Our Actions

The Provost has expanded the program to build inclusive excellence initiated over the past four years, with the Office of the Vice Provost for Faculty Advancement and the Office for Institutional Equity offering inclusive searches workshops for unit leaders and for search committees to promote inclusive and equitable hiring. Incentive funding for hiring diverse faculty has been expanded with a $16 million grant from the Duke Endowment. The effort is multifaceted and includes both individual hires and cluster hires focused on specific themes to build critical mass and expertise.

Update June 2022: The Office of Faculty Advancement has led a 30 percent increase in the number of Black faculty over the last four years; since 2019, 15% of our regular-rank hires have been Black and 10% Hispanic.

The Office for Faculty Advancement provides resources and programs dedicated tor faculty development and community building to support faculty success and retention.

Update, June 2022: Workshops on improving departmental climate, equitable hiring, unit-specific results of the climate survey, and advancement and professional success have been hosted for faculty throughout the year.

Our diversity hiring and retention efforts will be tracked through a new dashboard of faculty diversity data, which will be available to the entire Duke community.

The Provost will continue to review and update our policies and guidelines on promotion and tenure to ensure that they are equitable and attentive to the biases that disadvantage underrepresented faculty and research on underrepresented communities.

In 2021, we offered a new “Foundations of Equity” orientation program for incoming undergraduate students, which will be a part of first-year orientation in all future years.

We are continuing efforts to further diversify our campus, with renewed focus on recruiting students who are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color.

Securing support for students is an evergreen priority for university fundraising. We want all Duke students have access to resources and support so that they can thrive as scholars and participate fully in the life of the university.

Update, June 2022: Financial aid and student resources will be a significant priority for the upcoming development campaign.

The Office of Student Affairs and Office of Undergraduate Education have begun implementing revised recommendations of an undergraduate Hate and Bias Working Group to make that work more transparent, concrete, and responsive; graduate and professional students are undertaking similar work.

A new Low-Income First-Generation Engagement (LIFE) Steering Committee has been established to coordinate programmatic efforts to improve the university experience of these students.

Based on recommendations of the Hate and Bias Working Group, a dedicated Student Ombuds office was created to help undergraduate and graduate/professional students and will be expanded in the coming year as we return to campus.

Update, June 2022: During the summer of 2022, Duke will launch a combined Office of the Ombuds for faculty, staff, and students, including a dedicated ombudsperson for students.

We continue to recruit and support first-generation students and those from low-income backgrounds. 

Equity and anti-racism will be included in the ongoing annual review process for direct reports to the president in order to ensure that university leadership continues to consider this a priority for the future.

More than 12,800 students, faculty and staff responded to Duke University’s first university-wide survey on diversity, equity and inclusion in April 2021. Results from the survey will be used as a baseline to assess current and planned programmatic and policy changes designed to help Duke become a more just and equitable community for all its members. A written report will be issued to the Duke community later in the summer.

Update, November 2021: President Price released the results of the survey, which are guiding the work of REAC.

Human Resources will track promotions and new hires and offer pay-equity analyses on a regular, ongoing basis. These data will be available to any member of the Duke community beginning in January.

Update, June 2022: REAC is developing tools for conducting a pay equity study across the institution, with a goal of implementing in Academic Year 2022-23.

Duke is expanding internship, training, and apprenticeship programs to make Duke career pathways more accessible.

Update, June 2022: The REAC Infrastructure and Policy Subcommittee is developing a racial equity advancement rubric to track equitable opportunities for career advancement.

Duke is launching new professional-development opportunities for our staff at all levels, with a focus on reaching historically underserved populations.

In 2021, we offered a new “Foundations of Equity” orientation program for incoming undergraduate students, which will be a part of first-year orientation in all future years.

In September 2020, President Price, along with the Board of Trustees, deans, officers, vice presidents, and vice provosts, engaged in an anti-racism and equity workshop. Duke’s senior university leadership is committed to continuing this training on an annual basis in the years ahead.

To ensure every unit on campus has the resources required for education and training, a library of anti-racist educational assets is being made available through anti-racism.duke.edu and the website for the Office for Faculty Advancement, including a video series that can serve as a primer on anti-racism as we work to develop more comprehensive resources. Additionally, a range of educational workshops and resources on anti-racism, implicit bias, and inclusion & belonging, along with modules specifically for hiring managers (such as “Equitable Search Practices”), are available through the Office of Institutional Equity.

The Office of the Provost and the Office for Institutional Equity, with a grant from The Duke Endowment, are collaborating with faculty on designing new curricula for faculty, students and staff that will be informed by history and empower them to promote anti-racism, equity and inclusion on campus and in the academy. The 2021 University Course, titled “The Invention and Consequences of Race“, will be offered in the fall semester to all undergraduate students.

Update, June 2022: The University Course will be offered again in Fall 2022. The Office of Faculty Advancement hosted an anti-racist curricula workshop in Spring 2022, and the REAC Education Subcommittee is developing assets for teaching and learning.

Duke Health’s comprehensive anti-racism plan, Moments to Movement, commits to health equity as a mission-critical element of clinical care, with systems to define and measure access, treatments, clinical outcomes and the patient experience through the lens of health equity to eradicate identified inequities.

