GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... ·...

9
14 L IBERAL E DUCATION WINTER 2005 FEATURED TOPIC Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Students at liberal arts colleges report more frequent experiences with diversity on average than do their counterparts at other types of institutions IN MANY WAYS, liberal arts colleges seem uniquely well suited to provide high quality undergraduate experiences. Their relatively small size ostensibly promotes student-faculty interaction and meaningful relations with peers. Many have salient missions—some be- cause of denominational roots, others because of curricular arrangements—that are thought to leave distinctive imprints on their students’ attitudes and values (Clark 1970; Kuh et al. 1991; Townsend, Newell, and Wiese 1992). According to Richard Hersh (1999, 192) these structural and cultural features make liberal arts colleges “sui generis, themselves a special kind of pedagogy.” That is, they em- phasize a range of intellectual and practical knowledge, skills, and competencies and cre- ate the conditions inside and outside the classroom that help students integrate and bring coherence to their learning. This is sup- ported by some pretty convincing empirical evidence. Decades of studies show that resi- dential liberal arts colleges “produce a pattern of consistently positive student outcomes not found in any other type of American higher- education institution” (Astin 1999, 77; see also Pascarella and Terenzini 1991). The Association of American Colleges and Universities’ Greater Expectations report (2002) makes a persuasive argument that a liberal education may be more relevant today than at any previous time, given the social, cultural, and economic challenges facing col- lege graduates. Yet, some of the educationally powerful features of liberal arts colleges could be constraints in a world that is becoming in- creasingly diverse in virtually every way. For example, because of their location or denomi- national affiliation, many liberal arts colleges are fairly homogeneous in terms of student and faculty racial and ethnic backgrounds. This relative lack of structural diversity re- duces the probability a student will frequently interact with someone different from them- selves in terms of race or ethnicity. Studies show that experiences with diversity are pre- cursors to such desirable outcomes as im- proved intergroup relations, critical thinking, and satisfaction with the learning environ- ment (Gurin 1999; Hurtado et al. 1999). Thus, it would appear that in terms of having experiences with diversity, students at many liberal arts colleges may be disadvantaged compared with their counterparts at larger, more structurally diverse universities. At the same time, it is possible—as Mitchell Chang (2001) has demonstrated—that an institution can compensate for its relative lack of structural diversity by providing students with opportu- nities to experience and learn more about human diversity. Examples include required multicultural or diversity courses (often part of the general education component), elective ethnic studies courses, cultural awareness workshops, and cultural centers. All this begs the question, how do students at liberal arts colleges fare in terms of experi- encing diversity? We provide a partial answer to this question by threading together key findings from two complementary projects. The first is the Na- tional Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), an annual survey of tens of thousands of first- year and senior students (Kuh 2001, 2003). For this study we analyzed the responses of 98,744 undergraduates (49,706 first-year students and 49,038 seniors) from 349 four-year colleges GEORGE D. KUH is chancellor’s professor and director of the Indiana University Center for Postsecondary Research. PAUL D. UMBACH is assistant professor of higher education at the University of Iowa.

Transcript of GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... ·...

Page 1: GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... · Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH ... practices that encourage and support cross-racial

14 L I B E R A L ED U C A T I O N WI N T E R 2005

FE

AT

UR

ED

T

OP

IC

Experiencing Diversity G E O R G E D . K U H ■ PAU L D . U M B A C H

Students at liberal arts

colleges reportmore frequentexperiences

with diversityon average

than do theircounterparts at other typesof institutions

IN MANY WAYS, liberal arts colleges seemuniquely well suited to provide high qualityundergraduate experiences. Their relativelysmall size ostensibly promotes student-facultyinteraction and meaningful relations withpeers. Many have salient missions—some be-cause of denominational roots, others becauseof curricular arrangements—that are thoughtto leave distinctive imprints on their students’attitudes and values (Clark 1970; Kuh et al.1991; Townsend, Newell, and Wiese 1992).

