Diversity Digest: The commitment to religious diversity on campus

In January of 2000, the Cornell University renewed its commitment to a diverse and inclusive educational and work environment through its "Open Doors, Open Hearts and Open Minds" statement. This commitment to diversity not only includes those areas traditionally considered as part of diversity, such as race and gender, but other aspects as well, such as sexual orientation, disability, veteran status and religion.

A commitment to religious diversity is supported by law, particularly Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination by an employer against a person because of that person's religion. Title VII also states that the employer must reasonably accommodate the employee's religious practices unless doing so would cause undue hardship on the employer. In the spirit of Title VII, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) issues guidelines to help employers make good faith efforts to accommodate the religious practices of its employees. The commission defines religious practices to include "moral or ethical beliefs as to what is right and wrong which are sincerely held with the strength of traditional religious views."

According to the EEOC, over the past decade, religious discrimination complaint filings with the agency nationwide have increased by 85 percent from 1,388 in fiscal year 1992 to 2,572 in FY 2002. This trend may be associated with an increasingly diverse religious landscape in American society that highlights the need for greater religious pluralism, tensions in the Middle East that may be reflected in work environments, and both terrorism and responses to terrorism, among other factors.

Cornell has taken steps to address religious diversity in both the classroom and in employment. Each year, the dean of the faculty sends a memorandum to faculty to advise them of major religious holidays with the request that exams not be scheduled on these days and to encourage faculty to be sensitive to the religious needs of students. In addition, the Office of Workforce Diversity, Equity and Life Quality has requested that administrative offices take into account religious holidays when scheduling major office events. Later this year, the office will be implementing a religious accommodation process for faculty and staff, similar to the disability accommodation process (Policy 6.13) to further support the university's commitment to diversity.

Religion can be a lightning rod issue in the work environment due to the lack of clarity as to what is and is not appropriate. While many persons in the workplace do not participate in religious practice or are ambivalent about religion, we want to respect their freedom to orient their lives in these ways, while ensuring that there is not a prohibition against those who want to demonstrate their faith perspective. This is a delicate balance to achieve.

Departments within the university can offset the perception of religious bias by clearly stating and circulating policy that is in keeping with Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. At the same time, such policy should take into consideration the culture of the work environment. A well-written online white paper that provides guidelines for religion in the workplace that can be helpful to employees and supervisors can be found on the site of Business for Social Responsibility: http://www.bsr.org/BSRResources/WhitePaperDetail.cfm?DocumentID=528. This topic will also be addressed at length in a forthcoming and widely-anticipated book, Religion and the Workplace: Pluralism, Spirituality, Leadership, by Douglas A. Hicks (Cambridge University Press, November 2003).

This column was written by Kenneth I. Clarke, director of Cornell United Religious Work, and Lynette Chappell-Williams, director of Cornell's Office of Workforce Diversity, Equity and Life Quality.