On February 28, 2008, IASWR co-hosted a ground-breaking event, Enhancing Diversity in Science, a leadership retreat that was partially supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF).  Led by the Consortium of Social Sciences Associations (COSSA), the interdisciplinary planning committee included IASWR, the American Psychological Association, the American Sociological Association, the American Education Research Association, the Federation of American Societies of Experimental Biology, the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s Center for Careers in Science and Technology, the Society for Research on Child Development and the American Association of Medical Colleges.  More than 60 organizations ranging from mathematics and cell biology to pediatric nurse practitioners, occupational therapists, social workers, dental researchers and education researchers attended the meeting along with NIH, NSF and foundation staff.  They came together over mutual concerns that fewer underrepresented minorities are pursuing careers in science, especially at a time when there is a need to build the scientific workforce to respond to global challenges and an increasingly diverse population. The planners anticipated that professional associations and scientific societies concerned about building the scientific workforce might benefit from increased communication and collaboration to identify strategies to reduce pipeline leakages and to develop an agenda to work together to advise policymakers, higher education institutions, federal agencies, and foundations.  Through the meeting and a survey of 250 associations and societies that preceded the meeting, interventions that address recruitment and retention of scientists and outcomes to assess such strategies were identified.  At the meeting the challenges presented by tight funding and legal opinions specific to minority recruitment programs were discussed and program innovations supported by foundations, federal agencies and specific universities were presented. 

From a social work research perspective it was interesting to hear the common challenges faced in nursing and dentistry – needing to balance both academic and practice workforce gaps; attracting and maintaining people as direct health practitioners while also needing to build scientific capacity and to have sufficient numbers of doctorate-prepared faculty to teach in the expanding number of programs.  

From the discussions it was clear that professional associations and scientific societies can play many roles in diversifying the scientific workforce.  They can be advocates both with universities and in the policy community; they can serve as conveners and program catalysts by launching diversity training, mentoring and networking programs that bring together constituents; they can serve as evaluators; and they can serve as role models by modeling diversity within their own staff and leadership.  A full report will be available from COSSA http://www.cossa.org/c(http://www.cossa.org/communication/diversity_workshop/diversity.html ommunication/diversity_workshop/diversity.html and will be disseminated through IASWR.