One would hope that STEM schools would lead in reestablishing a meritocratic hiring standard in higher ed, given the need for excellence in hard sciences and the goods and services they produce. This leadership in deletership (apologies) appears to be the case, with MIT doing away with a diversity statement for its faculty applicants. (The statements were, at best, a waste of time, and, at worst, used to recruit for ideological traits rather than establishing candidate quality and discriminate against “overrepresented groups” such as Asians and Jews.)

John Sailer reports for UnHerd:

In what’s likely to be a watershed moment, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has ended the use of diversity statements for faculty hiring, making it the first elite private university to backtrack on the practice that has been roundly criticised as a political litmus test.

On Saturday, an MIT spokesperson confirmed in an email to me that “requests for a statement on diversity will no longer be part of applications for any faculty positions at MIT”, adding that the decision was made by embattled MIT President Sally Kornbluth “with the support of the Provost, Chancellor, and all six academic deans”.

The decision marks an inflection point in the battle over diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in higher education. Since at least the late 2010s, diversity statements have been ubiquitous in faculty hiring, sometimes carrying serious weight in the selection process. As one dean at Emory University put it while describing her approach to hiring, “Diversity statement, then dossier.”

May other schools join in and do away with the diversity statements’ affront to merit.