Yildirim named Vice Provost for Inclusive Excellence

Dear University Community:

We are pleased to announce the appointment of Professor Seval Yildirim as vice provost for inclusive excellence, effective November 20, 2023.  Professor Yildirim currently serves as vice president for diversity initiatives and chief diversity officer and professor of interdisciplinary studies and law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

As vice provost, Professor Yildirim will play a key role in partnering with UB’s other senior leaders, unit diversity officers, and academic and academic support units across campus to further UB’s goals around inclusive excellence. She will oversee the Office of Inclusive Excellence, which is responsible for leading, enabling and monitoring UB’s efforts to institutionalize the culture of equity and inclusion university-wide to build campus diversity, enhance teaching and scholarship, increase cultural understanding, and foster a welcoming campus environment.

Professor Yildirim brings to this role extensive administrative experience in equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI), including in the areas of recruiting and retaining faculty and students from underrepresented groups, promoting inclusive pedagogy and classrooms, and building high school to university pipelines. At UNLV, Professor Yildirim is responsible for aligning and expanding the university’s EDI-related initiatives to promote student, faculty and staff success. She oversees the Office of Diversity Initiatives, the Intersection: Academic Multicultural Resource Center, the First Gen Network and the Undocumented Student Program. Prior to UNLV, Professor Yildirim served as associate provost for faculty affairs and development and co-chief diversity officer at California State University, San Bernardino. 

An expert in international human rights, Professor Yildirim's scholarship focuses on secularism, religion and state relations, and individual rights in liberal democracies. A professor of law at Whittier College prior to joining CSUSB, Professor Yildirim has also held visiting faculty positions at Harvard, UC Berkeley, Villanova University, and New York University. In addition to her work in higher education, Professor Yildirim has served as pro bono counsel and legal consultant on individual rights cases across the United States.

Professor Yildirim holds a JD and LLM from New York University School of Law, an MA in international affairs from George Washington University and a BA in politics and women’s studies from Randolph-Macon Woman's College.

We would like to extend our sincere thanks to Dean Robin Schulze and all of the members of the search committee for their outstanding service, which was vital to the successful outcome of this search. We would also like to take this opportunity to thank interim vice provost for inclusive excellence Jacqueline Hollins for her leadership and stewardship of the Office of Inclusive Excellence during the transitional period.

Please join us in welcoming Seval Yildirim to UB and to this important leadership role within our campus community. For more details on this appointment, please view the full announcement.

Sincerely,

Satish K. Tripathi  
President

A. Scott Weber
Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs