Atlanta, GA — Almost 1,300 minority doctoral students, faculty members and education leaders from across the country convene in Atlanta this week to focus on issues that face new and aspiring faculty members of color. The goal of the Institute on Teaching and Mentoring, the largest gathering of minority Ph.D. scholars in the nation, is to address the shortage of minority faculty in college classrooms and labs around the nation.

WHO: The doctoral students and new faculty members from underrepresented minority groups, from more than 40 states and almost 100 fields of study at almost 300 institutions of higher education.
 
The Southern Regional Education Board State Doctoral Scholars Program hosts and manages the Institute on Teaching and Mentoring, which is sponsored by a partnership of regional, federal and foundation programs called the Compact for Faculty Diversity.

WHAT: The annual Institute on Teaching and Mentoring provides strategies and support for doctoral students and new college professors, who learn how to survive the rigors of graduate school and succeed as faculty members in sessions on topics ranging from how to get published to how to be a great mentor. Attendees say the Institute gives them skills to overcome barriers and motivates them for the challenges of the coming year.

WHY:  The mission behind the conference is to increase the number of ethnic and racial minority faculty members on college and university campuses.

More than one-third of America’s college students are people of color, but too few minority graduates go on to earn doctorates. The Class of 2019 at U.S. public high schools is projected to be 46 percent non-white, up from 38 percent in 2009. Yet only about 5 percent of U.S. college and university faculty are African-American, 3 percent are Hispanic and 1 percent are Native American.