3 ms·

The general population of the UK is overwhelmingly white compared to eg. the US. Many parts of the UK eg. Scotland it is 98% white or more, so it would be expec

The general population of the UK is overwhelmingly white compared to eg. the US. Many parts of the UK eg. Scotland it is 98% white or more, so it would be expected that courses in any discipline are going to be overwhelmingly white at universities in those regions.

thicknavyrain 7y ago
For sure, although given that 87% of Britain is White British, for a cohort of 95 students in my year, one would expect all things equal for there to be about 12 non-white students, when in fact there were two. This is not to get mired into a debate about inclusion in STEM, but it's also worth noting that both me and my other non-white friend (who's background I know because we grew up together, weirdly), were very fortunate to have had quite middle class upbringings too, and hailed from Northwest London. In fact, I doubt it comes as any surprise for me to say that from my time at undergrad all the way up to completing my PhD, I suspect that the much bigger discriminant for getting into Physics is class more than race (gender is a separate issue here I suppose). I remember this coming up in a talk from someone on the IOP commission to look at inclusion in Physics, although for their online reports I can only find the ones on gender, for anyone interested: http://www.iop.org/education/teacher/support/girls_physics/reports-and-research/page_63816.html http://www.iop.org/education/teacher/support/girls_physics/r...
- JetSetWilly 7y ago
  Another thing to consider is that the UK as a whole not being 99% white is a recent development of the last four or five decades. At least in the first few decades most immigrants were working class and so you wouldn't expect their offspring to be proportionately represented at university level for socioeconomic reasons. So I would argue the disparity is more of a socioeconomic access one than a racial one.
kgwgk 7y ago
UK population is 87% white (2011 census), US population is 72% white (2010 census). So non-white population is 13% in the UK and 28% in the US, "only" twice as much.

thicknavyrain 7y ago

For sure, although given that 87% of Britain is White British, for a cohort of 95 students in my year, one would expect all things equal for there to be about 12 non-white students, when in fact there were two. This is not to get mired into a debate about inclusion in STEM, but it's also worth noting that both me and my other non-white friend (who's background I know because we grew up together, weirdly), were very fortunate to have had quite middle class upbringings too, and hailed from Northwest London. In fact, I doubt it comes as any surprise for me to say that from my time at undergrad all the way up to completing my PhD, I suspect that the much bigger discriminant for getting into Physics is class more than race (gender is a separate issue here I suppose). I remember this coming up in a talk from someone on the IOP commission to look at inclusion in Physics, although for their online reports I can only find the ones on gender, for anyone interested: http://www.iop.org/education/teacher/support/girls_physics/reports-and-research/page_63816.html http://www.iop.org/education/teacher/support/girls_physics/r...

JetSetWilly 7y ago
Another thing to consider is that the UK as a whole not being 99% white is a recent development of the last four or five decades. At least in the first few decades most immigrants were working class and so you wouldn't expect their offspring to be proportionately represented at university level for socioeconomic reasons. So I would argue the disparity is more of a socioeconomic access one than a racial one.

kgwgk 7y ago

UK population is 87% white (2011 census), US population is 72% white (2010 census). So non-white population is 13% in the UK and 28% in the US, "only" twice as much.