FAQ

NYU is defining campus climate as the current attitudes, behaviors, standards, and practices of employees and students of an institution. Personal experiences, perceptions, and institutional efforts also often shape the climate, according to Dr. Susan Rankin of Rankin & Associates Consulting.

Dr. Rankin's research maintains that positive personal experiences with campus climate and positive perceptions of campus climate generally equate to successful outcomes. Examples of successful outcomes include positive educational experiences and healthy identity development for students, productivity and sense of value for faculty, administrators, and staff, and overall well-being for all.

Students, faculty, administrators, and staff have all pointed out that organizations only manage what they measure. By conducting the assessment, NYU hopes to create a baseline against which future improvements can be measured, with a specific focus on equity, diversity, and inclusion.

The Assessment Committee of the University Senate Ad Hoc Advisory Task Force on Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion was charged with reviewing potential vendors to conduct the assessment. After an extensive review process, that committee and the entire Task Force recommended that the University engage Rankin & Associates Consulting on this project.

Dr. Susan Rankin (Rankin & Associates Consulting) is the consultant working directly with us on this project. Dr. Rankin is an emeritus faculty member of Education Policy Studies and College Student Affairs at Pennsylvania State University and a senior research associate in the Center for the Study of Higher Education. She has extensive experience in institutional climate assessment and institutional climate transformation based on data-driven action and strategic planning. Dr. Rankin has conducted multi-location institutional climate studies at more than 170 institutions across the country. She developed and utilizes the Transformational Tapestry model as a research design for campus climate studies. The model is a “comprehensive, five-phase strategic model of assessment, planning and intervention. The model is designed to assist campus communities in conducting inclusive assessments of their institutional climate to better understand the challenges facing their respective communities” (Rankin & Reason, 2008).

Rankin & Associates led the working group through the process of developing the questions that are included on the assessment. Rankin & Associates will also analyse the final data set and report the results back to the university community. In order to ensure that only eligible members of the NYU community are able to take the assessment and that each person can take it only once, an additional third party, Helios Labs, was engaged to administer and secure the online assessment. Helios Labs will send the final data set to Rankin & Associates at the end of the assessment period.

 

 

 

The working group was charged with determining the questions that will be included on NYU’s climate assessment. Although the working group continues to engage and update the NYU community about its progress, the working group—in consultation with Rankin & Associates—is solely responsible for the development, implementation, and interpretation of the assessment and its results.

The Task Force believed that an external reviewer would be able to assess NYU’s climate more objectively. Rankin & Associates can also draw on its experience with 170 other institutions to evaluate our data and recommend interventions.

This initiative includes the following phases:

• Conducting focus groups to inform the assessment questions (Spring 2017)
• Developing the assessment (Spring/Summer 2017)
• Implementing the assessment (Fall 2017)
• Reporting the results (Spring 2018)

Rankin & Associates has administered climate assessments to nearly 200 institutions across the nation and developed a repository of tested questions. NYU’s working group includes students, faculty, staff, and administrators from across the university and plays the critical roles of helping to contextualize the assessment for NYU’s unique characteristics (including our global nature), and also ensuring that the assessment capitalizes on previous assessment efforts. The working group was responsible for developing the questions. The team reviewed selected questions from the consultant’s tested collection, and also included NYU-specific questions that capture both what is working well at NYU and also identify areas for improvement. The Spring 2017 focus group results informed the assessment questions.

Current NYU students who have a Net ID and are enrolled in at least one class as of September 25, 2017, and current NYU employees who have a Net ID and are paid as of November 5, 2017 are eligible to complete the assessment. Participants must be at least 18 years of age to participate. Students and employees of the NYU Langone Medical Center are not eligible to complete this assessment.  

It is important in campus climate research for participants to “see” themselves in response choices to prevent “othering” an individual or an individual’s characteristics. Some researchers maintain that assigning someone to the status of “other” is a form of marginalization and should be minimized, particularly in campus climate research which has an intended purpose of inclusiveness. Along these lines, respondents will see a long list of possible choices for many demographic questions. However, it is reasonably impossible to include every possible choice to every question, but the goal is to reduce the number of respondents who must choose “other.” 

Eduardo Molina, assistant vice president for Institutional Research, is the primary investigator for the IRB process. The IRB has approved the project.

Although the working group believes the process itself is informative, we have sought and received commitment from the President and senior leaders that they will use the data and results to promote successful efforts to create a more inclusive climate at NYU as well as to inform future interventions that may be necessary to improve the climate.

