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Allegheny College President Hilary L. Link announced today that Allegheny College is among 51 colleges and universities that have joined to form the Liberal Arts Colleges Racial Equity Leadership Alliance, an initiative launched by the University of Southern California Race and Equity Center.

“We are very proud to be an inaugural member of the Liberal Arts Colleges Racial Equity Leadership Alliance, and we are looking forward to the resources and collaborative opportunities that the Alliance will provide for the Allegheny community as part of our enhanced diversity, equity, and inclusion framework,” said Link.

“Joining this initiative is an important step in Allegheny College’s commitment to building a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive campus community,” said Kristin Dukes, Allegheny dean for institutional diversity. “Broadly, the Liberal Arts Colleges Racial Equity Leadership Alliance has the potential to make meaningful and sustained change across higher education institutions.”

The University of Southern California Race and Equity Center will offer a wide range of resources to Alliance members. Beginning in January 2021, the Center will host a dozen eConvenings, each on a particular aspect of racial equity. Allegheny will send up to eight members of the community to each session. These live three-hour learning events, each on a different topic, will be delivered virtually by highly respected leaders of national higher education associations, tenured professors who study race relations and people of color, chief diversity officers and other experienced administrators, and specialists from the center.

The center also is developing an online repository of resources and tools for alliance member colleges. Downloadable equity-related rubrics, readings, case studies, videos, slide decks, and conversation scripts will be included in the portal. Every employee across all levels at each Alliance member college will have 24/7 full access to the virtual resource portal.

In addition, Alliance member colleges also will benefit from campus climate surveys on a three-year rotational basis: a student survey in year one, a faculty survey in year two, and a staff survey in the third membership year. The center’s National Assessment of Collegiate Campus Climates (NACCC) has been administered to more than 500,000 students at colleges and universities in every geographic region of the United States. Using the NACCC as a guide, the center is developing a pair of workplace climate surveys for faculty and staff.

Presidents of Alliance member colleges also will meet quarterly to share strategies, seek advice, and identify ways to leverage the Alliance for collective impact on racial equity in higher education. In addition, presidents will occasionally come together to craft rapid responses to urgent racial issues confronting the nation. Alliance presidents will collaboratively determine what to do; what to say to their respective campus communities; and what they can communicate in a unified voice to policymakers, journalists, and other audiences.

Along with Allegheny, the Alliance includes Amherst College, Bard College, Barnard College, Bowdoin College, Bucknell University, Carleton College, Centre College, Claremont McKenna College, Colby College, Colgate University, Colorado College, Connecticut College, Davidson College, DePauw University, Dickinson College, Goucher College, Grinnell College, Hamilton College, Harvey Mudd College, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Lafayette College, Luther College, Macalester College, McPherson College, Mount Holyoke College, Muhlenberg College, Pitzer College, Pomona College, Oberlin College, Occidental College, Randolph College, Reed College, Rhodes College, Scripps College, Skidmore College, Smith College, Soka University of America, St. Olaf College, Susquehanna University, Swarthmore College, Union College, University of Richmond, Utica College, Wabash College, Washington and Lee University, Wellesley College, Westminster College, Whittier College, Williams College, and Wofford College.