Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Planning and Resources
for
the M.S. Nonprofit Management program
School of Professional Studies
Columbia University
Summer 2020
M.S. Nonprofit Management Mission Statement
The M.S. Nonprofit Management Program at Columbia University will provide our
students and alumni with the leading curriculum and professional credential in the
nonprofit sector. Our program shall be viewed as a locus of thoughtleadership and
research on nonprofits and philanthropy, and one that is grounded inequity and
inclusion considerations, which are crucial to our nonprofit sector and the communities
we serve.
Our graduates will possess a grounding in the major management skills needed for this
uniquesector and the analytical framework to understand contemporary policy
issues,leadership challenges, and ethical considerations.
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In alignment with our mission statement, the M.S. Nonprofit Management program at Columbia
University continues to strive to improve its efforts and demonstrable outcomes for inclusivity, equity
and cultural competencies within its student body, faculty, curriculum and ancillary programming,
including professional development. To that end, and with transparency, the program will refresh the
information regarding our planning around diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives outlined below
throughout the year and make available to all students, alumni, faculty, staff and the public. The
Program is committed to continuing conversations with our students, alumni, faculty and staff to take
meaningful actions that will allow us to more deeply understand the realities of Black, Indigenous, and
People of Color's (BIPOC) lives within our program and to oppose discrimination in all forms.
In response to the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery and the national and
international protests of racial injustice and inequity, on June 6, 2020, Academic Director Lott issued
the following statement in conjunction with an announcement of a program-sponsored Racial Equity
Forum, held on June 12, 2020:
The Nonprofit Management program stands in solidarity with all who denounce
racism, who decry the perniciousness of inequality, who demand change in their
communities and beyond. We recognize the hurt and pain experienced by some members
of our community. We support you in your fight for the equity and justice that you have
gone so long without. Our program has, at its core, a mission for the common good for all
of society, not just for some. We are committed to this cause. With your help and shared
expertise, we will learn from you, and we will continue to strengthen our offerings to all
of you both personally and professionally.
For more information on the statement and forum, as well as statements from President Bollinger and
SPS Student Affairs, please see:
https://sps.columbia.edu/events/justice-and-compassion-community-conversation.
Student and Alumni
The Nonprofit Management program is committed to supporting our student and alumni needs
related to diversity, equity, inclusion and anti-racism. The program has an open door policy for
students and alumni to discuss concerns with the Academic Director, the Deputy Academic Director,
full-time and adjunct faculty, Associate Instructors and our program’s Student Affairs advisor.
Beginning in Fall 2020, the program will hold a monthly student-only open forum, as well as a
monthly student and alumni open forum, both to be hosted by program administration. In addition,
students may take advantage of resources within SPS Student Affairs, including an online portal for
reporting issues within the program, SPS or Columbia, where students may identify themselves or
report anonymously here. Columbia University’s reporting resources are also available to students
here.
Setting expectations from the first interactions between prospective students and the Nonprofit
Management program, through its essay portion of its application the program asks applicants to
address how the program will afford them opportunities to expand and explore cultural competencies
and equity considerations, both of which are crucial to the success of the nonprofit sector. Once
students have committed to matriculate to the program, as of Fall 2020, our new students will
participate in Student Affairs' orientation module on unconscious bias issues. We ask that our
continuing students participate in this online module, as well.
We will continue our new faculty-student advising program that began in 2019, where full-time
faculty are assigned student cohorts to field requests and queries on professional and academic
development, including issues related to racism in the classroom and in the workplace.
The Program already works with diverse groups to bring inclusive perspectives into the Program's
offerings, both inside and outside of the classroom, but will enhance significantly those efforts, and
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request the same of our partners within SPS: faculty advising, networking events, Career Design Lab,
Student Affairs, the Nonprofit Management Student Association, etc. We are the program most
frequently chosen by students who garner the HBCU Fellowship, and we have graduated more
HBCU fellows than any other program at SPS. In addition, for the first time, in 2019-2020, academic
programs at SPS were able to offer one-time fellowship funds to individual applicants, and the
program often has utilized these funds to help increase diversity within the student body.
