Grant Awarded to Bolster Collegiate Latino Faculty

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The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded a $5.1 million grant to two graduate university programs in an effort to increase the number of Latino professors in the humanities programs at American colleges and universities.

New York University and the University of Pennsylvania will partner on the program entitled “Pathways to Professoriate,” which seeks to prepare 90 students from Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs) for Ph.D. programs over the next five years.

“As the demographic profile of the U.S. changes, the country has a compelling interest in obtaining the full participation of previously underrepresented communities,” said Mariët Westermann, Vice President of the Mellon Foundation. “The past decade has seen considerable gains in doctoral degree attainment for Latinos, yet these gains have not kept up with the growth of the U.S. Hispanic population.”

During the five-year program, the University of Pennsylvania will partner with three HSIs: Florida International University, the University of Texas El Paso, and California State University, Northridge. Along with New York University, the partnership with work with three additional research institutions: the University of California, Berkley, Northwestern University, and the University of California, Davis.