According to RichardHersh (1999, 192)

these structural and cultural features make liberal arts colleges “sui generis, themselves aspecial kind of pedagogy.” That is, they em-phasize a range of intellectual and practicalknowledge, skills, and competencies and cre-ate the conditions inside and outside theclassroom that help students integrate andbring coherence to their learning. This is sup-ported by some pretty convincing empiricalevidence. Decades of studies show that resi-dential liberal arts colleges “produce a patternof consistently positive student outcomes notfound in any other type of American higher-education institution” (Astin 1999, 77; seealso Pascarella and Terenzini 1991).

The Association of American Colleges andUniversities’ Greater Expectations report(2002) makes a persuasive argument that aliberal education may be more relevant todaythan at any previous time, given the social,cultural, and economic challenges facing col-lege graduates. Yet, some of the educationallypowerful features of liberal arts colleges could

be constraints in a world that is becoming in-creasingly diverse in virtually every way. Forexample, because of their location or denomi-national affiliation, many liberal arts collegesare fairly homogeneous in terms of studentand faculty racial and ethnic backgrounds.This relative lack of structural diversity re-duces the probability a student will frequentlyinteract with someone different from them-selves in terms of race or ethnicity. Studiesshow that experiences with diversity are pre-cursors to such desirable outcomes as im-proved intergroup relations, critical thinking,and satisfaction with the learning environ-ment (Gurin 1999; Hurtado et al. 1999).

Thus, it would appear that in terms of havingexperiences with diversity, students at manyliberal arts colleges may be disadvantagedcompared with their counterparts at larger,more structurally diverse universities. At thesame time, it is possible—as Mitchell Chang(2001) has demonstrated—that an institutioncan compensate for its relative lack of structuraldiversity by providing students with opportu-nities to experience and learn more abouthuman diversity. Examples include requiredmulticultural or diversity courses (often partof the general education component), electiveethnic studies courses, cultural awarenessworkshops, and cultural centers.

All this begs the question, how do studentsat liberal arts colleges fare in terms of experi-encing diversity?

We provide a partial answer to this questionby threading together key findings from twocomplementary projects. The first is the Na-tional Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE),an annual survey of tens of thousands of first-year and senior students (Kuh 2001, 2003). Forthis study we analyzed the responses of 98,744undergraduates (49,706 first-year students and49,038 seniors) from 349 four-year colleges

GEORGE D. KUH is chancellor’s professor anddirector of the Indiana University Center forPostsecondary Research. PAUL D. UMBACH isassistant professor of higher education at theUniversity of Iowa.

Page 2: GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... · Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH ... practices that encourage and support cross-racial

y What Can We Learn from Liberal Arts Colleges?

University of Iowa

Page 3: GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... · Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH ... practices that encourage and support cross-racial

FE

AT

UR

ED

T

OP

IC and universities who participated in the NSSE

survey in spring 2002. Of this group, 17,640(9,598 first-year students and 8,042 seniors)were enrolled at sixty-eight baccalaureate lib-eral arts colleges, as defined by The CarnegieFoundation for the Advancement of Teaching(McCormick 2001).1

The second project is a recently completedtwo-year study of twenty colleges and univer-sities (Kuh et al. 2005). Known as ProjectDEEP (Documenting Effective EducationalPractices), the schools selected for the studyall had higher-than-predicted scores on NSSEand higher-than-predicted graduation rates.The purpose of DEEP was to discover and document the policies and practices at theseschools that contributed to the better thanexpected performance by their students.2

Experiences with diversity: How do liberal arts colleges stack up?The NSSE data point to two general conclu-sions. The first is about diversity experiencesat liberal arts colleges compared with othertypes of colleges and universities. The secondis related to students’ experiences with diver-sity at liberal arts colleges.

First, students at liberal arts colleges reportmore frequent experiences with diversity onaverage than do their counterparts at othertypes of institutions. Table 1 illustrates thiswhere the overall diversity experiences scorefor liberal arts colleges is set at zero. The pat-tern of negative effect sizes for all the othertypes of institutions indicates that students atliberal arts colleges, on average, report moreexperiences with diversity compared with

other schools. The effect size is the proportionof a standard deviation change in the depen-dent variable (in this instance, diversity expe-riences) associated with the independentvariable (institutional type). The larger theeffect size, the more likely the differences are“real.” For our purposes, an effect size of 0.20is worthy of note.

