A new edition of The Challenge of Diversity with new introduction from the editors, which compares today's statistics to those in 1989. The original monograph is still valuable and relevant, and it is presented in its original form. In 1989 when The Challenge of Diversity was first published, the monograph made the case that the country's changing demographics required reframing diversity to focus on institutions' capacity to educate and involve an increasingly diverse student population. Looking at current research, the book pointed to patterns of alienation, not involvment. Our demographics are indeed different today, but many of the same challenges remain: access and success for historically underrepresented minority groups, but also the basic institutional issues such as curriculum, climate, and hiring. At the same time, the context has changed: nontraditional students (older students, women, and part-timers) are now mainstream, and numbers of some minority groups and multiracial students continues to grow. While higher education has changed profoundly, our institutions still have not yet developed the capacity to successfuly educate the diversity of students present on our campuses today. In addition, we are experiencing a backlash to some diversity initiatives, and societal factors indicate that higher education needs to become more proactive in responding favorably to diversity. If the monograph were first published today, we would call it The Imperative of Diversity. This is Volume 30 Issue 6 of the Jossey-Bass series ASHE Higher Education Report.

Reviews the growth of diversification and its causes. Explores student retention, the alienation of minorities, useful theoretical perspectives, patterns among successful institutions, and the value of organizing for diversity.

Reviews the growth of diversification and its causes. Explores student retention, the alienation of minorities, useful theoretical perspectives, patterns among successful institutions, and the value of organizing for diversity.

Building sustainable diversity in higher education isn't just the right thing to do—it is an imperative for institutional excellence and for a pluralistic society that works. *Updated Edition* Daryl G. Smith has devoted her career to studying and fostering diversity in higher education. In Diversity's Promise for Higher Education, Smith brings together research from a wide variety of fields to propose a set of clear and realistic practices that will help colleges and universities locate diversity as a strategic imperative and pursue diversity efforts that are inclusive of the varied—and growing—issues apparent on campuses without losing focus on the critical unfinished business of the past. To become more relevant to society, the nation, and the world, while remaining true to their core missions, colleges and universities must continue to see diversity—like technology—as central, not parallel, to their work. Indeed, looking at the relatively slow progress for change in many areas, Smith suggests that seeing diversity as an imperative for an institution's individual mission, and not just as a value, is the necessary lever for real institutional change. Furthermore, achieving excellence in a diverse society requires increasing institutional capacity for diversity—working to understand how diversity is tied to better leadership, positive change, research in virtually every field, student success, accountability, and more equitable hiring practices. In this edition, which is aimed at administrators, faculty, researchers, and students of higher education, Smith emphasizes a transdisciplinary approach to the topic of diversity, drawing on an updated list of sources from a wealth of literatures and fields. The tables and figures have been refreshed to include data on faculty diversity over a twenty-year period, and the book includes new information about • gender identity, • embedded bias, • student success, • the growing role of chief diversity officers, • the international emergence of diversity issues, • faculty hiring, • and important metrics for monitoring progress. Drawing on forty years of diversity studies, this third edition also • includes more examples of how diversity is core to institutional excellence, academic achievement, and leadership development; • updates issues of language; • examines the current climate of race-based campus protest; • addresses the complexity of identity—and explains how to attend to the growing kinds of identities relevant to diversity, equity, and inclusion while not overshadowing the unfinished business of race, class, and gender.

College campuses provide ideal natural settings for studying diversity: they allow us to see what happens when students of all different backgrounds sit side by side in classrooms, live together in residence halls, and interact in one social space. By opening a window onto the experiences and evolving identities of individuals in these exceptionally diverse environments, we can gain a better understanding of the possibilities and challenges we face as a multicultural nation. The Diversity Challenge—the largest and most comprehensive study to date on college campus diversity—synthesizes over five years' worth of research by an interdisciplinary team of experts to explore how a highly diverse environment and policies that promote cultural diversity affect social relations, identity formation, and a variety of racial and political attitudes. The result is a fascinating case study of the ways in which individuals grow and groups interact in a world where ethnic and racial difference is the norm. The authors of The Diversity Challenge followed 2,000 UCLA students for five years in order to see how diversity affects identities, attitudes, and group conflicts over time. They found that racial prejudice generally decreased with exposure to the ethnically diverse college environment. Students who were randomly assigned to roommates of a different ethnicity developed more favorable attitudes toward students of different backgrounds, and the same associations held for friendship and dating patterns. By contrast, students who interacted mainly with others of similar backgrounds were more likely to exhibit bias toward others and perceive discrimination against their group. Likewise, the authors found that involvement in ethnically segregated student organizations sharpened perceptions of discrimination and aggravated conflict between groups. The Diversity Challenge also reports compelling new evidence that a strong ethnic identity can coexist with a larger community identity: students from all ethnic groups were equally likely to identify themselves as a part of the broader UCLA community. Overall, the authors note that on many measures, the racial and political attitudes of the students were remarkably consistent throughout the five year study. But the transformations that did take place provide us with a wealth of information on how diversity affects individuals, groups, and the cohesion of a community. Theoretically informed and empirically grounded, The Diversity Challenge is an illuminating and provocative portrait of one of the most diverse college campuses in the nation. The story of multicultural UCLA has significant and far-reaching implications for our nation, as we face similar challenges—and opportunities—on a much larger scale.

Student retention continues to be a vexing problem for all colleges and universities. In spite of the money spent on creating programs and services to help retain students until they achieve their academic and personal goals, and graduate, the figures have not improved over time. This is particularly true for minority students, who have a greater attrition rate than majority students. Demographic information shows that the minority population in the United States is growing at a faster rate than the majority. It is imperative that educational institutions find ways to help improve retention rates for all students but particularly minority students. Retention rates should not differ appreciably among different racial/ethnic groups."The Journal of College Student Retention: Research, Theory and Practice" is the only scholarly, peer-reviewed journal devoted solely to college student retention. It has published many articles on minority student retention, and this topic continues to garner much attention. This book is a compilation of the very best of these articles, selected on the basis of reviews by a cadre of experts in the education field. The articles discuss African American, Latino/Latina, Asian and Asian Pacific, Native American, and biracial students, and institutional commitments to retaining a diverse student population. For those interested in this vital area, the collection will teach and inspire them to achieve greater heights and pay additional attention to retaining minority students in our colleges and universities.