Workplaces across many industries are struggling to attract employees and creating a sustainable workplace environment for them. Practices like cluster hiring are meant to hire groups of individuals with similar identities. In theory, the strategy is intended to create a professional support system that both honors the identities of newer employees and helps retain longer-tenured workers.
In the documentary film “Clusterluck,” Southern Illinois University Edwardsville professor and first-time film producer Candace Hall chronicles her personal experience in a cluster hire in the university’s School of Education.
Hall said: “It rarely happens that you have such a critical mass of Black faculty in a department. For me, it was important that people would be able to see the community.”
Instead of writing a traditional academic paper, Hall thought it best to show in film, rather than tell. She said, “I’d hope that [the audience] would be able to feel the sense of community, and I wasn’t sure I would be able to get that across in the paper alone.”
Hall’s documentary has provided hope for others in academia including Black students. “I think students on campus have been excited to see that they too could become faculty one day..”
Southern Illinois University Edwardsville will be hosting a screening of “Clusterluck” along with a panel discussion Thursday evening.
Related Event
What: “Clusterluck” documentary screening
When: 4-6pm Feb. 2
Where: Dunham Hall, 50 Hairpin Drive, Edwardsville, IL 62026
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