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I am also very pleased that the Princeton Review ranks the Rutgers School of Law-Newark as the 10th among national law schools in the diversity of its faculty, and the third most welcoming of older students.

The extraordinary diversity of this campus has long attracted students and faculty who want to study and teach in our dynamic environment. In educating students together from so many different national, ethnic, racial and religious backgrounds, we fulfill the highest ideals of our nation and make a powerful statement about how education and the advancement of knowledge should be pursued in an increasingly global world. There is a broad consensus in American higher education that a diverse campus is an essential element in high quality education. Although U.S. News provides separate rankings for diversity and for academic quality, it is now widely recognized that diversity is integral to, and not just incidental to, academic quality. This was the argument made by the leaders of America’s most prestigious universities before the U.S. Supreme Court, and accepted by the court in its decisions on affirmative action. It is the argument made by CEOs of leading corporations competing in a global environment, who tell us that they want employees who are able to interact easily with colleagues and customers from many cultures.

I believe that today’s Rutgers-Newark already represents what this nation will look like two or three decades from now, and that this characteristic is preparing our students to face the multicultural future with confidence.

So let us take pride in our extraordinary diversity both for what it says about our values and for what it says about the quality of education at Rutgers-Newark.


Steven J. Diner, Provost, Rutgers in Newark, Summer 2006