In relative terms, liberal arts colleges appearto have diversity-rich learning environments.This advantage is substantial, even after con-trolling for student and other institutionalfeatures. This pattern is mildly surprising if forno other reason than that many of these insti-tutions are not naturally imbued with struc-tural diversity. For example, many liberal artscolleges are located for historical reasons inrural settings, which are neither populatednor viewed as desirable collegiate environ-ments by students from historically underrep-resented groups. As a result, many liberal artscolleges are not structurally diverse. That is,on average, they enroll relatively small num-bers of students from racial and ethnic minor-ity backgrounds. Even so, they seem to leave adistinctive diversity imprint on their students.

Second, diversity experiences at liberal artscolleges are positively associated with a hostof educationally purposeful activities and out-comes. This can be seen in table 2, which dis-plays the relationships between differentmeasures of diversity and selected indicatorsof student engagement and student self-re-ported progress since starting college. Theplus signs indicate that a highly significantcorrelation exists between the relevant mea-sures; a minus sign indicates a negative rela-tionship. The pattern of findings shows thatstudents at liberal arts colleges who more fre-quently interact with peers from diverse racialand ethnic backgrounds or who have seriousconversations with other students who holdpolitical and social views very different fromtheir own also engage at higher levels in othereffective educational practices, such as work-ing with peers on problem-solving activitiesinside and outside the classroom (active andcollaborative learning).

For this study, we defined structural diver-sity (table 2) as the probability that a studentwill interact with a student of another race.As expected, first-year and senior students atinstitutions with high structural diversityscores are more likely to engage in diversity-

16 L I B E R A L ED U C A T I O N WI N T E R 2005

Table 1 Engagement in diversity-related activities: Differences between liberal arts colleges and other institution types (after controls) represented by effect size

Carnegie Classification First-year Senior

Doctoral Research- Extensive -0.21 -0.19

Doctoral Research- Intensive -0.24 -0.25

Master’s I & II -0.27 -0.19

Baccalaureate- General -0.30 -0.28

Page 4: GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... · Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH ... practices that encourage and support cross-racial

Table 2Relationships between diversity experiences, effective educational practices, and desired outcomes for students at liberal arts colleges

First-year Students Seniors

Diversity DiversityStructural Climate in Course- Diversity Structural Climate in Course- Diversity

Dependent Variable Diversity Diversity Work Press Diversity Diversity Work Press

ENGAGEMENT

Academic Challenge + + +Higher-Order Thinking + + + + + +Active and Collaborative + + + + + +Diversity-related Activities + + + + + + + +

SUPPORTIVE CAMPUS

Supportive Campus Env. + +Interpersonal - +Support for Learning + + + + + +Satisfaction - + +

GAINS

Personal/Social + + + + + + +Understand Diversity + + + + + + + +Contribute to Community + + + + + +Understand Self + + + + + +Understand Others + + + + +

related activities and reportgains in understanding peoplefrom other backgrounds andcultures.

While structural diversityappears to matter in promot-ing engagement in certain ef-fective educational practices,the institutional climate fordiversity is even more important. Climate fordiversity represents students’ perceptions thatthe institution encourages and values interac-tion with people from different backgrounds.As table 2 indicates, climate for diversity ispositively related to almost all of the engage-ment and gains measures. As expected, thestrongest effects for both first-year and seniorstudents can be seen in the average engage-ment in diversity-related activities, such asthe frequency with which students encounterdiverse perspectives in class and make gains inunderstanding diversity.

The diversity press measure in table 2 is theoverall measure of the degree to which an in-

stitution values diversity, orthe sum of students’ experi-ences with diversity, students’perceptions of the climate fordiversity, and students’ expo-sure to diverse perspectives incoursework. At liberal artscolleges, the diversity press ismost strongly related to en-

gagement in diversity-related activities andgains in understanding diversity for both first-year students and seniors.

