Owens: Diversity On Campus Breeds Creativity, Innovation

Tennessee Tech to continue wants to focus efforts on increasing diversity on campus by engaging with the nearby community and alumni of color.

Chief Diversity Officer Dr. Robert Owens said when they talk about diversity, he tries to get across the depth of the topic. He said it goes beyond things like skin color and gender, and that it gets into diversity of thought.

“Creativity comes from diversity, innovation comes from diversity,” Owens said. “So I think our primary reason for wanting to enhance diversity is that it helps expand the minds of the students at the institution.”

Owens said they want to be intentional about recruiting students of various ethnic demographics that are not highly visible at the university. He said they try to do this in a variety of ways, both when connecting with local communities and also hosting events with recruitment in mind.

Owens said they see a lot of success with events like Race to Tech, which is a day-long event geared toward showcasing campus to students of color. He said another resource the university hopes to utilize is its alumni of color. Owens said the university has seen solid growth over the last few years in the Black and Hispanic student demographic.

“Last year we hit our highest percentage ever in terms of Black students at the university and that’s been the case for some years now in general has been a new record-setting year each year with the Hispanic student population,” Owens said. “And actually the Hispanic population surpassed the Black student population as the largest minority group if you will or group of students of color on our campus.”

Owens said conversations are also being had about what it would look like for Tennessee Tech as the university of choice for students with types of disabilities. He said he believes the university has room to grow in that area.

“We want to make sure that we have a campus that is diverse enough that our students will be prepared to go anywhere in the country, anywhere in the world and live a successful and productive life,” Owens said.