STRIDE Top 10 Best Practices

Please note that STRIDE training has been transferred to the oversight of Faculty Affairs. For further details or inquiries, please contact whitney.sweeney-martin@louisville.edu.

ATHENA STRIDE Search Committee Training 

TOP 10 BEST PRACTICES 

  • 3. Actively develop a diverse pool of applicants 
  • Network directly with newly established scholars. 
  • Review national pool and past search data and foster connections with institutions, on-campus postdoctoral programs, and professional organizations that train or support underrepresented groups in your field.
    See UofL STRIDE Handbook - Sec. IV.1 | Page 18. 
  • 4. Define the disciplinary area for your search as broadly as possible 
  • Search as broadly as possible. If you have multiple positions over a period of several years, consider more broadly defined searches, with a multidisciplinary search committee. See UofL STRIDE Handbook - Sec. III.7 | Page 13. 
  • Consider searching in subfields that are more diverse. These can be called out specifically as areas of interest in your broad search. 
  • 5. Ask for information you need from applicants 
  • Ensure that all applicants know the criteria on which they are being evaluated. 
  • Provide a template or checklist and clear instructions about the application process. 
  • Require candidates to write about their current and planned contributions to diversity and inclusion in a Diversity Statement and use a rubric to evaluate it. Use the “DEIB Rubric” tool in UofL STRIDE Handbook - Appendix 7 - Page 42. 
  • 6. Make sustained and conscious efforts to counter potential evaluation bias 
  • Discuss and define specific evaluation criteria before the search. Ensure all search committee members and department faculty have a clear and shared understanding of the criteria. See UofL STRIDE Handbook - Sec. IV.2 | Page 19. 
  • Design evaluation tools, such as rubrics, that examine a candidate's strengths, accomplishments, and attributes along a variety of dimensions, including rubrics for evaluating Diversity Statements. See UofL STRIDE Handbook - Sec. V.2 | Page 24. 
  • Consider the environment in which achievements were made. 
  • Be alert for bias around the candidate’s institution and/or subfield. 
  • Avoid global evaluations and summary rankings that fail to consider all of the search criteria. 
  • Use the “Rising Above Cognitive Errors” tool in UofL STRIDE Handbook - Appendix 3 - Page 37. 
  • 7. Provide a welcoming environment and circumstances that will allow you to see the candidate at their best during the interview and campus visit (See UofL STRIDE Handbook - Secs. VI.1-2 | Pages 27-30.) 
  • Attempt to avoid 'tokenism' in the interview pool by interviewing more than one female/minority candidate. 
  • Avoid telling a candidate that you are interviewing them or want to hire them because of the social group to which they belong. 
  • Ensure that all candidates meet a diverse group of people during their visit to campus. 
  • Provide complete information about the visit well in advance. 
  • Ask the candidate whom s/he would like to meet. 
  • Identify an appropriate faculty host. 
  • Ensure diversity in the audience for the job talk. 
  • Introduce the candidate's job talk with a summary of their accomplishments/expertise. 
  • Consider how welcoming the spaces in your department are (e.g. who is pictured?) 
  • Do not ask the candidate about their personal life (age, marital status, children, etc.) even in off- campus situations (e.g. dinner with the search committee). Questions about personal life can have unintended consequences. 
  • 8. Ensure that all candidates know about dual career support and family friendly policies. 
  • Provide an information packet to all candidates (rather than making this contingent on gathering inappropriate personal information). 
  • Be aware that dual career support is available to domestic partners of faculty recruits regardless of marital status or sexual orientation. Chairs, associate deans and deans – not individual faculty or the search committee - are the appropriate people to communicate with the candidate about dual career support.
    See UofL STRIDE Handbook - Secs. IIII.10 | Pages 15-17.
  • 9. Manage the decision making process 
  • Consider only job relevant criteria in evaluating candidates and make sure the views of all faculty are heard.
    See UofL STRIDE Handbook - Sec. VI.3 - Page 30. 
  • Use the candidate evaluation rubric/tool for each step of the interview process, and refer to items on the evaluation tool when discussing the candidate, rather than subjective terms like “fit”.
    See UofL STRIDE Handbook - Secs. V.2-3 | Pages 24-25 & Appendix 4 | Page 38
  • 10. Recruit the selected candidate and complete the STRIDE Data Debriefing
  • Once a candidate is selected for a job offer, all relevant factors can be discussed. 
  • Provide detailed information to ensure that the negotiation process is positive and effective for all candidates. See UofL STRIDE Handbook - Secs. VII.1-2 | Pages 31-32. 
  • Check the Initial stage pool's Diversity characteristics on WorkDay
  • Prepare STRIDE Debriefing Document and discuss with your EPA and as a committee (use this template) 
  • Email STRIDE Debriefing Document  to athena@louisville.edu
  • BONUS ITEM! Develop department policies and practices that aid in faculty support and retention
  • Create mechanisms to support diversity, equity, inclusion, and retention.
  • Make sure new faculty are mentored well and supported from Day 1 to be successful. 

 

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. HRD-1936125. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

Credits: This list is adapted from UofL STRIDE Handbook and University of Michigan ADVANCE Program’s STRIDE Faculty Recruitment Workshop - What Can We Do? Top 10 Best Practices