Purdue dismantles DEI offices, programs as state, federal threats mount
University scrubs diversity offices, websites, staff Friday out of fear of an ‘increasing number of actions and policy measures at both the federal and state level’
Purdue shuttered assorted diversity and inclusion initiatives on its West Lafayette campus Friday, announcing in a memo sent that day that the move came under mounting state and federal mandates targeting DEI efforts.
“Acting under the authority of our Board of Trustees, the university is sunsetting historical DEI activities and initiatives, effective today,” Provost Patrick Wolfe wrote in a memo sent university-wide Friday afternoon. “An increasing number of actions and policy measures at both the federal and state level have made it clear that doing so is a necessary part of our future as a public university and a state educational institution.”
Among the moves laid out in Wolfe’s memo:
The university’s Office of Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging – which fell under the provost’s office – will close, “as will related activities in colleges and departments.” Wolfe wrote that staff members in those offices and with those initiatives will have a chance to interview for job vacancies in other parts of the university.
What he called “leading programs” in colleges – including the Minority Engineering Program and the Dr. Cornell A. Bell Business Opportunity Program, each part of the university’s diversity efforts for more than 50 years – would be folded into Boilermaker Opportunity Program Plus in the Office of the Vice Provost for Enrollment Management “to serve all academic programs and to best support all current and future students.”
The university’s cultural centers “will continue to serve as open resources for the entire Purdue community, providing support for all students.” The cultural centers would shift under the university’s vice provost for student life.
By the time the memo went out Friday, references to diversity efforts on campus had been scrubbed from Purdue’s website. That included Wolfe’s role as chief diversity officer at Purdue and the provost’s main landing page for the university’s diversity and equity programs.
Wolfe and other Purdue officials did not respond to questions, beyond what he wrote in the memo.
So, it wasn’t clear how many staff and faculty were affected and whether they were asked to leave immediately. (Notes from campus sources hinted that meetings called overnight Thursday led up to announcements on campus Friday.)
Purdue officials did not respond to questions about what the memo meant when it referenced “acting under the authority of our Board of Trustees.” The trustees have had several executive sessions since their last public meeting on April 4 but no announced public sessions, where official votes and action would have to happen. The trustees are scheduled to meet next on June 6.
They did not clarify, either, whether the memo meant that the Black Cultural Center and other cultural centers connected to campus would remain funded by the university or would be asked to self-finance their operations, as some other parts of the university have been asked to do in the past year.
The only response from Erin Murphy, Purdue’s chief spokesperson, was: “Please refer to the memo.”
The campus followed the lead of other schools in the state, including Indiana University and Ball State, who announced similar moves in recent weeks.
Wolfe wasn’t specific about which state and federal actions and policy measures prompted the move Friday. But the university had been tracking a series of mandates from the federal government since the start of President Donald Trump’s second term in January, including warnings about the loss of federal funding for programs referencing diversity and a directive that hung financial consequences over higher ed institutions that considered race in their decisions.
A month ago, Gov. Mike Braun signed Senate Bill 289, which stop public institutions from taking action based on an individual's "personal characteristic," such as race, religion, color and sex. The measure also allows someone to sue state schools or government entities over DEI policies.
Purdue President Mung Chiang has been reluctant over the past semester to stir the waters, at least publicly, over state and federal threats and mandates, including over DEI programs. He’s touted “institutional neutrality” as a way to duck some of the blowback hitting other universities. Chiang was challenged during a February meeting of the faculty-led University Senate by members who equated silence with complicity, asking whether the university would have faculty and staff’s backs if any of them wound up targeted directly. . Chiang told the University Senate: “At any given moment, there are many questions that we don’t know the answers to, just like you. … And we cannot execute on hypothetical directives that have not been given to us.”
On Friday, as offices were closed and staff were given chances to interview for other jobs on campus, the university did not respond to a request to speak with or relay questions to Chiang about the DEI maneuvers.
One example: It was 2021 when the university committed to the Purdue Equity Task Force, a five-year effort that put cash and concerted effort toward a goal of recruiting and retaining Black students by 1 percentage point a year “by removing barriers” that limit applications “incentivizing progress and rewarding progress toward our goals.” Still remaining Friday afternoon, an Equity Task Force site continued to tout that “while we are committed to making the university more diverse and inclusive to all, we recognize that supporting people of color – especially Black students, faculty and staff – is an area that needs greater focus,” with a promise of initiatives “focusing on representation, experience and success for Black Boilermakers over the next five years.”
Attempts by Based in Lafayette to speak to staff who played DEI or roles of some sort on campus weren’t immediately successful Friday or were turned down.
Brian Leung, a Purdue English professor, was chair of the University Senate during the 2023-24 academic year.
“Speaking only as an Indiana citizen, Purdue University built a powerful yet temperate Midwest brand of diversity, inclusion and belonging under the extraordinary leadership of Vice Provost John Gates,” Leung said. “While I lament the misunderstandings in the political winds, I take heart that student services and resources at Purdue will remain robust per Provost Wolfe's statement. To be clear, for many, it is not easy to live, much less feel welcome, in Indiana. That will come as a surprise to some of your readers. I can attest. My very personal fear as a biracial man married to a man, is that even more of Purdue's graduating students will flee Indiana to more welcoming places. That feels like an avoidable loss on investment. My promise is to remain in Indiana and support all of the young people who are Indiana's future.”
Here’s the full text of Wolfe’s memo to campus Friday:
LAYOFFS ANNOUNCED FRIDAY AT IVY TECH
Indiana Capital Chronicle reporter Casey Smith had this Friday: “Ivy Tech Community College will lay off 202 employees statewide as it responds to significant cuts in state funding and frozen tuition rates, the school system’s president, Sue Ellspermann, announced Friday. The layoffs — affecting both full-time and part-time workers — represent about 2.8% of Ivy Tech’s total workforce, including 180 full-time positions, or 5.3% of its full-time staff, according to data provided by the college. The reductions include 38 faculty members, 162 staff and two administrative faculty.”
Of the 202 employees hit by the layoffs, 10 were from the Lafayette campus, Emily Sandberg, Ivy Tech’s assistant vice president for communications, told Based in Lafayette. Of those 10, two were faculty members and eight were staff members, she said.
For more: “Ivy Tech to lay off more than 200 employees across Indiana.”
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The layoffs at Ivy Tech are heartbreaking, and lay bare the emptiness of Republican rhetoric in higher ed. They claim they want to support students entering the skilled trades, but is there one Republican state investing in the community colleges that educate such students? Indiana says it wants more manufacturing, but cheaps out in supporting the college that educates students in subjects like advanced manufacturing. No college in the state educates more students who will remain in Indiana, and yet the legislature consistently hamstrings Ivy Tech in its ability to do so.
Ivy Tech is perpetually in a no-win funding cycle. As I said in another thread this week community college enrollments run countercyclical to the economy - they go up when the economy is bad and down when the economy is good. This means that the college needs more resources right in the moment when state revenues are down, and then has its resources cut when the economy is good. And as the tariffs come home to roost it'll likely need more resources right after having to lay people off.
The people who work there are dedicated to the students of Indiana. It's a damn shame the cheapskates in the legislature only want them to keep doing more with less.
Yeah, I'm just wondering what a Chinese American university president is doing while this is all going on. How long before his time comes? We are in an horrendous time of purging education and intellectualism. Indiana seems to be a leader in dropping to the knee, both 4 year and 2 year degree granting institutions giving in to authoritarianism from on high. What will we have left in this state? STEM without Humanities gives us a deprived citizenry. Higher ed without craft training leaves us helpless in our homes and manufacturing. This is such a sad time.