Apr 21, 2022

Dear colleagues,

I am pleased to announce the outcome of the 2021-22 call for proposals for the UCI Black Thriving Initiative Faculty Cluster Hiring Program. The program is a competitive two-year effort to recruit faculty who interrogate structural racism in its myriad forms. As part of the UCI Black Thriving Initiative, the program aims to build on the hiring priorities of academic units; pave new paths for research and creative expression, teaching and learning, and community engagement; and manifest our commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion in research, teaching and service.

The second call for proposals received a total of eight pre-proposals, representing more than 60 faculty and 20 departments across nearly all schools. These numbers signal considerable interest and participation in this campuswide initiative. Six full proposals were reviewed by the Academic Planning Group, the ADVANCE Program Advising Committee, and the academic deans. I appreciate the work that went into preparing and reviewing these proposals. The two proposals below have been selected for funding.

  • Infrastructure Equity, led by Douglas Houston, Associate Professor, Urban Planning and Public Policy. The proposal team includes representatives from the Samueli School of Engineering, the School of Law, UCI Newkirk Center for Science and Society, the School of Physical Sciences, and the School of Social Ecology.
  • Poetic Justice: Advancing Arts and Culture in Higher Education to Support Black Community Thriving, co-led by Sora Han, Associate Professor, Criminology, Law and Society, and Department Chair, African American Studies, and Liz Glynn, Associate Professor, Art. The proposal team includes representatives from the Claire Trevor School of the Arts, the Paul Merage School of Business, the School of Humanities, Jack and Shanaz Langson Institute and Museum of California Art, and the School of Social Ecology.

Thank you to the authors for their willingness to advance our mission along the lines specified in their proposals. I look forward to working with the authors of these proposals and the pertinent deans and department chairs to carry out the proposed recruitments.

Please join me in congratulating the selected proposal teams and wishing them well with next steps.

Sincerely,Hal SternProvost and Executive Vice ChancellorChancellor’s Professor, Department of Statistics