The working group hopes that every eligible student, faculty, staff, and administrator will complete the assessment. Every response matters and is valuable in providing the most beneficial feedback and results. The working group has developed a robust marketing plan to achieve the goal of maximal participation.

Climate exists in micro-climates, so creating opportunities to maximize participation is important. Along these lines, the consultant has recommended not using random sampling due to the risk of potentially "missing" particular populations where numbers are very small. Because inclusiveness is a critical project goal, this sampling technique is not used. In addition, this project will not use randomized stratified sampling because NYU does not collect population data on all identities. For example, NYU collects population data on gender and race/ethnicity, but not on sexual orientation or religious affiliation. So a sample approach could miss many groups.

Eligible students, faculty, administrators, and staff in all participating units will receive an invitation to complete the assessment either online or on paper. Helios Labs, the independent third party that is administering and securing the online assessment, will send the final data set to Rankin & Associates at the end of the assessment period. Participants who choose to complete online assessments can mail their responses directly to Rankin & Associates, in the stamped, addressed envelopes they receive when they pick up their paper assessments.  The working group will not receive any individual assessments.

The assessment includes both quantitative and qualitative questions. Many respondents will be able to complete the assessment in 20 minutes; some respondents will need more time. It is advisable to take the assessment in one sitting. If you need to step away from your computer while taking the online assessment, the browser will not timeout; you will be able to complete your responses when you return to your computer. If you close your browser before pressing “complete” at the end of the assessment, your responses will not be saved; you will be required to log in again and re-start the process.  

 

In order to ensure that only eligible current members of the NYU community are able to take the assessment, and that each person can take it only once, we are asking you to log in with your NetID and password to access the assessment. We know that confidentiality is critical and have engaged a third party to ensure that your personally identifying information will be masked as soon as you log in, and that your responses will not be stored alongside that masked identity.  

 

When a respondent logs in, NYU’s authentication system generates a random number, called the NYU number, for the individual and communicates that random NYU number to the independent third party (Helios Labs) that is charged with administering and securing the assessment.

 

The Helios Labs authentication service then generates a new random number, called the Helios number, and stores assessment results associated only with the Helios number. The Helios survey service knows nothing of the correspondence between the NYU number and the Helios number.

 

At the end of the assessment period, Helios sends the final data set to the independent consultant (Rankin & Associates) that helped the working group to develop the questions, referenced by a row number that is different than the Helios Number. Rankin & Associates will analyze the results and present university-level findings to the NYU community.

 

Helios Labs takes particular precautions to safeguard the correspondence between the NYU and Helios Numbers. This correspondence never leaves Helios Labs’s authentication service and is irreversibly destroyed once the survey period closes.

 

With these precautions and separation of responsibilities, neither NYU, Rankin & Associates, nor Helios Labs can link responses to a specific person. We are also able to ensure that only authorized NYU community members participate, and that they participate only once.

 

It may be useful to point out that the NYU Number and Helios Number are effectively random. Unlike an IP address, these numbers indicate no location information of any kind, and they are used solely for the purpose of the Being@NYU Assessment, so not linkable with usage of any other application. IP addresses are not collected.

 

 

The consultant will provide a final report that will provide high-level summaries of the findings and will identify themes found in the data. If the sample population percentages don’t reflect the population percentages, the consultants will weight the sample population consistent with accepted academic standards in assessment research. The committee will review draft reports and provide feedback to the consultant prior to public release.

 

All data transmitted to Helios Labs will be encrypted using TLS up-to-date best practices (a recent A rating from ssllabs.com).  All participants answers will be stored in a database using encrypted disk storage. The data in the database will be keyed on a Helios number, a number which cannot be linked back to an NYU identity by either Helios Labs or NYU alone. In addition, the servers that host the assessment are firewalled so that only HTTPS requests are served, and servers cannot be accessed over SSH or any other port. Access to the database requires 2-factor authentication.

The Helios Labs database is backed up nightly and is set up with redundant disk storage to withstand incidental hardware failure. In addition, a completely independent mirror database is set up with content mirrored from the main database within a few seconds. This ensures that it is particularly unlikely for any assessment data to be lost.

 

 

 

Anyone under 18 years of age will not participate in the assessment due to IRB regulations. Respondents under 18 would require parental consent to participate. Given the anonymous nature of the assessment, it is not possible to request this consent.

