University of Kentucky disbanding its diversity office, president announces
Republished from Kentucky Lantern
The University of Kentucky is disbanding its Office for Institutional Diversity effective immediatly, President Eli Capilouto announced Tuesday.
No one will lose their jobs, Capilouto said in a Tuesday afternoon email sent to staff. Other offices will absorb people and services. That includes a new office called the Office for Community Relations.
“We share the value that out of many people, we are one community,” Capilouto wrote. “But we’ve also listened to policymakers and heard many of their questions about whether we appear partisan or political on the issues of our day.”
The office’s goal, according to its website, was to “enhance the diversity and inclusivity of our university community through the recruitment and retention of an increasingly diverse population of faculty, administrators, staff and students, and by implementing initiatives that provide rich diversity-related experiences for all to help ensure their success in an interconnected world.”
This comes after diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) at public universities came under scrutiny during Kentucky’s 2024 legislative session — and nationally.
Though Kentucky lawmakers failed to pass a bill that would have ended DEI programs and offices at public universities and colleges, the discussion will continue during the interim.
The email from Capilouto says the university will also “not mandate diversity training” and will remove diversity statements from in hiring documents.
He also pointed to the national DEI discussion, writing that “universities across the country are grappling with the same questions that we are asking and being asked around diversity, equity and inclusion.”
“Kentucky legislators have made clear to me in our conversations that they are exploring these issues again as they prepare for the 2025 legislative session,” Capilouto wrote. “If we are to be a campus for everyone, we must demonstrate to ourselves and to those who support and invest in us our commitment to the idea that everyone belongs — both in what we say and in what we do.”
This story may update.
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