The year Lesley Rankin-Hill received tenure was one of the hardest of her life.

The self-described Afro-Latina -- she's part African American, part Cuban -- shakes her head as she remembers vicious departmental factions, the 50-50 vote of her colleagues, snubs in the hallways of Dale Hall Tower and exhaustive external reviews of her work.

Rankin-Hill, an associate professor of anthropology and women's studies, looks down at the Caesar salad she is eating and quietly drops her fork. The tenure process, she recalls, was "devastating."

Worse, she said, was the effect on her students, who launched a support campaign.

"Here were all these white graduate students who wrote letters, got alums to write letters on my behalf," she said. "It really disillusioned a couple of them. Two walked away and didn't finish. Others finished and got the hell out of here."

Race was at the heart of her struggle for tenure, Rankin-Hill believes. Not the racism that creates separate water fountains or dictates back-of-the-bus laws, but a much subtler, mutant form. The kind you can never litigate, never fully prove.

Percentage gap


George Henderson, College of Liberal Studies dean, once joked that all the tenured African-American faculty members at OU could fit inside a phone booth. Now he's only half joking.

Seven African-American faculty members -- the fewest of any minority group -- have tenure, according to the OU Affirmative Action Office. The total number of faculty members with tenure is 530. OU ranks second in the Big 12 for enrollment of African Americans, but ranks fourth in the number of African-American faculty, according to fall 1997 data. Of Big 12 schools, OU also has the biggest gap between the percentages of African-American students and African-American faculty.

"The numbers don't surprise me," said Aaron Carpenter, architecture senior. He said he noticed the lack of African-American professors when personal problems forced him out of school for five years. When he looked for an African-American professor in his department, he found none.

"I wouldn't have been comfortable discussing the problems with a white professor," said Carpenter, now back at OU. "I felt I would be supporting African-American stereotypes just to express my problems. If there had been African-American instructors, I would have gone to talk to them."

Henderson and other professors are alarmed at OU's percentages and urge more aggressive recruiting and an atmosphere of mentorship and equality to aid retention.

"Unless there is a dramatic change in recruiting, retention and promotion policies and strategies, in five years we will have even fewer African-American faculty," he said. "Once again, we'll be the training place for ethnic minorities who go to other places and get tenure."

OU President David Boren acknowledges the need for a more diverse faculty and laments the fact that the pool of talented minority candidates is small. The competition is fierce as schools nationwide struggle to make their faculty reflective of the quickly changing student body. The top minority scholars are often snatched up by Ivy League schools that can offer more prestige and higher salaries. Others opt out of the academy and into the corporate sphere.

"We're making some measurable progress, but it seems almost as if we're running just to stay even," Boren said. "And it's very difficult."

Recruiting focus


Nancy Mergler, senior vice president and provost, oversees a $250,000 fund earmarked to help departments recruit women and ethnic minorities by matching offers from other universities or contributing one-third of the cost of a spousal hire.

Since the fund's inception a little more than a decade ago, the number of ethnic minority faculty members has grown from about 10 percent to 15 percent. Specific figures for how African Americans have benefited from the reservoir are not available, Mergler said.

"It's enough to make a difference, but the problem has been in finding the right people," Boren said. "We have to make sure that we choose minority faculty members who have a very good chance of making it through the tenure process because we're not just trying to recruit them here for a year or two and then (have them) leave."

But many African-American professors said OU is not trying hard enough. Betty Harris, a tenured associate professor of anthropology and director of Women's Studies, said she has observed a trend away from recruiting in her 12 years at OU.

"It's a backburner issue," she said. "There was a more concerted effort in the late '80s. (Also), recruiting should not be confined to the junior level. There should be a more concerted effort to hire into senior positions as well."

Mergler said the first step in faculty hiring is advertising open positions in trade publications such as The Chronicle of Higher Education and posting announcements on department Internet home pages. Each opening receives anywhere from 50 to 300 applicants, which are then narrowed down by the search committee, Mergler said. Candidates visit the campus, give a lecture interview and mingle with department faculty. It is this campus visit, Boren said, that is crucial in attracting ethnic minorities to OU.

