Tactics implemented at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln for growing inclusive excellence in engineering Lily M. Wang 1 Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction University of Nebraska - Lincoln 1110 S. 67th St. Omaha, NE 68182-0816, USA

ABSTRACT The percent of women and other underrepresented minorities who receive graduate degrees in engineering within the United States has been steadily increasing over the past 25 years, but it remains under 25%. Many colleges of engineering in the United States are implementing various methods to improve culture towards achieving greater inclusive excellence, helping to support women and underrepresented minorities among their undergraduate, graduate, and faculty populations. In this talk, assorted tactics that have been used at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln will be discussed, many of which could be incorporated into professional society activities. These include offering training on (a) recognizing implicit bias, (b) learning tactics to interrupt implicit bias, (c) growing the number of allies who actively support persons from underrepresented groups in our field, (d) writing diversity statements to include in job applications, and (e) mastering non-violent communication skills. Additionally regular demographic and climate surveys should be conducted to gauge the levels of diversity and inclusivity in our professional societies. Descriptions of the tactics and suggestions on how to deploy them in other organizations are provided.

1. INTRODUCTION

Inclusive excellence is a term that is broadly used to encompass the idea of achieving excellence on foundations of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). Because these three terms (DEI) can be incorrectly used and intermixed, at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln (UNL), the Office of Diversity and Inclusion has been regularly sharing the more precise meaning of each of these terms and how they may be related. Please visit this website to learn more: https://diversi ty .unl.edu/inclusive-excellence-and-definitions 2. EXISTING DATA

The UNL College of Engineering became an inaugural bronze award recipient in the American Society of Engineering Education’s (ASEE) Diversity Recognition Program in 2019: https://diversi ty recognition.asee.org/ . To achieve this honor, colleges had to take the following actions:

• The Dean must complete a Diversity Pledge. • The College must be leading K-12 pipeline activities. • The College must have a partnership with a non-PhD granting engineering school serving populations underrepresented in engineering.

1 lilywang@unl.edu

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• The College must commit to diversifying its engineering faculty. • The College must have a written ‘Diversity and Inclusion Plan’ that includes demographic data to be updated annually. The author had the pleasure of serving as the Associate Dean for Faculty and Inclusion at that time in 2019, responsible for authoring the UNL College of Engineering’s ‘Diversity and Inclusion Plan’. During the writing that document, existing data on the status of diversity were examined, particularly from reference [1]. 2017 population data presented in reference [1] show that women were 51.5% of the US population, Hispanics were 14%, Black or African American were 12%, Asian were 5%, and others were 2%, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Noninstitutionalized resident population of the United States and civilian labor force of the United States from 2017, from reference [1]. That report also shows how the percent of women and other underrepresented minorities who receive degrees in engineering within the United States has been steadily increasing over the past 25 years, but it remains under 25%, and not at all following the representative population percentages in the United States (Figures 2 and 3, also taken from reference [1]). In 2016, 20.9% of all engineering bachelor’s degrees were awarded to women, and 22% of all engineering bachelor’s degrees awarded to underrepresented minorities. The College’s demographic data similarly were at lower percentages than leadership would like, so several different strategies have been followed since 2019 in an effort to increase the diversity of the faculty and the sense of belonging in the College. These include:

• Offering training to faculty, staff, and graduate students on recognizing implicit bias • Offering training to these same groups that cover tactics for interrupting implicit bias • Growing the number of allies who actively support persons from underrepresented groups • Mandating required diversity statements from applicants to UNL engineering faculty positions, and providing rubrics on how those would be assessed (both to faculty candidates and search committee members) • Created a ‘Celebrate Diversity’ website, through which stories of diverse members in the community can be highlighted

© te women © Asian women (© Clack or Aticon American women @ Htspanc or Latino women ‘ter women © rte men © Asianmen lac or Atican American men © ttaperie or Lune men raat

• Sponsoring a College Distinguished Speaker series, to which a range of diverse speakers are invited to present, often in recognition of the particular heritage month • Providing training on mastering ‘crucial conversation’ skills for productive, respectful communication in high stakes conversations • Deploying a regular climate survey to gauge perceptions around diversity and inclusion in our college community

Figure 3: Engineering degrees earned by women, as a function of degree type, from 1997 to 2016, from reference [1].

Doctorate Master's Bachelor's so 40 30 20 Percent women 1997 wo 0 10 20 Number of women (thousands) M2006 M2016 30

Figure 3: Science and engineering degrees earned by underrepresented minorities, as a function of degree type, from 1996 to 2016, from reference [1]. 3. ADDITIONAL RESOURCES RELATED TO TACTICS

Additional resources related to the tactics that are used at the UNL College of Engineering may be found at these following websites:

• ‘Are You Unconsciously Biased?’ https://ncwit.org/resource/are-you-unconsciously-biased/ • Harvard Implicit Bias Test: https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/takeatest.html

Percent 2 20 = —~ 1996, 1998 2000 202 7008 2006 Year © Doctorate > Master's 20082010 © Bachelor's ane Ea ag eg 2016

• The Ohio State University’s Kirwan Institute for the Study for Race and Ethnicity:

https://kirwaninstitute.osu.edu/implicit-bias-training • ‘Ouch! That Stereotype Hurts’ https://www.diversityinclusioncenter.com/ouch-series/ouch-

stereotype-hurts/ • UNL College of Engineering Diversity Statement Rubrics:

https://engineering.unl.edu/candidate-statements/ • UNL College of Engineering Celebrate Diversity website:

https://engineering.unl.edu/celebrating-diversity • UNL College of Engineering Celebrate Diversity Distinguished Speaker Series:

https://engineering.unl.edu/celebrating-diversity/celebrating-diversity-seminars/ • ‘Crucial Conversations for Mastering Dialogue’: https://cruciallearning.com/crucial-

conversations-for-dialogue/

4. REFERENCES

1. National Science Foundation, National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics. Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities in Science and Engineering: 2019 . Special Report NSF 19-304. Alexandria, VA, 2019. Available at https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/wmpd .