"The program is mainly Black Ph.D's and doctors," she says, and many are eventually offered positions at Harvard.

While the School of Public Health has achieved its original faculty hiring goals, the other nine schools of the University cannot so easily be tagged as successes or failures in their diversification efforts.

Mixed Results at Other Schools

Levels of progress vary across a spectrum, from the School of Public Health to others which have achieved in some areas and failed in others.

Officials in the schools attribute their shortfalls to many factors, which vary from school to school. One problem for some is the difficulty of increasing the number of total tenured faculty, which some administrators say are likely to remain constant in size for their schools.

The Business School, which was able to meet its goals for all faculty posts except tenured positions, will likely not meet goals for tenured faculty within the coming year for that reason, according to Robert H. Hayes, the school's administrative dean.

"We may not achieve our goals in the time frame," he said. The school, which reports eight tenured minorities and five tenured women, needs to tenure one minority and ten women to meet its goals.

Hayes estimates three to four positions are opened up each year, most through retirement of professors. At this rate of hiring, it would take three or four more years to reach the goals set five years ago.

Another alternative, to increase the size of the tenured faculty, is not under consideration, Hayes says.

"The pressure is to hold the current level," he says. "Ninety tenured professors represent about 60 percent of the faculty. As some things in business become more important a larger percentage of tenured faculty robs the school of its flexibility."

The problem is likely to increase, officials in some schools say, due to the upcoming implementation of a Federal law banning forced retirement of tenured professors.

"It worries me, because you don't have to be a rocket scientist to see this means there will be fewer retirements.. and this is going to diminish the number of appointments of people of color and women," says McCarthy.

University officials also point to the small pool of qualified minority and female candidates in many fields. Although the affirmative action goals reflect the availability of possible professors, the recruitment of stellar candidates is often highly competitive and sometimes unsuccessful, they say.

"The problem is there aren't many highly qualified minorities in the pipeline," says Professor of Oral Diagnosis Joseph L. Henry, associate dean of the School of Dental Health.

Hayes says the goals of the Business School have been frustrated because highly qualified candidates are often attracted by lucrative salaries in the private sector.