UC Irvine's School of Biological Sciences names Raven Baxter director of diversity initiatives

Raven Baxter became director of diversity initiatives at UC Irvine's School of Biological Sciences on July 1, 2021. She joined the school's Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, led by Michael Yassa, its inaugural associate dean of diversity, equity and inclusion.

The school created the office in October 2020. Its 2021 Dean's Report called COVID-19 and the surge in demand for social justice "wake-up calls for institutions." The office had already launched a student inclusion task force, a schoolwide climate council and an undergraduate wellness survey.

The move came during a wider reckoning. In August 2020, UC Irvine launched its Black Thriving Initiative, a campuswide response to anti-Blackness. That same year, Black researchers in dozens of fields used hashtags such as #BlackinSTEM to find and promote one another online, Nature reported.

According to the office's people page, Baxter's role focused on "building strong communities within the sciences." She worked with faculty and staff "to translate engagement and a sense of belonging into classroom experiences." Orange Coast magazine reported that she would build programs for faculty, staff and students, mentor faculty on best practices, and create student community events.

Baxter told the magazine her approach to diversity reaches beyond race. It means "allowing people to be individuals and feel like they belong," she said. "Although I did experience a lot of negative things in the past, I feel really great about my experience as a scientist overall. But there's still work to do."

Baxter speaks on a Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health panel, June 6, 2022. Image: Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health video

Nearly a year into the job, she described the work in public. On a Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health panel in June 2022, she said she was "working on initiatives to build science communication into the curriculum in the School of Biological Sciences." She added "community-centered opportunities for our students, so that they can feel connected to the world around them." She hoped to make it a joint effort with the School of Education and with journalism or communications programs.

At the STARZ #TakeTheLead Summit that May, she described plans to take science into Orange County and Los Angeles, to "bring science into the community, but also bring community into science."

UC Irvine opened in 1965 with biological sciences as one of its founding divisions. Founding dean Edward A. Steinhaus created what the school calls "the world's first academic department dedicated to brain research." It became the Charlie Dunlop School of Biological Sciences in 2024.

Baxter, a molecular biologist and science communicator, was then a doctoral candidate at the University at Buffalo. Her dissertation asked Black women in and outside STEM careers about her science videos. The most interesting result, she told Orange Coast, was "that of the women who did not have STEM careers, 80 percent felt that if they had seen that type of representation early in their lives, they would have pursued a STEM career."

Baxter's portrait on the UC Irvine diversity office's people page, 2021. Photo: UC Irvine School of Biological Sciences

She held the post into 2022. The Orange Coast profile and the office's 2021 people page remain online.