The assessment has been optimized for use with common assistive technologies, including screen readers, screen magnification software, speech-to-text software, and keyboard-only access. For additional questions about accessibility, please contact the Moses Center for Students with Disabilities at +1-212-998-4980 or mosescsd@nyu.edu. You may also contact the Office of Global Inclusion, Diversity & Strategic Innovation at +1-212-998-8365.

We recognize that language is continuously changing. All the terms offered here are intended as flexible, working definitions. The classifications used here may differ from legal definitions. Culture, economic background, region, race, and age all influence how we talk about others and ourselves. Because of this, all language is subjective and culturally defined and most identity labels are dependent on personal interpretation and experience. This list strives to use the most inclusive language possible while also offering useful descriptions of community terms.

Ageist:  Someone who practices discrimination or prejudice against an individual or group on the basis of their age.

American Indian (Native American): A person having origin in any of the original tribes of North America who maintains cultural identification through tribal affiliation or community recognition.

Androgynous: A person appearing and/or identifying as neither man nor woman, presenting a gender either mixed or neutral.

Asexual: A person who does not experience sexual attraction. Unlike celibacy, which people choose, asexuality is an intrinsic part of an individual.

Assigned Birth Sex: The biological sex assigned (named) an individual baby at birth.

Biphobia: An irrational dislike or fear of bisexual people.

Bisexual: A person who may be attracted, romantically and/or sexually, to people of more than one gender, not necessarily at the same time, not necessarily in the same way, and not necessarily to the same degree.

Bullied: Being subjected to unwanted offensive and malicious behavior that undermines, patronizes, intimidates, or demeans.

Classist: Someone who practices discrimination or prejudice against an individual or group based on social or economic class.

Climate: Current attitudes, behaviors, and standards of employees and students concerning the access for, inclusion of, and level of respect for individual and group needs, abilities, and potential.

Cronyism: The hiring or promoting of friends or associates to positions without proper regard to their qualifications.

Disability: A physical or mental impairment that impacts one or more major life activities.

Discrimination: Discrimination refers to the treatment or consideration of, or making a distinction in favor of or against, a person based on the group, class, or category to which that person belongs rather than on individual merit. Discrimination can be the effect of some law or established practice that confers privilege or liability based on race, color, national origin, religion, sex, gender, gender expression, gender identity, pregnancy, physical or mental disability, medical condition (cancer-related or genetic characteristics), genetic information (including family medical history), ancestry, marital status, age, sexual identity, citizenship, or service in the uniformed services.

Ethnocentrism: Someone who practices discrimination or prejudice against an individual or group’s culture based solely by the values and standards of one's own culture. Ethnocentric individuals judge other groups relative to their own ethnic group or culture, especially with concern for language, behavior, customs, and religion.

Experiential Learning: Experiential learning refers to a pedagogical philosophy and methodology concerned with learning activities outside of the traditional classroom environment, with objectives which are planned and articulated prior to the experience (internships, service learning, co‐operative education, field experience, practicum, cross‐cultural experiences, apprenticeships, etc.).

Family Leave: The Family and Medical Leave Act is a labor law requiring employers with 50 or more employees to provide certain employees with job-protected unpaid leave due to situations such as the following: serious health conditions that makes employees unable to perform their jobs; caring for a sick family member; caring for a new child (including birth, adoption or foster care). For more information: http://www.dol.gov/whd/fmla/.

Gender Identity: A person’s inner sense of being man, woman, both, or neither. Gender identity may or may not be expressed outwardly and may or may not correspond to one’s physical characteristics.

Gender Expression: The manner in which a person outwardly represents gender, regardless of the physical characteristics that might typically define the individual as male or female.

Genderqueer: A person whose gender identity is outside of, not included within, or beyond the binary of female and male or who is gender non-conforming through expression, behavior, social roles, and/or identity.

Harassment: Unwelcome behavior that demeans, threatens, or offends another person or group of people and results in a hostile environment for the targeted person/group.

Heterosexist: Someone who practices discrimination or prejudice against an individual or group based on a sexual orientation that is not heterosexual.

Homophobia: An irrational fear of, aversion to, or discrimination against homosexuality and individuals who identify as or are perceived as homosexual.

Intersex: Any one of a variety of conditions in which a person is born with a reproductive or sexual anatomy that does not seem to fit the typical definitions of female or male.

Nepotism: The hiring or promoting of family members to positions without proper regard to their qualifications.

Non-binary: Any gender, or lack of gender, or mix of genders, that is not strictly man or woman.

