Topic: Diversity, equity, and inclusion
Past Event
May 21, 2023
Living Wages in the Museum Field: Signs of a Crisis on the Horizon
Session at the 2023 American Alliance of Museums Annual Meeting
On Sunday, May 21 at 8:40 – 9:05 am MDT at the 2023 American Alliance of Museums Annual Meeting, Ithaka S+R’s Liam Sweeney, Deirdre Harkins, and Joanna Dressel will present a session on signs of a crisis on the horizon for the museum field, drawing insights from the Art Museum Staff Demographic Survey, published in November 2022.
Past Event
May 19, 2023
BTA and Ithaka S+R: Perspectives from the Art Museum Trustee Survey
Session at the 2023 American Alliance of Museums Annual Meeting
On Friday, May 19 at 11:30 – 12:30 pm MDT at the 2023 American Alliance of Museums Annual Meeting, Ithaka S+R Senior Analyst Liam Sweeney and Analyst Deirdre Harkins will present a session on the Black Trustees Alliance for Art Museums and Ithaka S+R Art Museum Trustee Survey, published in November, 2022. The survey examined the experiences and demographics of art museum trustees from museums in the US, Canada, and Mexico.
Blog Post
February 14, 2023
An End to Affirmative Action Must Not—and Need Not—End the Pursuit of Diversity at Selective Colleges and Universities
If, as is widely expected, the US Supreme Court issues a decision in 2023 that significantly limits, if not completely prohibits, the use of race in college and university admissions, it would come at exactly the wrong moment in the ongoing struggle to address our racial history. To further socioeconomic mobility and racial equity in the United States, selective colleges and universities must create more opportunities for high-achieving students from racially minoritized backgrounds, not fewer. But even if the Court…
Issue Brief
February 10, 2023
Alternative Strategies to Support a Diverse Student Body
Affirmative Action at Risk
With a decision pending in two lawsuits challenging race-conscious admissions practices at Harvard and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC), many observers are predicting that the US Supreme Court will significantly limit, if not completely prohibit, the use of race in college and university admissions. Such a decision would stand sharply crosswise to current needs. Selective colleges and universities, both public and private, are still far from embodying racial equity.
Blog Post
November 16, 2022
New Insights on Trustees and Staff in Art Museums
The Black Trustee Alliance 2022 Art Museum Trustee Survey and the Art Museum Staff Demographic Survey 2022
Today Ithaka S+R releases two research reports, the 2022 Art Museum Trustee Survey and the Art Museum Staff Demographic Survey 2022, which introduce new insights into key constituencies in the cultural sector. For roughly a decade Ithaka S+R has produced research reports that shed light on strategy and leadership, staff demographics and employment characteristics, as well as governance and organizational structure within art museums.
Research Report
November 16, 2022
The BTA 2022 Art Museum Trustee Survey
The Characteristics, Roles, and Experiences of Black Trustees
The Black Trustee Alliance for Art Museums (BTA) has partnered with Ithaka S+R to examine the experiences and demographics of art museum trustees from museums in the US, Canada, and Mexico. Through a shared interest in representation in the arts, BTA and Ithaka S+R fielded the Art Museum Trustee Survey to board members in the fall of 2021. The report investigates the characteristics, roles, and experiences of Black trustees in North American art museums.
Research Report
November 16, 2022
Art Museum Staff Demographic Survey 2022
With support from the Mellon Foundation and in partnership with AAM and AAMD, Ithaka S+R conducted a third cycle of the Art Museum Staff Demographic Survey. As museums have struggled with revenue losses due to the pandemic, many in the field expressed concern that museums would grow less diverse. This study shows that the opposite is true. Findings shed light on the trajectory of demographic changes and the impact of the pandemic on staffing.
Playbook
November 9, 2022
Leading by Diversifying Collections
A Guide for Academic Library Leadership
Academic libraries build collections in the context of their parent institutions—primarily to support the institution’s research, teaching, and learning mission. They also build collections that document and preserve the cultural and scientific heritage of our society to represent a wide range of perspectives. In these efforts, universities and their libraries are developing approaches that address calls for greater diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) with a focus on creating space for and the perspectives of historically marginalized groups.
Blog Post
October 12, 2022
The Library Director Survey 2022 is Live!
We are excited to announce the launch of the 2022 Ithaka S+R Library Director Survey. In order to track high-level strategic and leadership perspectives across the field, we conduct a national survey of academic library deans and directors every three years. Consistent with previous survey cycles, this iteration of the study will provide insights into issues of strategic priorities, budgeting, staffing, and collections, as well as introduce new questions designed to track emerging trends in the field.
