BILL NUMBER:  S4978

 TITLE OF BILL :

An act to amend the education law, in relation to requiring the hiring
of a professional search firm with a history of recruiting minority
candidates

 PURPOSE :

This bill aims at increasing the pool of minority candidates that are
made available by search firm to college campuses engaged in
recruiting to fill an administrative and faculty position.

 SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS :

Section 1: The education law is amended by adding a new section, 355-d
to read as follows:  355-d. Professional search firm selection.

1. For any position at a state-operated institution in the state
university that requires the hiring of a professional search firm to
assist in the recruitment of candidates, the hiring institution shall
select a professional search firm with a demonstrated history of
recruiting minority candidates. Such search firm shall be approved by
the state university trustees. The state university trustees shall
provide for the approval process for such firms.
              

2. Potential search firms shall be required to provide to the state
university trustees any documents detailing how such firms ensure and
pursue diversity in recruiting candidates for positions in higher
education as well as other employment sectors. Such documents shall
include the ethnic and racial breakdown of the final candidate hired
by their clients. The names of candidates and the search firms'
clients provided to the state university trustees may be redacted if a
search firm's contract with a client is confidential or if candidates
have requested their names be kept confidential.

Section 2: Paragraph g of subdivision 2 of section 355 of the
education law, as amended by chapter 552 of the laws of 1985, is
amended to read as follows: (g).... and to provide for the process of
selection of a professional search firm as needed to assist in the
recruitment of such positions and the approval of such firm by the
state university trustees pursuant to section three hundred
fifty-five-d of this article.

 JUSTIFICATION :

The State University of New York is the largest state-operated system
of colleges in the nation with over 465,000 students and over 80,000
faculty and staff. Almost 100,000 of its student body are minority
students of which over 40% are from the New York City region. Its
current African-American and Latino faculty rates are 4.5% and 3.2%
respectively.

For some time now, there has been considerable concern with the lack
of diversity on the SUNY campuses. Currently out of its 64 campuses
there are four African American college presidents. None are Latino.
As the number of minority students increases throughout the system and
minority students become the majority of high school graduates in the
state, the need to increase diversity in SUNY's faculty and
administrative ranks is essential.

The current recruitment process relied on by the SUNY system and
individual campuses have failed to yield any positive improvements in
terms of diversifying the system. Even with affirmative action
officers on their campuses, SUNY colleges and universities have
excluded affirmative action staff from searches to fill faculty or
administrative positions and at other times has hired professional
search firms to recruit for vacant posts.

Around the nation, these search firms are notorious for the lack of
diversity on their own staffs and the lack of qualified minority
recruits they suggest to potential employers. However, there are
professional search firms that have a proven track record in
recruiting talented minority candidates for all employment sectors.

This legislation is an effort to ensure that SUNY and its individual
campuses hire professional search firms with a proven history of
diversifying the pool of candidates they recruit. This legislation
requires that SUNY campuses hiring professional search firms must have
those firms approved by the SUNY Board of Trustees. This legislation
also set forward information that will be required to help the board
make a proper determination as to the ability of the proposed search
firm to help meet the diversity mantra that the system likes to
promote in print, but as it appears by the data, not by real numbers.

 LEGISLATIVE HISTORY :

2016: S.7143-REFERRED TO HIGHER EDUCATION/A.8035- referred to higher
education
2015: A.8035- referred to higher education

 FISCAL IMPLICATIONS :

NONE

 EFFECTIVE DATE :
This act shall take effect immediately.