Professor Soucek Comments for N.Y. Times, L.A. Times About End of UC Diversity Statements in Hiring

After the University of California announced in March that it will no longer require faculty job applicants to submit diversity statements, Professor Brian Soucek provided perspective about the change in hiring practices to the New York Times, Los Angeles Times and CBS Bay Area.

 

Soucek, a leading expert on the use of diversity statements in higher education, pointed out that the timing of the decision came amid the increasing pressure from the Trump administration to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion efforts at universities across the nation. Soucek is quoted in the New York Times expressing his disappointment in the decision saying, “attempts to appease those who have been explicit about their intent to destroy higher education as we currently know it are politically naïve.”

 

Professor Soucek’s primary teaching and research interests are antidiscrimination law, civil procedure, constitutional law, and refugee/asylum law. He holds a J.D. from Yale Law School and a Ph.D. from Columbia University. He has clerked for U.S. District Court Judge Mark R. Kravitz in Connecticut, and Judge Guido Calabresi of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Professor Soucek is a UC Davis Chancellor’s Fellow. His book, The Opinionated University: Academic Freedom, Diversity, and the Myth of Neutrality in American Higher Education, will be published later this year by the University of Chicago Press.