Past Event
September 21, 2022
Closed Door Conversation: The Inaugural Art Museum Trustee Survey Report
Black Trustees Alliance for Art Museums
On September 21st at 4:00 – 5:30 pm, the Black Trustees Alliance for Art Museums (BTA) is hosting a closed-door conversation with BTA membership to share the complete findings from the Inaugural Art Museum Trustee Survey. Liam Sweeney and Deirdre Harkins will present “The Characteristics, Roles, and Experiences of Black Trustees,” alongside BTA Data Chair Celeste Watkins-Hayes. The session will end with a Q&A session, giving attendees the opportunity to ask questions and provide feedback. The final report will be…
Blog Post
August 18, 2022
Diversity, Equity, and the PhD Pipeline
Expanding the Toolkit
The growing mismatch between the profiles of current full-time faculty, 75 percent of whom are white, and the nation’s increasingly diverse undergraduate student bodies, 45 percent of whom are people of color, represents a serious threat to socioeconomic and racial equity and intergenerational mobility. In spite of a generation of comprehensive targeted enrichment interventions from the undergraduate through postdoctoral fellowship stages, public and privately-funded efforts to increase the number of PhDs from historically underserved populations has been painstakingly slow.
Issue Brief
August 18, 2022
Post-Baccalaureate Bridge Programs
An Underutilized Tool for Strengthening Faculty Diversity
Over the last 50 years, the US has experienced significant shifts in its racial and ethnic makeup, making it a much more racially diverse country than it was a half century ago. The racial and ethnic composition of the higher education system has shifted too. In spite of this progress, various forms of racial bias, socioeconomic inequality, and academic gatekeeping continue to limit access of students from underrepresented minority (URM) and low-income backgrounds to higher education’s resources and potential benefits.
Blog Post
July 26, 2022
An Interview on QuadEx, Duke University’s New Equity-based Residential and Learning Model
Dr. Jenny Wood Crowley and Chris Rossi on Driving Campus Change
As part of our Academic Equity Interview Blog series (see linked our previous posts on campus climate and mental health), we explore how Duke University, a member of the American Talent Initiative’s (ATI) Academic Equity Community of Practice, is driving campus change through their inclusive living and learning model, QuadEx. QuadEx…
Blog Post
July 21, 2022
Gearing Up for the Ithaka S+R National Library Director Survey
This fall, Ithaka S+R will be fielding the sixth iteration of our Library Director Survey. While we ran a special cycle of the survey in 2020 to track pandemic-related decision-making among academic libraries, as well as changing perspectives on diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility and anti-racism, this upcoming survey marks the return to our triennial cycle, established in 2010. The Library Director Survey 2022 examines the strategic and leadership perspectives of…
Issue Brief
May 16, 2022
Can Evidence-Based Teaching Techniques Address the Education Debt that Students of Color Are Owed?
Evidence-based teaching strategies (EBTs) have become increasingly popular, as the practices have been linked to positive academic outcomes and should, theoretically, benefit all students regardless of their background. In this brief we identify the areas where research on EBTs lacks a critical, equity-minded orientation and offer suggestions on how future research can utilize an equity-first mindset. We present strategies that can be used by practitioners who hope to orient EBTs towards creating equitable learning environments for their students.
Research Report
March 31, 2022
The Impacts of Emergency Micro-Grants on Student Success
Evaluation Study of Georgia State University’s Panther Retention Grant Program
The Panther Retention Grant (PRG) program at Georgia State University (Georgia State) is one of the nation’s pioneering examples of a retention or completion grant program, a type of emergency financial aid program aimed at supporting students with immediate financial need. The program, which specifically targets students who are in good academic standing and have exhausted all other sources of aid, automatically awards up to $2,500 to clear students’ unpaid balances and allow them to remain enrolled for the term.
Research Report
March 30, 2022
Underrepresentation of Black and Latino Undergraduates at America’s Most Selective Private Colleges and Universities
Attending a more selective college or university matters because these institutions graduate a larger share of their students. Attaining a bachelors’ degree increases expected lifetime earnings by roughly 65 percent over attaining only a high school diploma. Who has access to these selective institutions therefore has an impact on economic and social mobility in America, an objective that justifies the federal, state and local support of higher education. However, evidence suggests that selective schools could be doing more.
Past Event
April 8, 2022
Data for Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging in the Arts
Ithaka S+R with Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
Mark your calendars! Next Friday, April 8th at 12:30pm Eastern, Ithaka S+R will be in conversation with the Mellon Foundation via Instagram Live (@mellonfdn) to discuss the value and impact of data for diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging in the arts. Now and over the next few months, please send your questions or comments to sr-amsds@ithaka.org. We encourage all art museum employees and stakeholders to engage with us in this future-forward discussion about the Art Museum Staff Demographic Survey. …
Blog Post
March 17, 2022
Art Museum Staff Demographic Survey Cycle 3
Interim Updates
On Monday, February 7, 2022, Ithaka S+R opened Cycle 3 of the Art Museum Staff Demographic Survey—a survey funded by the Mellon Foundation and fielded in partnership with the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD) and the American Alliance of Museums (AAM). Cycle 3 has now been open for approximately one month, and we would like to offer the following updates to support art museums still compiling their employee…
Blog Post
February 11, 2022
Announcing the Next Cycle of the Art Museum Staff Demographic Survey
The Mellon Foundation and Ithaka S+R opened the third cycle of the survey on February 7
In 2014 and 2018, Ithaka S+R partnered with the Mellon Foundation, the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD), and the American Alliance of Museums (AAM), to conduct a quantitative study on diversity within art museums who are part of these associations. We are excited to announce the continued collaboration through a third cycle of the demographic survey examining diversity amongst art museum employees. Previous Cycles The idea…