"We attempt to have a diverse interviewing committee because nothing is more off-putting to a potential minority faculty member than to sit there in front of an interviewing committee that doesn't look like you at all," he said.

But OU is a hard sell even with multiracial committees and negotiations of spousal hires. The reason? Norman demographics. About 3.5 percent of Norman residents are African American, according to information from the Norman Economic Development Coalition.

"Norman is not a very socially diverse, broader community," Boren said. "If you bring, say, a single professor who's a member of a racial minority to this campus, their social life is very limited. So providing a good social life and social setting for them is difficult, which makes it all the more important that the rest of our faculty go out of their way to be inclusive."

Support from others

Ben Keppel, assistant professor of history, sits at his desk preparing for his next class, "African-American History From 1865 to Present."

About half of the students in the class are African American, but Keppel, who is white, said he's heard nothing but positive feedback on his teaching.

"The surprise to them is not my race or me, but that the course is even offered," he said.

Keppel said he understands the pressures put on African-American and other minority faculty members. They shouldn't be the sole torch bearers in the struggle for equality and representation.

"The role (of white professors) is to speak up," he said. "Black professors cannot be asked and should not be put into the position of having to be the sole or major advocate for diversity. It's important for everyone, and if you believe that, speak up and vote that way."

Catrina Beard, health and sports sciences sophomore, said she has been taught by one African American in her two years at OU. Beard, also African American, said she has benefited from exposure to white professors, but wishes for more role models of her own race.

"It would be really helpful to see a professor who's been there and done that as far as all the little things that go along with being black and in college," Beard said. "To see more African Americans would motivate me to say, 'They did it, and I can, too.'"

Keppel said classroom recruiting, encouraging students to attend graduate school, targeted searches and more reasonable, nuanced discussion on affirmative action are necessary to diversify faculty.

"The only way we're going to solve this problem is by telling our gifted freshmen that this is what they need to do for a living," he said.

Henderson said he appreciates the efforts of his colleagues and agrees with Keppel that creating a truly multicultural society is not the task of any one race.

"There are white sympathizers," Henderson said. "These are the ones who are aggressive. These are the ones who write letters of support. They are a small, vocal minority whose behavior is consistent. Without them, it would be unbearable."

Atmosphere of struggle

Mind games designed to impute inferiority. Lack of recognition for awards or contributions. Little or no departmental support of research. Struggle to receive tenure.

These are the common experiences listed by African-American faculty members all over the university. Several professors said they work, mentor and research in an environment that is not so much hostile as it is superficial.

"I don't feel persecuted, I feel like the Invisible Man," Rankin-Hill said. "They don't know you. There's an assumption that I don't know certain things. They think that you must be someone who got your degree because of affirmative action."

Nearly every one of the seven tenured African-American professors said the only reason they remain at OU is their love for their students. Thomas Carey, professor of music, said he has turned down several offers from other schools, many with more diverse faculties and much better salaries.

"You feel so isolated -- it's like being lost in the middle of the ocean," Carey said. "I'd be a warped individual if I thought it was my tenure keeping me here. I'm only here because of my opera association and my incredible students."

The tenure process, in which a candidate's research and accomplishments are evaluated at nine levels, is a tedious, nerve-wracking ordeal for most tenure-track faculty members. But African-American professors said they are evaluated more stringently, with doubts raised about their work ethic, published works and areas of research.

"Every African American who has gotten tenure at this university has struggled at some level," said Virginia Milhouse, associate professor of human relations. "I don't know of one who has sailed through."

Clifford Reed, an African-American and assistant professor of drama, is awaiting tenure. Like Rankin-Hill, several students have supported Reed through letters and a petition. The most unnerving part of the process, he said, is the secrecy.

"The more it is secretive and cloaked, the more subjective it becomes," he said. "And the less people are held accountable. You have to have more transparency to level the playing field."

Reed said he's not worried, but he has tenure-related Web sites bookmarked on his office computer. This is a subject he cares about. Thinks about.

Still, a denial would not make him question his worth as a teacher.

"I know I've been the best scholar, best educator, best artist I can be," he said. "This is my life work, my life pursuit. That's not up for grabs."
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