Diversity and Equity in Environmental Organizations: The Salience of These Factors to Students

Abstract Diversity in environmental institutions is of increasing concern to scholars and practitioners. The author examined student perceptions of the importance of 20 diversity and equity factors in their decisions to accept a job. A national sample of 1,239 students in 9 environmental disciplines (biological sciences, geosciences, natural resources, agricultural sciences, forestry, geography, environmental science, environmental engineering, and social sciences) participated in the study. Although most respondents assigned some importance to diversity and equity factors, large ethnic and gender differences existed in the significance that respondents assigned to each factor. Ethnic differences in assessing the importance of the diversity and equity factors also occurred in the extent to which respondents distinguished between factors that did or did not mention subgroups of workers. Keywords: diversityminorities and the environmentminority hiringworkplace equity