At the beginning of Pride Month, new data reveals higher education’s nasty little secret

June 1 is the first day of Pride Month. In support of that as well as Black History Month, Hispanic Heritage Month and International Women’s Day, the IBV has conducted a large survey of business professional on topics surrounding diversity and experience. Based on that data along with personal experiences communicated in diversity Jams and other channels, we have already published three major diversity studies. And we will be launching a new study on LGBT+ experience on June 9.

As we analyzed the experiences of LGB in the data and a recent LGBT+ Innovation Jam, a nasty if unsurprising theme began to emerge. Education was identified as the institution in which LGB experience most discrimination – especially higher education.

Colleges and universities are frequently painted as bastions of liberalism, places where ideas are welcomed, diversity extolled, and opportunities boundless. But inside these ivory towers, reality is often different, darker and more complex. And by no means restricted to LGBT+.

Two years ago, Boston University fired David Marchant, a tenured geologist, for sexual harassment. While on a field trip in Antarctica, Marchant reportedly pushed Jane Willenbring, a female grad student, down a mountainside, blew volcanic ash in her eyes, and continuous and often sexualized abuse. Another woman was castigated nightly at dinner in front of her male peers, with demeaning language about her body and work performance.

It took years for the women to report the abuse. Some switched schools and changed their thesis topic. Others left academia altogether. Only when Willenbring became a tenured associate professor at UC San Diego, did she feel comfortable submitting a formal complaint to BU.

Aside from occasional stories like this, misogyny on campus is often well hidden. And what we hear about even less are incidents of discrimination directed toward LGBT+. Yet the data reveals that incidents are rife. The underlying pathology is often related.

Our new survey of around 6000 professionals inclusive of ~700 LGB reveals that LGBT+ individuals experience higher rates of discrimination in university settings than they do in either the workplace or society in general. Younger generations are particularly affected. When we asked, “To what extent to you feel that discrimination exists in higher education against those who share your sexual orientation,” 61% of Millennials and 53% of Gen Xers said that they did.

The American Psychological Association made waves in 2019 when it codified a new dysfunction, tying a “masculinity ideology,” defined by its anti-feminist attitudes, an association of femininity with weaknesses and masculinity with achievement, to increased incidents of homophobia, bullying and sexual harassment.  

Unsurprisingly, masculinity ideology thrives in patriarchal settings. And there are few more patriarchal settings than the inner sanctum of a university. Academic departments are often fiefdoms. Constructs like tenure, intended to enable scholarly freedom, often operate to repress it, concentrating power in a handful of untouchables and making the path to tenure one of pleasing those in positions of influence.

360-degree reviews and codified development tracks—initiatives that top businesses use to create transparency and accountability—are rarely found in higher ed. In the warren of academic departments, practices that would wither under outside scrutiny, such as belittling language and subjective hiring, firing and funding can flourish.

What needs to be done? The first thing is to own up to the problem. Universities might like to think that with gains in equality in the wider community in recent years, such as with gay marriage, that homophobia is a thing of the past. But our survey makes clear, it’s not. Leaders need to take the pulse of their own institutions and understand the experiences of students, teaching assistants and faculty members who are women, people of color, LGBT+ - and those that intersect across these groups.

Second, institutional leaders need to find creative ways to disable bias—a task for which they should be well suited, given their role as learning labs. An increasing number of orchestras, for example, hold blind auditions in order to reduce conscious and unconscious prejudice in hiring. Could some elements of the tenure process be blinded to ensure a fairer shot for all candidates?

Finally, and most importantly, universities need to eradicate a culture of enablement and entitlement that allows discrimination to persist. At BU, for instance, the five-member faculty panel that reviewed Marchant’s case recommended that he be suspended for three years without pay.

BU’s president ultimately rejected that recommendation and requested that Marchant be fired. But the fact that five peers felt that the offenses, which altered or halted the career trajectory of several women, were not worth terminating Marchant’s employment is a sobering indictment. So evolves the culture of complicity – and enablement.

Universities can either invite change or have it thrust upon them. Despite—or perhaps because of—all the attention paid to issues of diversity, current and recent students are both more sensitive to discrimination and more hostile to it. Where older generations – including me – have simply put up with slights or exclusionary behavior, Gen Zers are saying, “No more.”

For the full set of IBV diversity thought leadership click here: https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/institute-business-value/industry/diversity-and-inclusion