Opportunities for students and alumni to engage
Just as we hosted our Racial Equity Forum on June 12, 2020, for our students, alumni, faculty and
staff, we will continue to cultivate a safe environment for students of color through open fora and
workshops, prioritizing a sense of community within the program.
The SPS Office of Student Affairs will be hosting DEI-centered events and workshops in the coming
academic year, including
a. “How to Identify and Address Microaggressions at the Workplace”
b. “Code-Switching and Being your Authentic Self at Work”
c. “’Black Tax’ and How to be a Good Ally in the Workplace”
d. “Navigating Imposter Syndrome”
e. “Understanding Racial Justice for International Students Workshop”
f. “Implicit Bias”
All workshop registration information may be found HERE.
At the university level, Columbia’s Office of Multicultural Affairs is hosting a series of workshops in
2020 on unconscious bias and anti-racism. In addition, Columbia developed a Taskforce on Inclusion
and Belonging, Columbia University Life Initiatives:, which works to identify issues and develop
responsive strategies that address students’ experiences both in and outside of the classroom related to
diversity, inclusion and a sense of belonging on campus. The work of the task force is open to all
students, faculty and staff, and includes:
a. Campus Conversations Initiative: Campus Conversations is a dialogue-based initiative
centered on building community, real conversation and dialogue across differences. It
offers students a way to talk about identity and community across campus.
b. Graduate Initiative for Inclusion and Belonging: The Graduate Initiative for Inclusion
and Engagement is part of Columbia’s commitment to diversity and the success of all
graduate and professional school students.
c. Diversity, Dialogue, and Dinner Series: The Dialogue and Dinner series is an
opportunity for students and faculty to have meaningful conversations on critical
student life issues, such as navigating the University as a first-generation student or
raising awareness about the LGBTQ+ community.
d. Resources for promoting racial justice and anti-black violence.
All of these resources are available not only through Columbia University’s website, but the program
posts these resources to the student Canvas site to which all students have access.
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Faculty
Diversity in Recruitment and Hiring Faculty
Faculty diversity has been a major focal point within the M.S. Nonprofit Management program; it is
imperative that we address historical and current systemic inequities in both higher education and
specifically in our field of nonprofit management. The program and its students have benefited from a
positive trajectory toward a more diverse and inclusive faculty, as concerted efforts have been made in
the past years to recruit, hire and retain both full-time and adjunct faculty who reflect our student
demographics and those of the communities we serve as nonprofit and philanthropy professionals.
Data for diversity demographics within program faculty are maintained and updated by SPS Faculty
Affairs; our program’s faculty website is available HERE. For example, in 2019-2020, 45% of the
faculty teaching in the Nonprofit Management program self identified as Black, Hispanic or Asian.
The program will make available to students and alumni annual updates on recruitment and hiring
processes.
To date, students are always invited to teaching demonstrations and job talks by candidates for
full-time faculty positions; in the future, the program will also make these demonstrations and talks
available to alumni, as well. Job postings for adjunct and full-time faculty will be disseminated to
students and alumni for further reach into their own professional contacts.
In addition, Faculty Affairs within the School of Professional Studies issues its own statement
regarding the value of, efforts toward and outcomes of SPS diversity initiatives in hiring and retaining
diverse faculty. Faculty Affairs has partnered with Columbia University EOAA to examine SPS
Faculty Recruitment and determine areas of targeted growth and goals for the continued diverse
growth of full-time and adjunct faculty.
SPS Faculty Affairs is in the process of collecting data from its first SPS Faculty Climate Survey, which
will give the school the ability to better report on demographics. SPS Faculty Affairs is committed to
ensuring that SPS has an inclusive, engaging, and supportive environment. The goals of the survey are
1) to provide a broad understanding of faculty experiences at Columbia SPS; 2) to compare SPS
faculty conditions with peer institutions; 3) to access insights and data to create recommendations to
develop a Faculty DEI Strategic Plan; and 4) to inform overall Columbia SPS DEI policy and practice
improvements.
Lastly, Columbia University itself has posted the Columbia University Faculty Diversity Initiative,
focused on recruitment, retention, and success of Black, Latinx, and other underrepresented faculty
members.