In only two instances was a diversity mea-sure negatively related to effective educa-tional practices or desired outcomes ofcollege. The more racially and ethnically di-verse the student body, the less satisfied first-year students were with their overall collegeexperience and the quality of the interper-sonal environment on campus. Apparently,schools need to do more than simply recruitmore students from historically underrepre-sented groups for students to benefit from experiences with diversity.

WI N T E R 2005 L I B E R A L ED U C A T I O N 17

FE

AT

UR

ED

T

OP

IC

Diversity experiences at liberal arts

colleges are positivelyassociated with

a host of educationallypurposeful activities

and outcomes

Page 5: GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... · Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH ... practices that encourage and support cross-racial

FE

AT

UR

ED

T

OP

IC How liberal arts colleges foster diversity

experiences: Some insights from DEEPWhat is it about liberal arts colleges that con-tributes to their relative advantage in creatingdiversity-rich learning environments? We havesome insights into this phenomenon from theDocumenting Effective Educational Practices(DEEP) study (Kuh et al. 2005). Common toall twenty colleges and universities in theDEEP project was a commitment to diversity.This was especially evident in the missionstatements of the ten liberal arts colleges in

the study. For example, multiculturalism andinternationalism are two of the “four pillars”in Macalester College’s mission. ThoughMacalester students perennially urge the insti-tution to become even more diverse, in rela-tive terms the levels of interaction amongstudents of different backgrounds and attitudesplaces the institution above the ninetiethpercentile nationally on the NSSE diversityitems. Another liberal arts college with strongdiversity scores, California State University-Monterey Bay (CSUMB), also emphasizes

18 L I B E R A L ED U C A T I O N WI N T E R 2005

University of Iowa

Page 6: GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... · Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH ... practices that encourage and support cross-racial

diversity in its mission: “to build a multicul-tural learning community founded on acade-mic excellence from which all partners in theeducational process emerge prepared to con-tribute productively, responsibly, and ethicallyto California and the global community.”CSUMB’s commitment to diversity and multi-culturalism flows naturally from its visionstatement, which features serving “the diversepeople of California, especially the workingclass and historically underrepresented andlow-income populations.” The Evergreen

State College, also a strong performer on di-versity measures, was founded with a strongsocial justice commitment. Today, Evergreen’smission is guided by five foci, one of which is“teaching across significant differences.”

Another way liberal arts colleges promotediversity is by implementing programs andpractices that encourage and support cross-racial interactions. Creating living-learningcommunities organized around diversitythemes is one way to promote more frequentcross-racial interactions. Ursinus College offerstwo such living units, Musser Hall and Umoja,that are home to students interested in inter-national, multicultural, and diversity issues.But for such facilities to be successful, minoritystudents must enjoy a modicum of academicand social success, enough that they are will-ing to persist and graduate. For this reason,Ursinus created the Bridge Program, whichbrings minority students to campus threeweeks before the start of the semester to helpthem “bridge the gap” between high schooland college. The percentage of students ofcolor graduating from Ursinus is comparableto that of white students.

Including diverse perspectives in the class-room is essential. CSUMB keeps diversity onthe front burner every day, beginning with itsfirst-year proseminar and continuing in classes,even in fields such as science where discussionsabout multiculturalism are rare. Ursinus College requires two courses that emphasizediversity as part of its core curriculum, onefocused on diversity within the United Statesand another that examines issues from aglobal perspective.

Evergreen institutionalizes its commitmentto diversity with regular activities, events, andorganizations that create opportunities forminority students to interact with and supportone another and that encourage them to learnabout and celebrate their cultural heritages.Groups such as the First People’s Coalition, asupport group where both individuals andgroups can find friendship, common cause, andmutual support, offer a full repertoire of socialand service activities, big sibling programs,social and political action opportunities, andcommunity outreach and service programs.

