Back to DEI Home

SCS DEI Update

Oct. 9, 2020

At its foundation, the School of Computer Science is a collective and expansive community, committed to equity and inclusivity. We are a global community, and it is crucial that SCS be welcoming and inclusive to achieve excellence in the instruction, research and application of computer science. We work to ensure equal access for students, staff and faculty from diverse backgrounds.

We know our country is a disproportionally dangerous place for our Black citizens. Because of this, we strongly support the Black Lives Matter movement and nonviolent protests aimed at achieving equality. Just as we have pledged to stand with our international students when their visa statuses have been threatened — and as we have stood firmly alongside our community members affected by the #MeToo movement — so, too, do we stand alongside all students, staff and faculty from underrepresented groups.

Accordingly, many factions of SCS have come together to create this document — one that will give voice to our actions on diversity, equity and inclusion. We must recognize the work currently underway and offer thanks to all members from our community for their contributions and commitments thus far. Additionally, we welcome and appreciate the discussions and enthusiasm from all corners of SCS to begin additional initiatives that serve to make our school more diverse, equitable and inclusive.

With these goals in mind, we bring you this update on the activities of SCS’ initiatives on diversity, equity and inclusion. It will be the first of a continuing series of updates published roughly every two weeks going forward.

This is not meant to be a definitive or exhaustive list of our initiatives and activities, but rather a framework for all of SCS to gather, gain insight, reflect and to contribute. We intend to create this forum of ideas where SCS students, staff and faculty are able to stay informed on current actions and to collaborate on solutions where progress may require their assistance. We realize that we are not able to accomplish everything we set out to do all at once. Therefore, we will be looking to all SCS academic and operating units for partnership and support to achieve the pledges we have made, and the pledges we will identify and add.

SCS Pledges To:

Embed diversity, equity and inclusion in all our goals and efforts

• We are currently conducting meetings to coordinate DEI efforts across all SCS working groups.
• Development of an SCS Communications Plan is underway.

Increase BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and People of Color) recruitment and hiring 

• Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REUs) represent a key opportunity to expand the scope of applicants to our master's and Ph.D. programs. We have demonstrated success with REUs in our departments and plan to expand the program across SCS departments.

Establish stronger connections with minority-serving undergraduate institutions, feeder programs, and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs)

• We will continue our recruitment efforts internally with SCS4All and AIforAll; this year, we are expanding to include virtual mentoring at TAPIA and the Grace Hopper conferences. We will track interactions with students at these events and how they affect our constituency.
• We will pilot a BIPOC virtual recruiting event in the HCII.

Publish a diversity statement and plan for its institution within hiring committees

• A Diversity Statement is currently part of employment application.
• We are revising and implementing hiring processes, including committee selection, training, and evaluation.

Create onboarding and mentorship materials for all SCS stakeholders, outlining our commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion

• Our new faculty orientation has expanded again this year to understand bias and how to mitigate it. In the next year, we will continue to expand this kind of training to make it a part of orientation for SCS students at all levels.
• We plan to invest in pre-UG and pre-Ph.D. summer programs to provide additional academic preparation.

Create sources of advocacy and mentorship within each of SCS’s units

• DEI committees have been formed in all SCS units; the Dean's Advisory Committees created.
• We are making sure that people know where to go if they have experienced or witnessed behaviors in our community that reveal bias and unequal treatment.

Collect data to benchmark our progress

• We are developing the tools for tracking and publishing data on our outreach, admissions and hiring programs.

Build ties to and increase connections within our own faculty, student organizations, and staff members that foster inclusion and retention 

• We are currently implementing community engagement programs. Example: HCII’s 30-day racism challenge allowed people to engage with content to educate themselves every day for 30 days

Communicate our DEI progress across SCS (via email, publications, social media and web) including upcoming events and opportunities for collaboration as well as ideas for replication of program successes across divisions.

• We will continue to work with and communicate with the SCS community on our DEI efforts
• We will host a special diversity speaker series in the next academic year with the goal of expanding our collective thinking on these issues.

We will report on additional and upcoming efforts as we make progress that applies to our stated goals.

We have collectively gathered these goals, which represent our shared desire for change. These include, but are not limited to, the stated goals of CMU President Farnam Jahanian, the SCS Report on DEI, goals collected from across SCS departments and units, student and faculty petitions and the input of SCS’s broad constituencies. We ask for your commitment to help implement these goals alongside the cooperative efforts of every member of the SCS community.

Though we are a diverse community, we intend to come together with one voice, one unified response for the SCS community. We thank each of you for the work already accomplished and for your support of our efforts going forward to bring more diversity, equity and inclusion to SCS. There is much more work ahead of us going forward. We require the help of all to fully carry out our efforts.

Please visit the SCS DEI website for a complete record of these updates and to discover ways to connect and collaborate with the efforts of SCS.

Martial Hebert
Dean, School of Computer Science