Our Commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
The CTE strongly supports Rice’s ongoing efforts to expand diversity, equity, inclusion, and access in the classroom. To this end, the CTE offers programming and curricula that highlights the importance of equity-based approaches to higher education and which advances the perspectives of historically underrepresented and marginalized communities, with the goal of reversing historic trends of marginalization and exclusion in higher education. The land that Rice University occupies is the ancestral home of the Karankawa, Atakapa-Ishak, and Sana peoples. A painful history of settler colonialism, genocide, and forced migration and assimilation occurred here, and the descendants of these communities need to be recognized and included in the history of our community. Rice University’s benefactor and namesake, William Marsh Rice, benefited from the institution of slavery, both as the owner of enslaved people as well a merchant and investor who provided goods, services, and credit which supported the institution of slavery; Rice University itself was as a segregated institution until 1965. Settler colonialism, war, slavery, and anti-Black racism and segregation have all harmed the communities they occur in, and this legacy continues to shape our institution, community, and society through the present day.*
We believe our diversity as a community strengthens our research and scholarship, as well as the educational experiences of our students. Rice graduate and undergraduate students, faculty, and staff are diverse in many ways, including race, ethnicity, gender identity and expression, national origin, sexual orientation, disability, socioeconomic status, and religion. In our work with faculty, graduate and undergraduate students, we seek to support the creation of a teaching and learning environment at Rice that welcomes, supports, and challenges all members of the community so that everyone may thrive and succeed to the best of their abilities.
*To read more about William Marsh Rice and Rice University’s history, please see the work of the Rice University Task Force on Slavery, Segregation, and Racial Injustice.