdoctoral researcher and scholar regardless of their title, role, tenure, and/or social identity.

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Communications i. Develop and implement an EDI Communication Plan to promote transparency about our EDI values, status, and directions; encourage data-driven conversations about existing EDI challenges and how best to address those; and create an informed dialog within McKelvey, particularly with leadership, about EDI. ii. Establish a school-wide process and system for communicating the ongoing activities within McKelvey to improve EDI while identifying synergies and sharing best practices among departments within McKelvey, between McKelvey and its departments, between McKelvey and other schools, and between McKelvey and the university about approaches and strategies to improve EDI.

Data, Governance, and Decision-Making i. Commit to regular EDI data collection to ensure accountability (e.g., PULSE surveys, climate surveys, course evaluations) and track the impact of the investments made as result of the EDI Action plan. A goal is to empower leadership with the information required to alter initiatives and relocate resources based on data. ii. Develop McKelvey’s EDI data sharing practices to ensure data is shared appropriately, school leadership is equipped to make data-informed decisions, and that the McKelvey community has opportunities to understand important schoolwide decisions. iii. Formalize the EDI Committee as a standing body with a formal charge, dedicated funding, and defined advisory role to the Dean.

Support Structures i. Create a framework, to be applied school-wide, for staff-manager alignment that entails regularly clarifying standard work with the aims of creating equitable and inclusive environment. ii. Establish “staff community norms” or guiding principles that set clear expectations of behaviors and attitudes that build a shared belief in a collaborative working environment and normalize habits that create a greater sense of safety and belonging. iii. Develop a leadership development program required for all McKelvey staff managers with the goal of supporting managers’ self-awareness and expanding capacity for leading inclusive teams. iv. Build additional capacity within McKelvey human resources, enabling the school to perform pay equity analysis, measure progress in employee inclusivity and belonging efforts, reduce barriers between employees and McKelvey human resource personnel, increase coordination with university-level human resource personnel, and design/deploy employee support and experience programs. v. Hire staff and allocate resources to assess undergraduate and graduate student success and equity, understand the sense of inclusion among students, and track metrics assessing progress towards stated goals in the EDI Action Plan. vi. Hire and allocate staff dedicated to McKelvey’s EDI journey, the implementation of the EDI Action Plan, and support the efforts of the Director of Diversity Initiatives, EDI Committee/Specialist, and Women & Engineering Center.

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2.

Population-Specific EDI Infrastructure and Programs McKelvey will invest resources in building infrastructure and programs where change is necessarily related to specific dimensions of EDI. We recognize that the unique backgrounds, strengths, and experiences of our McKelvey community members make us strong. Because we do not all live, work, or experience McKelvey in the same way, we will make data-driven investments that target specific parts of our culture and community.

Increase representation of racial diversity among our PhD student, postdoctoral researchers and scholars, and faculty populations Why focus on this aspect of our culture and community? We must strive for diverse representation. Not only are we behind our peers with regard to racial diversity among faculty, postdoctoral researchers and scholars, and graduate students, we know that interacting with faculty, lab mentors, and assistants who “look like you” can promote student success, encourage student engagement, and improve sense of belonging. Furthermore, the research also indicates that diverse teams innovate at higher rates and produce stronger research outcomes.

Our Vision. We envision a future in which engineering faculty, postdoctoral researchers and scholars, and graduate students from historically underserved populations want to come to McKelvey because they know the School is a place where they can thrive and belong.

Ongoing or Near-Term Infrastructure and Programmatic Investments i. Establish a Graduate Student EDI Taskforce: Composed of faculty on departmental graduate committees, graduate program advisors for each department, and a staff member from the office of Graduate Student Services, this group will develop and implement a centralized strategy to improve graduate student recruitment, access, equity, and success of historically underserved populations. ii. Develop a Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) and Minority Serving Institutions Strategic (MSI) Partnership Program: An engagement strategy that provides incentives for coordinated activity with partners under a framework that aligns with best practices to build reciprocal and transformative partnerships. iii. Develop a Postdoctoral Recruiting Toolkit: Resources and training for faculty to implement talent acquisition strategies designed to broaden and diversify the candidate pool for postdoctoral researchers and scholars.

Potential Areas of Longer-Term Infrastructure and Programmatic Investments i. Develop and implement Post-Baccalaureate or Predoctoral Programs – Enhancing the participation of students from historically underserved populations in McKelvey PhD programs in engineering through intensive research, academic, and mentoring experiences. ii. Establish a Faculty Target of Opportunity Program: This program would develop a system that actively identifies and tracks research talent from populations that would increase diversity among the McKelvey faculty at the early stages of their PhD career through continuous surveillance of research groups and programs, recruiting networks, HBCU/MSI partnerships, professional society conferences, etc.

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Foster inclusivity by creating more opportunities to engage, contribute, and grow within McKelvey Why focus on this aspect of our culture and community? Diversity does not lead to an inclusive culture. For diversity to enhance research, work, and learning outcomes, our McKelvey community including women, community members of color, and those who identify as LGBTQIA+ must also feel as though they belong.

