Cornell University Provost Kent Fuchs announced today (Dec. 1) that the Africana Studies and Research Center will become a distinct unit of the College of Arts and Sciences, effective July 1, 2011. In making the announcement, Fuchs issued the following statement:

Following a thoughtful assessment of the capacity of the Office of the Provost to oversee individual academic programs, I have decided to move the Africana Studies and Research Center, which currently reports to me, into the College of Arts and Sciences, effective July 1, 2011. As with similar changes I have made regarding other programs that previously reported directly to my office, my goal in making this change is to provide the robust level of academic support that significant programs, such as Africana Studies, have a right to expect.

Most significantly, this move will allow for the establishment of a Ph.D. program that will strongly increase the national prominence of Africana Studies and bolster Cornell's ability to attract superb faculty and students. Africana Studies undergraduates already are Arts and Sciences students: the College admits and advises them, offers their curriculum through the College of Arts and Sciences courses of study, and awards their undergraduate degree.

Arts and Sciences is the natural home for Africana Studies because of its broad overlap of interests, especially in the social sciences and the humanities. This action is consistent with other top universities - including Harvard and Yale - that have adopted a model where the Africana Studies program is an integral part of the liberal arts college.

In its new academic home, Africana Studies will retain its faculty, staff, and North Campus facility, and receive the critical academic and administrative support that a college is best able to provide, including a plan to increase the number of its faculty, for which I have committed the necessary resources.