Diversity and Inclusion Report 2021

As the year is coming to an end, Quizlet is excited to share our annual update on our diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts this year. This is the fourth year we are publishing this report and we look forward to maintaining this tradition of transparency. In 2021, we were eager to apply what we learned from 2020 and drive our progress towards a more inclusive environment at Quizlet. With the groundwork for many of our DEI efforts being laid out in 2020 and prior years, we came into 2021 with a clear focus on how to advance our diversity goals.

First, our strategy has always started with a focus on the diversity of our own team. After all, our employees are a reflection of our rich community of Quizlet learners. We started the year off by setting goals directly related to our recruiting efforts. With a big year of hiring ahead, we were thoughtful about how we would source and recruit candidates to reach a diverse audience. To ensure that we cast a wide net as we build our candidate pipeline, and we continue to partner with programs such as Pursuit and Code2040 that connect us to an incredible pool of talented and diverse individuals.

Second, our DEI Council (formed in 2020), developed a 2021 roadmap of high-priority internal and external initiatives that would push us closer towards our diversity and inclusion goals. One of these efforts included the development of Executive DEI pledges, to ensure the accountability of each executive team member. Each Executive articulated their personal pledges for the year, setting out the DEI initiatives they would sponsor, lead, or support, and their metrics for success. These pledges ensured that these initiatives would be prioritized and appropriately resourced on our Executives’ 2021 roadmaps.

Our SVP of Engineering, Tim Miller, pledged to ensure a diverse Engineering intern class for our summer program. Given what we learned in 2020 about how to host a virtual internship program, we were excited and confident about our goal to host a larger class this year with a group of 14 interns. By partnering with Code2040 and performing outreach at schools with a diverse student body, we hosted our most diverse intern class ever with half of our Engineering class being female students and 38% underrepresented minority (URM) students . While we are certainly proud of the success of that program, we are particularly excited to share that we have since welcomed 4 of the program participants back to the Quizlet team as returning full-time employees.

Third, our Quizlet Communities (also known as Employee Resource Groups) continue to grow and thrive at Quizlet and we’re excited to share that we’ve added to our list of Communities with Black@Quizlet and Pride@Quizlet. Our Communities continue to be a source of support for group members, as well as providing educational resources and awareness to the company by hosting events specific to their communities, and also providing volunteer opportunities. We look forward to continuing to grow our Community list and creating a space for our employees to feel at home.

Lastly, as part of our external efforts, we continued to expand our Be The Change initiative. We introduced free lesson plans for teachers to help empower them to facilitate meaningful discussions about social justice issues by providing them with high-quality educational resources. We’ve had over 200k teachers and students view and interact with this important content, with 80% of teachers saying students were engaged with materials and 51% of teachers saying Be The Change helped them engage in tough conversations about social issues. We’re eager to continue adding to our library of resources for all to learn about America’s past and current social issues.

The numbers:

This year, we continued to prioritize women in technical roles as one of our top goals for diversity and inclusion. We also set specific goals around diversity within our recruitment and interview stages in efforts to expand the diversity of our teams.

We’re excited to share that underrepresented minorities (URM) at Quizlet are now at 16% of our workforce, up from the 12% we reported last year. While there's still a gap towards where we want and need to be, we are happy to see these numbers continue to grow each year and we will continue investing in our efforts to ensure that we meet our goals.

Women in technical roles currently make up 38% of our team, which represents a 1% decrease from the previous year, however, we increased our proportion of women in engineering to 33%, a 2% increase from last year. These shifts remind us that we must continue to evolve our recruiting and retention programs to create long-term, sustainable change. Our long-term goal of closing the gender gap between male and female engineers still remains, and we will continue to prioritize our efforts to push us towards our ultimate goal of 50/50 representation.

We’re proud to share that our number of females in management has increased to 38% (+2%) and women in technical management are 37%, up +4% from last year!

The DEI goals we set are essential to ensuring that we make progress towards the diverse workforce and inclusive environment that is critical to Quizlet’s overall success. As we head into next year, we will continue to set aggressive goals and hold ourselves accountable. As a company dedicated to serving a diverse set of learners, we will continue to create spaces where our employees, educators, and students can count on us to be an organization that recognizes, honors and champions diversity and inclusion.

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