Update, January 2022: Duke Health released a report on the actions of the first year of Moments to Movement.

Duke Health will also aggressively address socioeconomic determinants of health for patients through population health management. 

The Provost’s faculty leadership program incorporates approaches that are more consistently equitable and effective in addressing racism, expand current workshops to support units in producing systemic change, and works with partners inside and outside of Duke to offer programs and resources for leaders on topics related to diversity and equity.

The Executive Vice President and Chancellor for Health Affairs will also expand and monitor diverse leadership opportunities and ensure that systems, policies and procedures are in place to promote racial equity at all organizational levels.  

A Presidential Fellowship program to provide diverse leadership opportunities for mid-career faculty has been launched, with the first appointments soon to be announced.

Update, June 2022: The first Presidential Fellow, Tyson Brown, was appointed for Academic Year 2021-22. The next fellow will be announced in the coming weeks.

We will be seeking ways of foregrounding research on slavery and the history of the South, on social and racial equity, and racism through university communications and leveraging it in our own institutional planning and decision-making.

Update, June 2022: The Strategy Team 2030 report identified racial equity as an area for potential scholarly synthesis at Duke, and recent faculty hiring has expanded Duke’s expertise in social and racial equity.

Duke’s University-Wide Interdisciplinary Institutes, Initiatives & Centers (UICs) have developed comprehensive proposals to expand education and research that engages with the multi-faceted dimensions of structural racism and anti-racism.

Update, June 2022: The Offices of Institutional Equity and Institutional Research conducted the first campus-wide climate survey in April 2021, with nearly 13,000 responses. Results were released in November 2021, and the data are guiding the work of REAC.

We are committing to a dedicated program of ongoing institutional research, including regular surveys of Duke students, faculty and staff, to better understand and monitor our organizational culture and climate.  Results of this research will be made public and used to assess both overall institutional progress and to evaluate leadership across the university and health system. 

The Provost will soon announce a new funding mechanism to provide support for scholarly work on slavery and the history of the South, on social and racial equity, and racism.  

Update, June 2022: Supported by The Duke Endowment, the Office of the Provost will fund 18 faculty research projects on racial equity during Academic Year 2022-2023.

DAA is designing ongoing programming to address systemic racism, including programs co-facilitated by Duke Black Alumni and the Department of African and African-American Studies and further opportunities for continuing education and networking.

The Duke Alumni Association (DAA) conducted a survey of Black alumni to gather feedback on their experiences at Duke and to help chart a course toward a more inclusive community. The results of this survey will be shared publicly later this summer.

Trustee task forces on our forthcoming 2024 centennial and on Duke and Durham will explore ways of better engaging our community in Duke’s complex institutional history with respect to racial and social equity, in collaboration with the President’s Advisory Committee on Institutional History.

Update, June 2022: The reports of the task forces are guiding planning for the centennial and our ongoing relationship with Durham.

Duke named the Reuben-Cooke Building on West Campus in honor of Wilhelmina Reuben-Cooke, a member of Duke’s first integrated class of undergraduates, and we honored a more inclusive group of university founders. A permanent exhibit honoring the first five Black undergraduates was installed in the Reuben-Cooke Building, and we will seek opportunities for additional exhibits and recognitions per the recommendations of the Committee on Institutional History.

The Board of Trustees, on President Price’s recommendation and with the support of the President’s Advisory Committee on Institutional History, has approved the removal of the name of Thomas Jordan Jarvis—a North Carolina Governor and Trinity College trustee who was an avowed white supremacist implicated in the Wilmington Insurrection of 1898—from the dormitory on East Campus bearing his name. A plaque describing this decision will be installed at the entrance of the building, which will again be known by its original name, West Residence Hall.

We will offer new apprenticeship programs in partnership with community colleges including Durham Tech, as well as expanding Duke’s supplier diversity program and providing training for departments to encourage diverse sourcing.

We will significantly expand efforts to recruit from HBCUs and community colleges for our undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs, as well as for staff positions at Duke.

We will coordinate and expand work-based learning opportunities for high school and college students through programs such as Summer Internship Program with North Carolina Central University, the Summer Enrichment Program for the National Institute for Diversity and Health Equity, and the Made in Durham internship program, and other partnerships with the city and local nonprofits.

We are deepening support for educational equity through a lead contribution to the Durham Public Schools Foundation campaign for digital equity for Durham students, partnerships on internet connectivity with the city, and broadening connections between Durham students and Duke students.

Update, June 2022: The Office of Durham and Community Affairs is investing in five core priorities for advancing equity in Durham, including Early Childhood Education and College and Career Readiness.

We are collaborating with community-based organizations and local government to address community health disparities as measured by social indicators such as housing, early childhood development, and nutrition. We have also committed $5 million to the community for COVID-19 relief and sustained engagement through our Duke-Durham Fund.

Update, June 2022: The Office of Durham and Community Affairs is investing in five core priorities for advancing equity in Durham: Housing Affordability, Food Security and Nutrition, Early Childhood Education, College and Career Readiness, and Nonprofit Capacity.