Vice Provost for Inclusive Excellence

Seval Yildirim has served as Vice Provost for Inclusive Excellence since November 2023, focusing on UB’s efforts to create a culture of equity and inclusion university-wide to build campus diversity, enhance teaching and scholarship, increase cultural understanding, and foster a welcoming campus environment. As vice provost, Professor Yildirim plays 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.

Professor Yildirim has extensive administrative experience related to equity, diversity and inclusion, 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. Prior to UB, Professor Yildirim was Vice President for Diversity Initiatives and Chief Diversity Officer at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas where she oversaw 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.