Non-Native English Speakers: People for whom English is not their first language.

People of Color: People who self-identify as other than White.

Physical Characteristics: Term that refers to one’s appearance.

Pansexual: Fluid in sexual identity and is attracted to others regardless of their sexual identity or gender.

Position: The status one holds by virtue of their role/status within the institution (e.g., staff, full-time faculty, part-time faculty, administrator).

Queer: A term used by some individuals to challenge static notions of gender and sexuality. The term is used to explain a complex set of sexual behaviors and desires. “Queer” is also used as an umbrella term to refer to all lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people.

Racial Identity: A socially constructed category about a group of people based on generalized physical features such as skin color, hair type, shape of eyes, physique, etc.

Sexual Identity: A personal characteristic based on the sex of people one tends to be emotionally, physically, and sexually attracted to; this is inclusive of, but not limited to, lesbians, gay men, bisexual people, heterosexual people, and those who identify as queer.

Socioeconomic Status: The status one holds in society based on one’s level of income, wealth, education, and familial background.

Transgender: An umbrella term referring to those whose gender identity or gender expression is different from that associated with their sex assigned at birth.

Transphobia: An irrational dislike or fear of transgender, transsexual, and other gender non­traditional individuals because of their perceived gender identity or gender expression.

Xenophobic: Unreasonably fearful or hostile toward people from other countries.

 

To take the assessment, each person logs in with an NYU NetID and password.

 

NYU’s authentication system generates a random number, called the NYU number, for the individual and communicates that random NYU number to the independent third party (Helios Labs) that is charged with administering and securing the assessment.

 

The Helios Labs authentication service then generates a new random number, called the Helios number, and stores assessment results associated only with the Helios number. The Helios survey service knows nothing of the correspondence between the NYU number and the Helios number.

 

At the end of the assessment period, Helios sends the final data set to the independent consultant (Rankin & Associates) that helped the working group to develop the questions, referenced by a row number that is different than the Helios Number. Rankin & Associates will analyze the results and present university-level findings to the NYU community.

 

Helios Labs takes particular precautions to safeguard the correspondence between the NYU and Helios Numbers. This correspondence never leaves Helios Labs’s authentication service and is irreversibly destroyed once the survey period closes.

 

With these precautions and separation of responsibilities, neither NYU, Rankin & Associates, nor Helios Labs can link responses to a specific person. We are also able to ensure that only authorized NYU community members participate, and that they participate only once.

 

It may be useful to point out that the NYU Number and Helios Number are effectively random. Unlike an IP address, these numbers indicate no location information of any kind, and they are used solely for the purpose of the Being@NYU Assessment, so not linkable with usage of any other application. IP addresses are not collected.

 

 

We are offering all eligible members of the NYU community an opportunity to enter a random drawing as one additional way to encourage participation and also to thank you for supporting this important project.  All members of the NYU community who are eligible to complete the assessment are also eligible to win a prize, without regard to whether they complete the assessment.  Submitting your contact information for an assessment prize is optional. If you choose to enter the random drawing, your email address will be collected and maintained on a separate server, administered by the NYU Office of Institutional Research, to ensure that it is not possible to connect your contact information to your assessment responses.

 

If you don’t know your band, please follow these directions:

• Log in to NYUHome.

• Select the “Work” tab and then choose “PeopleSync.’”

• Click on “Personal Information,” and then “About Me.”

• Select the “Compensation” tab to find your Band number.

 

The assessment includes questions that require respondents to select one answer, as well as questions that allow respondents to select multiple answers. For questions that allow multiple responses, each possible response is marked with a text box. Respondents may uncheck answers they wish to change or erase. For questions that allow one answer only, each possible response is marked with a radio button. Respondents may click on a different radio button if they wish to change their answers. In order to delete a radio button answer, respondents must click the “clear answer” button.

Each respondent can take the assessment only once. The assessment requires all respondents to select one primary affiliation (i.e., faculty, student, staff, administrator). Employee respondents are required to select the school, institute, global academic center, or administrative unit with which they are primarily affiliated. Student respondents are able to select more than one school affiliation.

If you would like to take a paper version of the assessment, please email the working group at being@nyu.edu. Participants who choose to complete paper assessments can mail their responses directly to Rankin & Associates, in the stamped, addressed envelopes they receive when they pick up their paper assessments.  The working group will not receive any individual assessments.

The Being@NYU Assessment Ambassadors are charged with helping the working group promote the assessment in their specific schools, institutes, and administrative units.