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Why are we expecting these companies (or anyone) to fix all problems. The fix is simple. Focus on your own home and yourself first. Teach your kids more at h

Why are we expecting these companies (or anyone) to fix all problems. The fix is simple. Focus on your own home and yourself first. Teach your kids more at home. Be more involved with them. Teach them to take responsibility. Don’t do silly degrees that cost huge student loans. Do more STEM. Start a small business. Eat better food. Exercise. Sure there is systemic stuff out there - but it’s 2021 and you have a choice now in what you want to do with your life. An additional 10% of the population of every race doing just the above would make a bigger difference than any company, government or organization could. Google does not owe you anything.

rayiner 6y ago
> Teach your kids more at home. Be more involved with them. Teach them to take responsibility. Don’t do silly degrees that cost huge student loans. Do more STEM. Start a small business. Eat better food. Exercise. This is literally the ethos of HBCUs, which graduate a disproportionate share of Black STEM majors. The point of the article is that Google is ignoring HBCU candidates.
- vvG94KbDUtRa 6y ago
  No the point of the article is they didn't hold them in the same esteem as Harvard and Stanford. Which seems...fine?
  - ForHackernews 6y ago
    That's not what the article said: It said they considered them "long-tail" institutions (below even state schools) that they basically wouldn't hire from.
    - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
      "Basically wouldn't hire from" isn't a characterization consistent with the remainder of the article. A Howard spokeswoman said that Google's hired 119 interns and 30 graduates since 2017
      - ForHackernews 6y ago
        > Some schools such as Stanford University and MIT were predictably in the “elite” category, while state schools or institutions that churn out thousands of engineering grads annually, such as Georgia Tech, were assigned to “tier 1” or “tier 2.” ... > In lieu of a tier, Google’s University Programs recruiting division, responsible for forging partnerships with universities, labeled [HBCUs] “long tail” schools, in reference to the fact that it could take a long time before they would produce a large number of graduates qualified to work at Google, according to the Google employees. ... > At the time, the 16-year-old company had not hired a single HBCU computer science graduate into an entry-level software engineer role, according to a 2013 document. I think "basically wouldn't hire from" is a fair characterization of hiring zero for 16 years, and only a handful since then. (And no, interns are not hires).
        SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
        They noticed the problem in 2013, ramped up hiring since then, and are investing significant effort in helping HBCUs build their CS programs up to par. Isn't that exactly the right approach? (Of course, it's a very different story if Google's belief that "HBCU CS students struggle with the most basic of coding, algorithms and data structures" isn't true, but the source article didn't challenge this claim and I don't know a way to independently investigate it.)
- eric4smith 6y ago
  The teach at home thing - that’s what people need to do looooong before college. That being the ethos of HBCU’s is already too late.
whoknew1122 6y ago
> "Teach your kids more at home. Be more involved with them. Teach them to take responsibility. Don’t do silly degrees that cost huge student loans. Do more STEM. Start a small business. Eat better food. Exercise." Wow, I'm glad you have the program down for all the low income people. Why don't they pick themselves up by their bootstraps (which, incidentally, is physically impossible). > Teach kids at home Assumes your parents are educated and have time. Neither of my parents passed the 10th grade. What were they supposed to teach me precisely? > Be more involved with them Hard to do when my parents worked jobs and had to rely on public transportation and/or bicycles to get to work. Hard to be really involved with your kid when you continually face 12+ days just to make slightly-above minimum wage > Teach them to take responsibility What does this even mean? "Sure little Johnny. That company says you weren't a 'culture add.' Now take responsibility, internalize that and... do whatever it is that would make you a culture add. Who knows?" > "Don’t do silly degrees that cost huge student loans." Hi there. I get paid 6 figures at a FAANG and I triple majored in liberal arts. It's not that degrees are 'silly.' It's that business has a narrow view of what's important. My team is full of people with Master's degrees. Other than the military vets, I'm the only person without a master's degree. They all ask me how I quickly diagnose problems. Pro tip: It's because my silly bachelor's taught me how to critically think and synthesize disparate pieces of information into a coherent whole. Their 'prestigious' degrees taught them how to write C++ and Java. Neither of those skills are useful on my team. > "Do more STEM" Not everyone does well in STEM, nor does tech require a heavy STEM background. Also, it's a little difficult to get help on trigonometry when your parents are under educated. > "Start a small business." Creating small businesses take time and money. So does your 'Teach your kids more' and 'be more involved with them'. Where are you going to find all this extra time? Not to mention you have to have some cushion failures in business. If you don't have generational wealth (which people who go to HBCU's typically don't), creating a small business is a perilous enterprise that can ruin you easier than it can pull you out of poverty. > "Eat better food" Takes more money (non-processed food is by in large more expensive) and time (non-processed food has to be cooked). So that's 4 things that take more time. > "Exercise" The fifth thing that takes more time. --- Where are low income families supposed to get all this extra time when they're spending most of their time simply trying to make it to the next paycheck? This advise may make a good self-help book. You might even make a bit of money (see how successful Dale Carnegie got with his tripe!). But simple fix ignores the realities of growing up in a generationaly poor family with under-educated parents.

