History of the Institute
General Mission Statement
Specific Goals and Objectives
The Institute was originally established in 1989 to promote academic inquiry into the nature, causes and potential programs for the resolution of racial and ethnic conflicts.
The Institute’s mission has three components: research, education, and service.
• Explore the richness of diversity through research and analysis.
• Facilitates the research of faculty, students, and community organizations in the field of race/ethnic relations
• Collect and disseminate pertinent literature that includes significant findings, demonstration projects, data sets, and other materials.
• Provides resources to aid in bringing diversity into the curriculum, teaching strategies and evaluation methods.
• Hold conferences, symposia, and workshops on race/ethnic relations.
It accepted the challenge of ensuring the provision of quality research results to meet the needs of scholars, other researchers, advocacy groups and others in the field, as well as providing theoretical and practical support for the faculty and students conducting sponsored research under the auspices of the Institute. It was also charged with supporting credit and noncredit coursework on race and ethnic relations. In 1999, then-President Elson S. Floyd challenged the Institute to become a worldclass research operation in keeping with the University emphasis on being a studentcentered research institution. Such a thrust called for an interdisciplinary approach to research, education, and services to the University, region, state, nation, as well as an international focus.
• Host film festivals • Exchanges information and acquires knowledge on the subject of race and ethnic relations with the local, regional, national and international communities.
• Advocate for and/or implement exemplary demonstration programs.
• Participates as an initiator, facilitator, coordinator, and/or a collaborator in the areas of research, education and service.
• Provide a structure that allows any racial or ethnic group an opportunity to pursue external funding for research projects (applied and/or theoretical), demonstration projects, conferences, workshops, and more.