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Training
Faculty are offered professional development workshops on a wide range of pedagogical issues through
SPS Academic Affairs as well as Columbia University’s Center for Teaching and Learning, including
implicit bias and inclusion in the classroom. Beginning in 2020-2021, all faculty (full time, adjunct and
associate instructors) will be required to participate in an anti-bias training workshop. Prior to the
start of the Fall 2020 semester, the program has partnered with SPS Faculty Affairs to invite trainers
from Columbia University’s Office of Multicultural Affairs for an implicit bias workshop specifically
for our program faculty.
Outreach and Mentoring
Full-time faculty, adjunct faculty and associate instructors are all given the opportunity to mentor and
discuss with students and alumni professional development issues, both as to challenges and inequities
experienced in the workplace by underrepresented minorities, and to augment SPS’ professional and
networking opportunities. Beginning in 2020-2021, the program will convene a working group of
faculty who wish specifically to address anti-racism issues; this group will be available to meet with
students and alumni as requested.
SPS makes available each semester $500 for faculty who wish to engage outside the classroom with
students in activities that will afford opportunities for students and faculty to get to know each other
more informally; faculty are encouraged to use these funds to engage with students on important
topics such as implicit bias, racism and equity, both in our sector and in the professional workplace.
Curriculum
In a reflection of the nonprofit sector’s mission-based work within diverse communities, DEI-based
pedagogy is necessary. Just as our M.S. Nonprofit Management curriculum has as one of its program
learning objectives providing training in ethics and ethical practice within the nonprofit sector across
every course in the program curriculum, the program now explicitly has diversity, equity and inclusion
as an objective to be incorporated within all courses as well. Beginning in Fall 2020, the program will
draw on experts in Academic Affairs and across the university to help ground every course in a DEI
framework.
Program faculty, in conjunction with the Program’s Academic Director and SPS Academic Affairs, are
responsible for their syllabi and for developing inclusive pedagogical materials that expose students to
perspectives and communities often underrepresented in academic literature. A range of resources and
mechanisms is available to faculty to incorporate DEI frameworks, including expertise available for
syllabi development, guest subject matter experts who also represent best practices in our sector for
inclusive workplaces, case studies and materials drawn from a diverse range of topics and communities,
and in-class discussions and scenarios that afford opportunities for students to engage in and practice
anti-racism and equity principles.
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Our curriculum embraces DEI aspects across all subject matters within the program, and has a
particular emphasis in a number of courses: “The Role and Unique Nature of the Nonprofit Sector”,
“Governance in the Nonprofit Sector”, “Managing the Mission-based Organization”, “Data Analytics
and Metrics in the Nonprofit Sector”, “Leadership in the Charitable Sector”, and “Policy and
Advocacy in the Nonprofit Sector”. The program administration and faculty are committed to
augmenting anti-racism and inclusion topics as they intersect with specific course subject matter; we
will focus efforts on highlighting these issues and grounding the curriculum in an inclusive
framework. By design, every semester at least one client organization for “Capstone”, a required course
for all students in the Nonprofit Management program, has at its base a social justice mission or works
with those whose beneficiaries are within underserved communities.
In addition, in Fall 2019, the Nonprofit Management program offered for the first time "Diversity,
Equity and Inclusion in Nonprofits and Philanthropy,", a new elective course focused entirely on DEI
in our sector; both academic and practice-based; the course took two years to develop and was
designed and taught by a Ford Foundation program officer with DEI expertise and practice. This
course was the first in the nation within a philanthropy/nonprofit curriculum. In Fall 2020, we will
launch the new course “Strategic Philanthropy: Designing for Solutions at Scale” that directly
addresses strategies for our sector to tackle racism and other major societal issues.
In conjunction with other academic programs at SPS, the Nonprofit Management program is looking
forward in the next years to co-creating a course that will address social justice and anti-racism and be
offered as an elective to students across the entire school.
Ancillary Programming and Professional Development
Much learning and professional development occurs outside of classrooms, of course; importantly,
this learning trajectory does not end at graduation, as the program is committed to offering continued
opportunities for alumni to learn, stay fresh in their careers and take advantage of the immense
amount of expertise the program offers through faculty, Master Classes, professional development
workshops and other convenings and fora. Particularly regarding anti-racism, inclusion and equity
issues, we want to support both alumni and students as they navigate tough and evolving issues in their
workplaces and communities.
