Uploaded August 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Most faculty believe viewpoint diversity — methodological, theoretical, political, etc. — makes their discipline better. But too many of them underestimate how much their colleagues value it.
HxA's newest national survey asked 3,563 faculty at 80 institutions how they value different dimensions of diversity in their fields. Every one of eight dimensions measured — political, religious, methodological, and more — won majority support, and left-leaning faculty valued political diversity even more than their right-leaning colleagues did. Despite this, faculty consistently underestimated how much their peers valued it, too — a gap as wide as 15 points among social scientists. Moreover, nearly 30% of faculty said they don't regularly engage with anyone who disagrees with them on substantive issues in their field.
The data makes the case. The harder question is what to do with it: how to make viewpoint diversity a normative value; how to mobilize more faculty to engage in constructive disagreement; how to actually broaden viewpoint diversity on campus.
Join HxA Director of University Partnerships Justin McBrayer, HxA Senior Researcher and report co-author Shiri Spitz Siddiqi, and sociologists Ashley Rubin (University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa) and Jesse Smith (Ohio State University) for a candid conversation about what the data means — and what departments and institutions can do with it to make viewpoint diversity normative on campus, including:
Does engaging with politically diverse colleagues make faculty value it more, or less?
Is viewpoint diversity just cover for hiring conservatives, as critics claim?
What can departments and institutions accomplish with this data?
What can acting on this data actually look like in practice to mobilize faculty?
Most faculty believe viewpoint diversity — methodological, theoretical, political, etc. — makes their discipline better. But too many of them underestimate how much their colleagues value it.
HxA's newest national survey asked 3,563 faculty at 80 institutions how they value different dimensions of diversity in their fields. Every one of eight dimensions measured — political, religious, methodological, and more — won majority support, and left-leaning faculty valued political diversity even more than their right-leaning colleagues did. Despite this, faculty consistently underestimated how much their peers valued it, too — a gap as wide as 15 points among social scientists. Moreover, nearly 30% of faculty said they don't regularly engage with anyone who disagrees with them on substantive issues in their field.
The data makes the case. The harder question is what to do with it: how to make viewpoint diversity a normative value; how to mobilize more faculty to engage in constructive disagreement; how to actually broaden viewpoint diversity on campus.
Join HxA Director of University Partnerships Justin McBrayer, HxA Senior Researcher and report co-author Shiri Spitz Siddiqi, and sociologists Ashley Rubin (University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa) and Jesse Smith (Ohio State University) for a candid conversation about what the data means — and what departments and institutions can do with it to make viewpoint diversity normative on campus, including:
Does engaging with politically diverse colleagues make faculty value it more, or less?
Is viewpoint diversity just cover for hiring conservatives, as critics claim?
What can departments and institutions accomplish with this data?
What can acting on this data actually look like in practice to mobilize faculty?