Creating an inclusive culture represents an operational and moral imperative that requires intentional action.

Our Vison. We envision a future in which women, community members of color, and those who identify as LGBTQIA+ are not just represented at McKelvey but are empowered and equipped to be their best selves.

Our students, staff, faculty, and postdoctoral researchers and scholars will recognize that McKelvey is invested in their personal and professional growth as well as the advancement of the school’s academic and research missions.

Ongoing or Near-Term Infrastructure and Programmatic Investments i. Create a Diversity Grant Initiative: Provides a mechanism for the McKelvey community, outside of leadership, to play an integral role in creating a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive culture through innovative activities and projects design through a bottom-up and crowdsourced process. ii. Launch an EDI Certificate Program: Welcomes McKelvey faculty and staff to join the school’s pursuit of an environment where EDI is indispensable to the pursuit of excellence and distinction. iii. Expand the Engineering, Education & Race Series: Create a lecture series that invites experts in advancing equity for women, community members of color, and those who identify as LGBTQIA+ in STEM education and workforce development to speak to our McKelvey community. iv. Pay Equity Analysis: Pay gaps are a top inequity among underserved populations and the top-cited workplace inequity for women. Collecting data and eliminating disparities in this area will assist in recruiting and retaining diverse talent. Perform statistical analysis of payroll data to understand whether pay disparities exist among McKelvey staff. v. Identify a LGBTQIA+ Community Resource Specialist: An advocate for LGBTQIA+ students, faculty, postdoctoral researchers and scholars, and staff to work with the Director of Diversity Initiatives and EDI Committee to ensure that barriers facing McKelvey’s LGBTQIA+ community are identified and addressed, maximizing opportunities that support achievement and well-being.

Potential Areas of Longer-Term Infrastructure and Programmatic Investments i. Dedicate Spaces for Staff to Collaborate: As our workforce adopt more a remote work culture, dedicated physical spaces to enable collaborative work and social engagement needed to ensure the productivity that result from connectivity and community. ii. Create a Leadership Development Program - Becoming a leader is something that happens with time, along a journey of attempts, experiences, and failing-forward moments. Leadership skills can be established and fine-tuned with a program and in an environment that allows leaders to feel safe with taking a look in the mirror, while actively developing new knowledge with and through a cohort by “rumbling with vulnerability” and testing theories together in real time.

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As disparities are identified, develop policies and practices to increase student equity and success Why focus on this aspect of our culture and community? Nationally, gaps in academic preparation, institutional awareness, metacognitive skills, and executive functioning skills as well as a lack of a sense of belonging and community have been major factors that drive inequity in student success. We will work to identify challenges faced by McKelvey students, to reduce barriers to student engagement, and provide more equitable support structures that meet our students’ diverse needs.

Our Vision. We envision a future in which every McKelvey student has the necessary support to achieve their academic goals, fostering a holistic student experience and assisting them in reaching their personal, professional, and academic aspirations.

Ongoing or Near-Term Infrastructure and Programmatic Investments i. Create a Common STEM Ecosystem and Experience: Partner with Arts & Sciences to improve first-year student experience via a common STEM student ecosystem and experience. ii. Establish Experiential Learning Grants – Designed to expand access to experiential learning activities.

Potential Areas of Longer-Term Infrastructure and Programmatic Investments i. Purpose and Impact: Develop a framework to regularly explore and reinforce the connection among a student’s educational experience pathway at McKelvey, long-term professional objectives, and desired future impact on the world. ii. Develop a more inclusive engineering curriculum – Assist departments in implementing more inclusive teaching strategies across a selection of core courses for each undergraduate degree offered.

Methodologies include representing diverse types of peoples and perspectives through course content and materials as well as using effective syllabus and classroom behavioral policies to promote an inclusive environment. iii. Create Curricular Pathways with Delayed Math and Natural Science Requirement: Provide supportive and flexible degree progress options to support students who may need additional time or who have demonstrated academic and financial need (e.g., creating a 5-year pathway to graduation option).

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Measuring Success McKelvey has an urgent need to understand — through data — where it has been, where it is now, and what positive change looks like. The need for data and systems for data analysis to inform decision-making is a real concern, but also an unacceptable excuse for inaction.

Our challenge is building an infrastructure that drives and sustains data-driven decision-making and investment around EDI while taking immediate action to begin to address issues known to affect academia across the country. It is important that we develop investments and strategies in pursuit of a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive environment based on well-understood best-practices and national trends. But also, to collect and leverage data to evolve those investments to impact the specific needs and culture of McKelvey.

To do so, we will need to establish systems that ensure data availability and accessibility required for accountability, transparency, decision-making and problem-solving while using data-sharing policies that prevent the misuse or misunderstanding of that data. It is our commitment to regularly evaluate our need for resources, to develop and evolve initiatives and investments, communicate our motivations and reasons for the choices made to deploy limited resources, and report our progress or lack of progress — successes and failures — so that our community can hold us to account.

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