With the beginning of the academic year underway, The Eagle’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion group met for its first meeting of the semester Wednesday. According to this semester’s diversity report, The Eagle’s fall 2021 staffers are more racially and ethnically diverse than in the spring. The data was collected from The Eagle’s fall 2021 staff intake form.
This fall, about 65 percent of staffers identify as white, compared to about 67 percent of staffers in the spring. This is about 12 percent more than American University undergraduates overall. Additionally, the percentage of staffers that identify as multiracial has increased to about 13 percent and is about three times larger than the percent of multiracial undergraduates at AU.
The percent of staffers that do not receive federal financial aid grew, with about 55 percent of fall staffers receiving federal aid –– up from about 47 percent of staffers in the spring. The percent of staffers who receive pell grants fell from around 13 percent in spring to about 8 percent this fall.
The number of staffers from within the School of Communication has grown from the spring. Then, 65 staffers were students in the SOC, compared to 71 staffers this fall.
The number of staffers identifying as LGBTQ+ has grown since last semester, with around 27 percent of staffers who answered the fall intake form question identifying as LGBTQ+, compared to about 18 percent of spring staffers.
The gender of staffers remained similar from the spring. The percent of those who identified as female dropped about 1 percent from spring, while those who identified as male or gender-neutral or non-conforming stayed about the same.
Sophomore assistant copy editor Isabelle Kravis was voted as the next community outreach director at Wednesday’s meeting.
Among the paper’s DEI initiatives for the semester include implicit bias training, and workshops on reporting on disabilities, reporting on the LGBTQ+ community and multimedia work. The group is also placing a particular emphasis on staff bonding and community-building as the AU community returns to campus.
The Copy department will be working this semester to examine and expand The Eagle’s Style Sheet to help staffers accurately report on the AU and D.C. communities.
