Challenge for University of Colorado: Signing up Minorities for Diversity Housing Pilot Program

BOULDER, Colo.

The University of Colorado has launched a plan to create a more diverse campus by blending students of different backgrounds where they live and study.
More than 40 students signed up for the pilot program, which began last month at Hallett Hall. Those students in the Ethnic Living and Learning Community will live in the same wing of the residence hall and are offered specialty courses on diversity, multiculturalism and leadership.
But a week after the North Central Accreditation team said the campus needs to do more to encourage diversity, some officials were disappointed that slightly more than half the students who signed up for the pilot program are White.
"We were trying to get ethnic balance," said Ofelia Miramontes,
associate vice chancellor for diversity and equity. "We didn't quite make it."
This year, 13.8 percent of the CU freshman class of 5,160 are
minorities.
Hallett Hall has been viewed as a haven for diversity for more than a decade. Each month, students there focus on issues such as
sexual orientation or race by holding discussions or taking
trips to exhibits in Denver.