Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion

From the Dean

The School of the Arts is committed to nurturing a creative environment where students, faculty, and staff of all backgrounds can work together and thrive. Over the past several years the School has continued to focus on attracting a diverse faculty, staff and student body while working to increase scholarship funding. The School has also committed a great deal of its extensive public programming schedule at the Lenfest Center of the Arts, and elsewhere, to issues of race and anti-racism by collaborating with multiple partners including the Wallach Art Gallery, individual departments, and a wide-range of local and City organizations.

While we are aware that the issues of race and anti-racism are longstanding, we are actively attempting to acknowledge, understand, and transform them. My hope is that we can work collectively towards creating an environment that honors the rich diversity of our community and one that is in full support and respect of each other.

Carol Becker
Professor of the Arts
Dean of Columbia University School of the Arts

Faculty, Student, Staff Subcommittee

In Spring 2019, the School of the Arts Executive Committee established the Equity, Diversity and Inclusion subcommittee in order to address school-wide challenges and opportunities around equity, diversity, and inclusion in both the academic and co-curricular life of the school. Comprised of faculty, students, and staff, the subcommittee began with the following initial goals:

• Provide support for faculty, students, and staff to promote the schools' continued commitment to diversity and inclusion

• Strategic school-wide interdisciplinary initiatives and programming

• Sharing resources and experiences across the programs

• Efficiency in the School of the Arts' commitment to diversity and inclusion, i.e., avoiding the need to "reinvent the wheel" for each program

• Serve as a clearing house for resources, including research and university and outside programming 

• Assessing and making recommendations to the Dean of the School

Initiatives/Plan of Action

In addition to its listed goals, the subcommittee is currently working on a schoolwide assessment with the goal of an equity report, to be issued at the end of the Spring 2021 semester, recommending short and long term goals and plans. As these initiatives are developed we will provide updates.