Since the program’s launch four years ago, Academic Director Lott has requested that the student
association host a forum each semester and invite Prof. Lott to answer questions and address student
issues in a town hall format. This past spring, two such fora were held at Prof. Lott’s request, and these
fora remain an important conduit between program administration and students, particularly as we
work together to cultivate an anti-bias, anti-racism educational experience. Through the monthly
forum starting in Fall 2020 with alumni invited as well, communication with alumni will be routinely
established beyond current individually requested meetings and all-program events.
Among the many different professional development workshops, the program this summer
specifically addressed issues of race and equity by hosting a Racial Equity Forum, followed by a
subsequent forum for students and alumni who wished to discuss racism and bias issues in their own
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educational experience, hosted by Prof. Lott, Interim Dean Eggers and Academic Dean Dr. Nelson. In
addition, the program is offering two webinars this summer, “Pandemic and Protest” and “Paradigm
Shift: New Directions and Opportunities for Diversity in Fundraising due to Racial Equity
Awakening and Coronavirus” facilitated by faculty members Dr. Erwin de Leon and Dr. Ramone
Segree, respectively. Our special series on “Election 2020” has addressed diversity issues, as has our
Spring 2020 webinar “Careers in Foundations. Our Master Classes, one per semester, represent a
spectrum of perspectives and diverse presenters on varied topics and are open to all alumni, students,
faculty, and members of our program community and are also available online; invitations go to
approximately 3500 recipients in our program’s listserv.
Beginning Fall 2020, the Nonprofit Management program is partnering with two other SPS programs,
Negotiation and Conflict Resolution and Human Capital Management, to present a series of
DEI-focused professional development workshops, all to be presented virtually for all students and
alumni at SPS. The series will extend fall into spring, with workshops presented by each of the three
different programs on interrelated DEI topics and best practices.
As always, the program appreciates hearing from students, alumni and faculty as to any suggestions
and volunteer hosts for webinars and other events on such important issues as diversity and inclusion
in our sector, and for a diverse spectrum of presenters and facilitators on many different topics.
The program works with SPS’ Career Design Lab to keep students and alumni abreast of a wide range
of professional development opportunities. The program is committed to helping provide financial
resources for students of color and minorities to engage in professional development opportunities,
including:
● Career development, including paid internship opportunities where students may still
need additional funds to defray travel, housing, etc.;
● Stipends to attend relevant conferences and training;
● Augmenting the program’s practice of offering subsidized/discounted memberships to
appropriate social sector associations including, but not limited to, AFP, WiD, ANC,
CASE, PPGGNY (Philanthropic Planning Group of Greater NY), and ABFE (Association
for Black Foundation Executives)
In 2020-2021, the program will request further funds designated for these purposes, whether
administered through CDL or the program. We will have a heightened focus with CDL and faculty to
identify potential internships/employers who support DEI efforts overtly, and with whom our
graduates are an excellent match, building upon efforts we started in 2018.
Alumni-specific Collaborations
The program welcomes efforts for alumni to form an official alumni association, much as the
Nonprofit Management Student Association formed and works in tandem and in routine
communication with the program. Apart from the program’s own internal efforts to locate alumni
contact information and harness their expertise, SPS announced in Summer 2020 it would initiate a
new program aimed at supporting each academic program as we work more closely with alumni. For
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our Nonprofit Management program, this is welcome news, as we announced in 2019 that we would
be developing an advisory committee on fundraising for scholarships and fellowships for our students,
particularly to increase diversity and help those in the nonprofit world who may not otherwise be able
to afford a Columbia education. Currently, two summer interns in our program are tasked with
creating an alumni outreach plan, a student and alumni survey, and a start to a fundraising plan for
fellowships. With a 2021 anticipated start to that advisory committee, our efforts would be helped
immensely with the formation of a program alumni association.
We appreciate and support our student, alumni and faculty commitment to dismantling systems of
structural inequalities. We stand in solidarity with our BIPOC students, and all students working
toward equity and anti-racism, and we look forward to the opportunity to work together in this
endeavor.
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