The locations of some liberal arts collegeshelps to increase their structural diversity. At CSUMB, for example, fewer than half (46percent) of the students are white. But other

WI N T E R 2005 L I B E R A L ED U C A T I O N 19

FE

AT

UR

ED

T

OP

IC

Page 7: GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... · Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH ... practices that encourage and support cross-racial

FE

AT

UR

ED

T

OP

IC

liberal arts colleges do not have the advantageof nearly as much racial and ethnic diversity intheir region, yet have found ways to emphasizediversity, especially in the classroom. For example, there is not a lot of racial and ethnicdiversity in the region where the Universityof Maine at Farmington (UMF) is located. Toovercome this limitation, the institution inten-tionally designed programs that connect itsstudents in meaningful ways to people fromother backgrounds. One working example isan education methods course where studentscorrespond as “pen pals” with first graders ata Chicago public school. Every few weeks,students read aloud some of the handwrittenletters they receive and then discuss the chil-dren’s progress in writing skills. Student affairsstaff members at UMF do their part by offeringa full complement of diversity education pro-gramming and major productions, such as theLaramie Project, which was complemented bypostproduction discussions on themes of in-tolerance, hate crimes, sexual orientation,and religion.

The new 8,500 square-foot Malcolm X In-stitute at Wabash College reflects the symbol-ism and spatial arrangement found in atraditional African village. It is both a physi-cal manifestation of the college’s commitmentto multiculturalism and a programmatic effortto provide educational, cultural, and socialopportunities to the campus and surroundingcommunities. These range from student studytables, black experience library resources, aKwanzaa celebration, deejay parties, speakers,and major conferences such as “NegotiatingSuccess: Workshops for Black Men in the

Liberal Arts,” which brought together studentsand faculty from colleges around the countryto discuss issues affecting the black male inliberal arts colleges as well as the success ofblack people in general.

Of course, liberal arts colleges are not theonly types of institutions that are successfullyinfusing diversity experiences into the under-graduate program. In fact, some of the moreinnovative and effective approaches to facili-tating cross-group interactions are occurringat large universities such as the University ofMichigan (another DEEP school), the Univer-sity of Maryland, Indiana University Bloom-ington, and Arizona State University. Theseinstitutions have implemented intergroupdialogues that bring together diverse groups ofstudents with the purpose of discussing issuesrelated to their diversity. So far, the researchon the impact of these experiences is promis-ing, suggesting that these dialogues are an ef-fective way for students to learn to becomecitizens in an increasingly diverse society(Schoem and Hurtado 2001).

ConclusionAll things considered, students at liberal artscolleges report more frequent experiences withdiversity than do their peers at other types ofinstitutions. In part, this may be because manyliberal arts colleges have policies and practicesdesigned to prepare their students for a diversedemocracy. At the same time, developmentallypowerful experiences with diversity transcendinstitutional type. Ultimately, what really mat-ters is that students encounter in their studiesperspectives that reflect a range of human

20 L I B E R A L ED U C A T I O N WI N T E R 2005

University of Indiana-

Bloomington

Page 8: GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... · Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH ... practices that encourage and support cross-racial

experiences and that they are encouraged andsupported to interact with others in ways thathelp them think and respond in novel, morecomplex ways to contemporary circumstances.The few examples mentioned above indicatethat institutions can vary substantially instructural diversity, mission, type, size, and lo-cation but still present diverse views in theclassroom, communicate the value of diversity,and support the academic and social needs ofstudents from different backgrounds. Thus,ensuring that our students gain valuable expe-riences with diversity during college is not amatter of resources or location, but a matter ofinstitutional will. ■■

NOTES1. We measured student engagement using multiple

sets of items from NSSE that represent level of aca-demic challenge, higher-order thinking, active andcollaborative learning, and diversity-related activities.The supportive campus environment measure wasmade up of items reflecting interpersonal support,support for learning, and overall satisfaction withcollege. Students’ gains in learning and intellectualdevelopment were represented by two scales: gainsin general education and gains in personal and social development. The data were analyzed inthree stages in which a variety of student-levelvariables were used to control for possible con-founding effects. We used a series of hierarchicallinear models to explore the impact of differencesin student engagement by institutional type, to examine the institutional factors that are related todiversity and the effects of diversity experiences onstudent engagement at liberal arts colleges, and toprobe the relationships between student engage-ment with diversity-related activities at liberal artscolleges and measures of student engagement andself-reported gains in personal and educationalgrowth. These analytical methods are describedmore fully in Umbach and Kuh (forthcoming) andonline at www.iub.edu/~nsse/acrobat/experienceswith_diversity.pdf.

