Point Park University (PPU) in Pittsburgh recently announced a new effort to further diversify the Pittsburgh campus.
The school’s Center for Inclusive Excellence (CIE) revealed its newest project in development: a campus-wide “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Audit.”
Michael Thornhill, CIE Assistant Director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Training and Assessment, told The Globe he is “supposed to use [the audit] department by department to have them walk through every area with an equity lens [so that] we can have more equitable departments, not just from a student’s perspective, being from faculty to faculty.”
One student, however, is not on board with this upcoming initiative.
“The fact that they are forcing [DEI] into the hiring process and syllabus construction of courses shows clearly that this school is not supporting inclusion by forcing policies that are not universally agreed with,” PPU student Tyler Hillard told Campus Reform.
He continued, sharing that if “[PPU is] going to base the course syllabus and new hires on diversity, then they are clearly putting their politics over our education.”
The audit will evaluate the department’s “hiring, recruiting, and syllabus construction.”
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“My role is to coach executives, contribute to association planning, and particularly coach around diversity, equity, and inclusion, and cultural confidence,” Thornhill said.
Thornhill was previously a member of the university’s Office of Equity and Inclusion (OEI), which the university shuttered in March.
Campus Reform reached out to everyone mentioned and this article will be updated accordingly.
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- University commits to campus-wide ‘Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Audit’ - November 10, 2022
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