Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, HOUSE NEWS—Republican committee members demand information regarding Harvard’s diversity and inclusion efforts, (Jun 11, 2025)

By Patricia K. Ruiz, J.D.

In a letter, they take issue with Harvard’s efforts to increase the diversity of its applicant pool and student body.

In a letter to Alan Garber, the president of Harvard University, Education and Workforce Committee Chairman Tim Walberg (R-MI) and eight other Republican committee members requested information regarding whether the school engages in illegal, discriminatory hiring and employment practices in violation of Title VII. The letter points to several documents suggesting that Harvard “may have been and may still be unlawfully discriminating with respect to its hiring and employment practices” by taking steps to ensure inclusion of women and minorities.

Alleged discrimination. The letter cites Harvard’s “Best Practices for Conducting Faculty Searches” document, which recommends that administrators developing an applicant pool should “ensure that the early lists include women and minorities,” and adds, “A goal is by no means a quota. But in searches with a placement goal for women and minorities, it is that much more important that the committee conduct robust outreach.” The document further encourages the committee chair to use applicants’ self-identified demographic data, including gender, race, and ethnicity, to encourage diversity in the applicant pool. Additionally, the letter takes issue with Harvard’s provision to applicants “Diversity-Related Sample Interview Questions” to “assist in assessing a candidate’s understanding and commitment to diversity, inclusion, and belonging,” in which one of the sample questions is, “Explain how diversity played a role in your career.”

The letter also cites a charge by the EEOC citing public documents from Harvard touting its success in sharply changing demographics of tenured and tenure-track faculty. It also points to multiple hiring and training programs at Harvard that “seem to discriminate,” including Harvard Medical School’s Summer Training in Academic Research and Scholarship (STARS) Program, which has a “paid, full-time, summer internship and training program for “underrepresented minority (URM) undergraduate and first-year medical students.”” Harvard’s Mellon Mays Undergraduate Program also has a “paid two-year fellowship program for undergraduate students, for which “[a]pplications are particularly encouraged for students of color.”

Request for information. The committee requested that Garber provide the following information no later than June 25, 2025: (1) since January 20, 2021, any written policies or guidance documents that encourage or require the consideration of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin with respect to recruiting for potential employment, actual employment, or hiring, and for any policies or guidance that has since been rescinded, documentation of such rescission, and any replacement policies or guidance; and (2) an explanation of whether and how Harvard or its employees may consider race, color, religion, sex, or national origin with respect to recruiting for potential employment, actual employment, or hiring.

News: IndustryNewsTrends Discrimination SexDiscrimination RaceDiscrimination AgencyNews