2. The Documenting Effective Educational Practices(DEEP) project was conducted by twenty-four re-searchers between June 2002 and May 2004 withgenerous support from Lumina Foundation forEducation and the Center of Inquiry in the LiberalArts at Wabash College. In the process of twomultiple day visits to each institution, the researchteam interviewed more than 2,700 faculty, staff,and students and reviewed thousands of documents.More information about the DEEP study is avail-able in Kuh et al. (2005) and online atwww.iub.edu/~nsse/html/deep/main.htm.

WI N T E R 2005 L I B E R A L ED U C A T I O N 21

FE

AT

UR

ED

T

OP

IC

REFERENCESAssociation of American Colleges and Universities.

2002. Greater expectations: A new vision for learningas a nation goes to college. Washington, DC: Associ-ation of American Colleges and Universities.

Astin, A. W. 1999. How the liberal arts college affectsstudents. Daedalus 128 (1): 77-100.

Chang, M. J. 2001. The positive educational effects ofracial diversity on campus. In G. Orfield and M.Kurlaender, eds. Diversity challenged: Evidence on theimpact of affirmative action.Cambridge, MA: TheCivil Rights Project, Harvard University, 175-86.

Clark, B. R. 1970. The distinctive college: Antioch,Reed, and Swarthmore. Chicago: Aldine.

Gurin, P. 1999. Expert report of Patricia Gurin. InThe University of Michigan, ed. The compelling need for diversity in higher education, Gratz et al. v.Bollinger et al. No. 97-75231 and Grutter et al. v.Bollinger et al. No. 97-75928. Ann Arbor, MI:The University of Michigan, 99-234.

Hersh, R. H. 1999. Generating ideals and transform-ing lives: A contemporary case for the residentialliberal arts college. Daedalus 128 (1): 173-94.

Hurtado, S., J. Milem, A. Clayton-Pedersen, and W.Allen. 1999. Enacting diverse learning environments:Improving the climate for racial/ethnic diversity inhigher education. Washington, DC: The GeorgeWashington University.

Kuh, G. D. 2001. Assessing what really matters tostudent learning: Inside the National Survey ofStudent Engagement. Change 33 (3): 10-17, 66.

. 2003. What we’re learning about student en-gagement from NSSE. Change 35 (2): 35-44.

Kuh, G. D., J. Kinzie, J. H. Schuh, E. J. Whitt, andAssociates. 2005. Student success in college: Creatingconditions that matter. San Francisco: AmericanAssociation for Higher Education/Jossey-Bass.

Kuh, G. D., J. H. Schuh, E. J. Whitt, and Associates.1991. Involving colleges: Successful approaches to fos-tering student learning and development outside theclassroom. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

McCormick, A. C. 2001. The Carnegie classification of institutions of higher education, 2000 edition. Menlo Park, CA: The Carnegie Foundation for theAdvancement of Teaching.

Pascarella, E. T., and P. T. Terenzini. 1991. How college affects students. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Schoem, D. L. and S. Hurtado, eds. 2001. Intergroupdialogue: Deliberative democracy in school, college,community, and workplace. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.

Townsend, B. K., L. J. Newell, and M. D. Wiese.1992. Creating distinctiveness: Lessons from uncommoncolleges and universities. Washington, DC: TheGeorge Washington University.

Umbach, P. D., and G. D. Kuh. Forthcoming. Student experiences with diversity at liberal artscolleges: Another claim for distinctiveness. Journalof Higher Education.

Page 9: GEORGE D. KUH PAUL D. UMBACH Experiencing Diversitycpr.indiana.edu/uploads/Kuh, Umbach (2005... · Experiencing Diversity GEORGE D. KUH ... practices that encourage and support cross-racial