Lead Sheet

By President Lee Eliot Berk

In 1998, we began to look ahead and discuss Berklee’s priorities for the years 2000–2005. Thousands of ideas were presented by the extended Berklee community, and, as a result, a leading strategic initiative of the college became: “We will create a more congenial and supportive environment for women and minorities within our richly diverse community.”

Our gender task force has first focused on the position and role of our women faculty. Led primarily by Associate Provost Karen Zorn, the task force comprised faculty and administrators and a professional consultant who worked for over a year to structure a study of the college’s needs. The report, which was recently issued to the college community, includes such areas as compensation, promotion, recruitment and hiring, and perception of Berklee’s culture with respect to women.

Our task force on diversity has first focused on African American students. Led by Vice President for Student Affairs Larry Bethune and including faculty, staff, and students, the task force is completing arrangements for a professional review of the support needs of minority students. Meanwhile, the task force has already created additional venues for minority support. It has planned a welcoming event and jam session with faculty and staff geared specifically toward African American students, hosted a sneak preview of the VH1 “Say It Loud” documentary, and created more well-defined special-interest-group settings for all students at the Welcome Barbecue and other events. All of these have been cosponsored by the task force and the Black Student Union, the Berklee Association of Faculty of African Descent, and the College Diversity Committee.

With the participation of many Berklee trustees, we are also considering deepening the original commitment of the strategic initiative by changing the language of the statement to: “Create an environment in which women and minorities feel that they are full and valued members of the institution.”

Some of the goals we anticipate adopting include attracting and retaining talented female and minority faculty and staff in all departments of the college, eliminating the perception of gender or minority disparities in decision making, striving for a gender and minority profile throughout the college’s faculty and staff that is a model of inclusiveness for the music industry and that maximizes educational effectiveness, and integrating comparable women’s and minority achievements and historical contributions more fully into the Berklee curriculum.

This is a big agenda for our college as we move forward, but its achievement will enhance the richness of the Berklee community.