Supporting Diverse Graduate Students
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Rackham Graduate School has a history and tradition of valuing the diversity of our students as an essential dimension of excellence in graduate education. Our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Strategic Plan emphasizes four domains in which we are focusing our efforts:
- Recruitment
- High-Quality Academic and Professional Environment
- Retention
- Service, Partnership, and Collaboration
Rackham provides funding to graduate programs and sponsors numerous activities aimed at recruiting an outstanding and inclusive student body. We seek to provide intellectual, social, emotional, and financial support so that students from groups that are historically underrepresented in higher education or in their fields feel welcome and thrive in their studies.
Recent DEI Posts
Graduate Student Community
Rackham takes great pride in the diverse backgrounds and experiences of the members of our graduate community.
- Graduate Students with Children
- Students with Disabilities
- Student Military Service Members & Veterans
- International Students
- LGBTQ Students
- Students of Color
- Undocumented & DACAmented students
Student Organizations
Upcoming DEI Events
Recruitment of Diverse Graduate Students
Barbour Scholars
Among the oldest and most prestigious awards granted by the University of Michigan, offering funding to female students from Asia and the Middle East since 1917.
Bouchet Honor Society
The Edward Alexander Bouchet Graduate Honor Society recognizes outstanding scholarly achievement and promotes diversity and excellence in doctoral education and the professoriate.
Building Bridges to the Doctorate
The Building Bridges to the Doctorate program attracts a diverse student body into doctoral education—especially students from historically underrepresented groups—and fully funds students’ master’s educations.
Rackham Research Exchange
The Rackham Research Exchange focuses on increasing diversity in mathematics, physical sciences, computer science, engineering (MPCSE) and related disciplines.
Michigan Humanities Emerging Research Scholars Program (MICHHERS)
The Michigan Humanities Emerging Research Scholars Program was launched in 2015 to increase opportunities for students interested in pursuing doctoral degrees in the humanities.
The Rackham Merit Fellowship (RMF) Connection
The Rackham Merit Fellowship Connection is a program designed to assist and cultivate community among newly admitted RMF doctoral students.
Summer Research Opportunity Program (SROP)
Rackham’s Summer Research Opportunity Program offers outstanding undergraduates underrepresented in their field of study the opportunity to conduct research on our campus during the summer.
Promoting Diversity in Graduate Education
Faculty Allies for Diversity in Graduate Education
The Faculty Allies for Diversity is a group of faculty members who work within their programs and in collaboration with Rackham’s diversity initiatives on recruitment, admissions, climate, retention, and completion issues.
Faculty Allies and Student Ally Diversity Grants
These two funding opportunities—the Rackham Faculty Allies Diversity Grant and the Student Ally for Diversity Grant—provide support for diversity innovations in graduate programs.
Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs)
Minority Serving Institutions are institutions of higher education unique in their mission to serve minority populations. Through Rackham’s MSI coordinator, the school seeks to promote the strategic development of partnerships between the University of Michigan and MSIs in an effort to attract, recruit, and retain a highly qualified, diverse graduate student community.
Rackham DEI Professional Development Certificate
This new, innovative certificate program is designed to prepare graduate students to work in a diverse environment while fostering a climate of inclusiveness.
Rackham’s Faculty Committee on Mentoring (MORE)
The MORE committee engages with faculty and graduate students to foster mentoring conversations; the committee has engaged with 678 faculty members and 405 graduate students and has added a new module, “Mentoring Across Difference.”
Engendering Respectful Communities
Engendering Respectful Communities (ERC): Preventing Sexual and Gender-Based Harassment for Graduate Students is a program created and facilitated by U-M’s Sexual Assault Prevention and Awareness Center (SAPAC), in partnership with Rackham Graduate School and the U-M Educational Theatre Company (ETC).