Q&A: First diversity vice chancellor discusses goals for office

University officials announced Jerry Kang, a UCLA law professor, as the new vice chancellor for equity, diversity and inclusion Tuesday. His office will oversee two discrimination prevention officers, the Title IX officer and about 20 diversity specialists on campus. UCLA created the vice chancellor position after a 2013 report, headed by former California Supreme Court Justice Carlos Moreno, found that UCLA lacked adequate policies and procedures for handling discrimination reported by faculty members.

UCLA’s allocation of resources and funds to his office are yet to be determined and will be based on Kang’s proposals and needs for funding.

Daily Bruin reporter Alejandra Reyes-Velarde talked with Kang Friday about his goals and take on campus climate.

Daily Bruin: What are the main diversity-related problems you think UCLA faces right now?

Jerry Kang: To improve campus climate is one of the most important issues – improving procedures, hiring, tenure and full inclusion in the academic community.

DB: In a forum with the campus community, you said you relate to the problems of underrepresented communities and know what it feels like to be an outsider. Have you faced discrimination?

JK: I’m an immigrant, I’m a person of color, I didn’t grow up with socioeconomic resources. Even as a younger kid in my community at Harvard as a student, there is a certain feeling that you are different and you may not entirely belong.

I have countless stories of how difficult the transition is from being a Korean immigrant to an American kid. I remember distinctly as a young kid who didn’t speak English being pushed up against the wall by first graders. They asked me, ”Are you from the north or the south?” I had no idea what north and south meant. I must have just guessed south, and they said “good” and walked away. It was pure luck that I picked one versus the other. Those are more funny than anything else.

Those are small stories, but small moments in interactions between individuals are relevant to the larger environment of how each of us as individuals are made to feel.

DB: What are your specific goals that can be accomplished within a year’s time that we can hold you accountable to?

JK: I’m not yet on the job, and there’s so much I need to learn. I will spend a huge amount of time talking to students, staff, faculty, administrators, alumni, members of the community to learn more about what troubles them, what they’re excited about, suggestions they can make about improving UCLA and making it a fairer, more equitable and inclusive space. I expect to first learn a great deal and won’t say I have a list of top-10 things that I want immediately implemented.

Having said that, there are (many goals) that are about resolving existing or filed complaints dealing with discrimination. I want to make sure that practices and policies we have to adjudicate, find facts and resolve those complaints are as sensible and as fair as possible, clearly articulated in words and have a broad consensus from the relevant communities.

There are other issues that are (about) proactively preventing acts of hostility and discrimination, so I want to spend a lot of time about proactive structural prevention of challenges, difficulties and complaints by thinking about new structures that will make us all feel we are in a better environment.

DB: How should students measure the success of your office?

JK: One way to hold people accountable is to actually count. You can count numbers of complaints, number of fact finding reports, number of promotions, number of hires, number of students. You could also count subjective evaluations about climate, about procedural due process, and I’m interested in running surveys that allow us to get more information.

DB: How do you see students, faculty and staff playing a role in your office?

JK: I fully expect to talk with important representatives of all constituencies including students. I am thinking about leadership from multiple student organizations, affinity groups, the various ethnic and affinity-based students newspapers. My point is always to communicate transparently, oftentimes bluntly, and to push people to articulate what they think. (I want to know) how they agree, how they disagree and challenge them to help solve problems. Since students have, in some sense, the greatest stake, I want their input.

I will listen, but I will also push back because you all are being trained to be the next generation of professionals, leaders, scholars and politicians.

DB: In a forum, you said you wanted to use empirical data to explain cases of racial discrimination and analyze statistical data about diversity-related issues at UCLA. Can you clarify what you mean?

JK: (For example,) our faculty treated fairly by their students when they receive teaching evaluations. Right now, the way we deal with teaching evaluations might not lead to the fairest estimation of the teaching skills of faculty, by generation and or race.

It might be that women and racial minorities have greater variance in the scores they get. So, what would happen if you dropped the top 10 percent as well as the bottom 10 percent of the scores? You might be able to get better data that more accurately represents the modal teaching experience and learning experience that students had in the class. There are ways we can collect data and present it (with) all these statistical terms that will allow us to judge each other more fairly and asses faculty rigorously on their merits.