The program advertises its positions in journals like the Black Scholar and the Chronicle of Higher Education, and Sommers pays visits to campuses to recruit prospective candidates.
But although the department has over 300 applicants each year for a handful of open positions, Sommers says few minorities apply. Each of the past five years has seen only two or three minorities advance to the final round.
"Minority recruitment has been a mission and goal on our faculty," Sommers says. "They're just not applying."
Expos officials say their program is forced to compete--frequently unsuccessfully--for minority applicants who are also offered tenure track appointments.
"Minority candidates who are very good teachers are very hot commodities," says Associate Director of Expository Writing Gordon Harvey. "In a lot of ways we can't compete for them, and we tend to lose them."
Snow White Legacy T
Sommers says the nature of Expos appointments makes it difficult to interest qualified minority professors.
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