9 Minority professional staff in U.S. ARL university libraries continues to be disproportionately distributed across the country. Using Figure 1, we can compare the number of minority staff with other staff, region by region. These patterns of distribution have been relatively stable for the entire history of ARL’s data‐collection experience. Minorities are underrepresented by more than 25% in the New England, West North Central, and East South Central regions (see Table 25 for a definition of the regions). Proportionately to other regions, there are more minorities in the South Atlantic, West South Central, and Pacific regions. Figure 1 MINORITY PROFESSIONALS BY REGION (U.S.) IN ARL UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES, FY 2006‐07 New England Middle Atlantic E North Central W North Central South Atlantic East S Central West S Central Mountain Pacific TOTAL % Race/Ethnicity Category Black 33 56 93 21 117 22 19 9 42 412 34% Hispanic 24 30 29 8 42 4 32 24 35 228 19% Asian 66 88 78 21 73 9 37 24 135 531 44% AI/AN 4 4 2 4 4 6 2 6 28 2% Minority Total 127 176 204 54 238 35 90 63 212 1,199 100% Minority Percent 10.59% 14.68% 17.01% 4.50% 19.85% 2.92% 7.51% 5.25% 17.68% 10.59% Nonminority Total 1,146 1,204 1,355 523 1,228 368 567 462 800 7,653 Nonminority Percent 14.97% 15.73% 17.71% 6.83% 16.05% 4.81% 7.41% 6.04% 10.45% 14.97% Regional Percent Total staff 14.38% 15.59% 17.61% 6.52% 16.56% 4.55% 7.42% 5.93% 11.43% Proportional Minority Representation ‐29.27% ‐6.70% ‐3.90% ‐34.10% 23.71% ‐39.29% 1.31% ‐12.96% 69.14% ARL recognizes the difficulties that the profession has in attracting a diverse workforce and continues to work actively in the development of workplace climates that embrace diversity. The ARL Diversity Program, through its Leadership and Career Development Program and the Initiative to Recruit a Diverse Workforce, emphasizes ARL and its members’ commitment to creating a diverse academic and research library community to better meet the new challenges of global competition and changing demographics. Further, the Diversity Program focuses on issues surrounding work relationships in libraries while considering the impact of diversity on library services, interactions with library users, and the development of collections, at its homepage, http://www.arl.org/diversity/index.html. 4 American Indian/Alaskan Native.