Progress

TCU should develop and implement a comprehensive strategic plan to promote equity and inclusion in graduate and undergraduate student admissions, faculty and staff recruitment and retention, and the illumination of TCU’s full history through curricula programs such as Frog Camp and UNLF. 

• Academic Affairs initiatives to diversify faculty continue to produce results. To date, nine meritorious teacher-scholars have been hired through the Shared Cost Hiring Initiative for tenured or tenure-track underrepresented faculty. Since 2022, two postdocs have been hired and a search for an additional DEI postdoctoral scholar is in progress.
• The five-year plan to diversify faculty continues with an 8% increase in BIPOC full-time faculty since 2018. An increase to 30% of BIPOC students enrolled in 2023, up from 28.4% in 2022. Retention for BIPOC students rose to 94.6% from 89.3%, and six-year graduation rates rose from 78.7% in 2022 to 85.6% in 2023.
• To champion student success, as part of the Agile Analytics Initiative, official accommodations were provided for 1,815 students, an increase of 5.52% from 2022. A new academic advising platform reached more students across campus, and the Peer2Peer Tutoring Pilot completed 2,228 appointments during 2023, with more than 97% of participants highly recommending the program.
• Spanish-speaking DFW families are welcomed to campus with multiple events through the calendar year. Information sessions are led by Spanish-speaking Admissions staff and tours are guided by Spanish-speaking students.
• In light of the recent Supreme Court decision that addressed race-conscious admission, Admissions developed and incorporated programming for families of color into Experience TCU, our premier campus visit program for admitted students. These students and their supporters are invited to a special breakfast during which they not only connect with future classmates, but hear from faculty, staff and administrators of color, reinforcing the idea that when students come to TCU they will see themselves in their role models.
• Collaborating with the Office of Diversity and Inclusion and the Office of Scholarships and Financial Aid, Admissions developed a new scholarship program: Four Directions Scholars Program, that acknowledges leaders and emerging leaders in Native communities. To continue building bridges, this program includes mentorship and covers the cost of attendance.
• Admissions increased the number of students offered the Inclusive Excellence Scholarship with the hope of enrolling 40 students (up from 20). Increased scholarship amount from $10,000 to $20,000 annually. Scholarships are stackable with academic scholarships with first-year and transfer students also receiving scholarships.
• In the wake of increased antisemitism around the country and specifically on college campuses, Admissions held a focus group with Jewish students to understand the climate at TCU and how we can promote ourselves to prospective Jewish families.
• HR continued participation in the North Texas Lead program designed to attract and create a pipeline of diverse leadership candidates.
• HR’s N2TCU Orientation & Onboarding helps acclimate new employees to the TCU workplace. Self-paced content includes TCU DEI and Race & Reconciliation Initiative.

TCU should provide more robust contextual information near the Clark Brothers’ statue and memorialize a more complete story of TCU, commemorating the efforts of underrepresented or marginalized groups who contributed to TCU’s development and highlighting racist attitudes and behaviors from earlier years as an educational step toward creating an anti-racist community.

Located in the Intellectual Commons, the Sesquicentennial Plaza Project will commemorate the diversity of achievements throughout the history of TCU, reposition the Clark Brothers statue and recognize the top donors during the recent campaign, “Lead On: A Campaign for TCU.” The space will serve as a gateway that reflects the university’s past, present and future. The Sesquicentennial Plaza Project construction timeline is under development; the design process will commence in April 2024.

TCU should develop and maintain an online digital depository specifically focused upon Race & Reconciliation, which all members of the TCU community are able to access to understand the collective histories that contribute to TCU’s legacy.

Much progress has been made with the oral history project. Ten of the 21 oral histories are available to view on the library’s digital repository and more will be added each month.

TCU should perform a comprehensive inventory of all official vendors conducting business with TCU to qualitatively measure and assess equitable representation by diverse members of our business community.

TCU is committed to providing equitable contracting and procurement opportunities to diverse suppliers, including minority- and women-owned business enterprises, commonly referred to as MWBE. TCU has maintained its percentage of diverse spending at 7% via the following steps:

• Investment in the Procure-to-Pay workflow to create a central resource to encourage the use of preferred and potentially diverse suppliers.
• Initiate the use of diverse suppliers as punchout catalogs through our e-procurement tool.
• Invite diverse suppliers to participate in solicitations for competitive procurements. Our diverse supplier response rate has increased from 42% to 56%.
• Require our large construction management partners to invite MWBE suppliers to participate in subcontracting opportunities. Across all active construction projects MWBE awards averaged 8.5%.

We recommend that TCU develop and implement a comprehensive strategic plan to promote equity and inclusion in graduate and undergraduate student admissions, faculty and staff recruitment and retention, and the illumination of TCU’s full history through curricula programs such as Frog Camp and UNLF.

We recommend providing more robust contextual information near the Clark Brothers’ statue and memorialize a more complete story of TCU, commemorating the efforts of underrepresented or marginalized groups who contributed to TCU’s development and highlighting racist attitudes and behaviors from earlier years as an educational step toward creating an anti-racist community.

We recommend the development and maintenance of an online digital depository specifically focused upon Race & Reconciliation, which all members of the TCU community are able to access to understand the collective histories that contribute to TCU’s legacy.

We recommend more consistently recognizing the contributions of our Black, Indigenous and other alumni of color, more specifically through the ongoing funding, development and maintenance of the RRI Oral History Project designed to capture key alumni experiences.

We recommend the perpetual and continued observance of “TCU Reconciliation Day” as a means to maintain open forums of communication and expression on the topic of race and reconciliation while deliberately, intentionally and strategically increasing access to existing TCU media channels (i.e., student-run television, print and radio) to amplify multiple voices and perspectives on campus.

We recommend conducting a comprehensive inventory of all official vendors conducting business with TCU to qualitatively measure and assess equitable representation by diverse members of our business community.

We recommend continuing this Race & Reconciliation Initiative beyond the initial one-year time frame originally set for this committee’s investigation by continuing to make the modest investment in the human capital necessary to carry out the work of research and reconciliation as part and parcel of TCU’s efforts to lead on.