rayiner 6y ago

> Teach your kids more at home. Be more involved with them. Teach them to take responsibility. Don’t do silly degrees that cost huge student loans. Do more STEM. Start a small business. Eat better food. Exercise. This is literally the ethos of HBCUs, which graduate a disproportionate share of Black STEM majors. The point of the article is that Google is ignoring HBCU candidates.

vvG94KbDUtRa 6y ago
No the point of the article is they didn't hold them in the same esteem as Harvard and Stanford. Which seems...fine?
- ForHackernews 6y ago
  That's not what the article said: It said they considered them "long-tail" institutions (below even state schools) that they basically wouldn't hire from.
  - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    "Basically wouldn't hire from" isn't a characterization consistent with the remainder of the article. A Howard spokeswoman said that Google's hired 119 interns and 30 graduates since 2017
    - ForHackernews 6y ago
      > Some schools such as Stanford University and MIT were predictably in the “elite” category, while state schools or institutions that churn out thousands of engineering grads annually, such as Georgia Tech, were assigned to “tier 1” or “tier 2.” ... > In lieu of a tier, Google’s University Programs recruiting division, responsible for forging partnerships with universities, labeled [HBCUs] “long tail” schools, in reference to the fact that it could take a long time before they would produce a large number of graduates qualified to work at Google, according to the Google employees. ... > At the time, the 16-year-old company had not hired a single HBCU computer science graduate into an entry-level software engineer role, according to a 2013 document. I think "basically wouldn't hire from" is a fair characterization of hiring zero for 16 years, and only a handful since then. (And no, interns are not hires).
      - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
        They noticed the problem in 2013, ramped up hiring since then, and are investing significant effort in helping HBCUs build their CS programs up to par. Isn't that exactly the right approach? (Of course, it's a very different story if Google's belief that "HBCU CS students struggle with the most basic of coding, algorithms and data structures" isn't true, but the source article didn't challenge this claim and I don't know a way to independently investigate it.)
eric4smith 6y ago
The teach at home thing - that’s what people need to do looooong before college. That being the ethos of HBCU’s is already too late.

whoknew1122 6y ago

> "Teach your kids more at home. Be more involved with them. Teach them to take responsibility. Don’t do silly degrees that cost huge student loans. Do more STEM. Start a small business. Eat better food. Exercise." Wow, I'm glad you have the program down for all the low income people. Why don't they pick themselves up by their bootstraps (which, incidentally, is physically impossible). > Teach kids at home Assumes your parents are educated and have time. Neither of my parents passed the 10th grade. What were they supposed to teach me precisely? > Be more involved with them Hard to do when my parents worked jobs and had to rely on public transportation and/or bicycles to get to work. Hard to be really involved with your kid when you continually face 12+ days just to make slightly-above minimum wage > Teach them to take responsibility What does this even mean? "Sure little Johnny. That company says you weren't a 'culture add.' Now take responsibility, internalize that and... do whatever it is that would make you a culture add. Who knows?" > "Don’t do silly degrees that cost huge student loans." Hi there. I get paid 6 figures at a FAANG and I triple majored in liberal arts. It's not that degrees are 'silly.' It's that business has a narrow view of what's important. My team is full of people with Master's degrees. Other than the military vets, I'm the only person without a master's degree. They all ask me how I quickly diagnose problems. Pro tip: It's because my silly bachelor's taught me how to critically think and synthesize disparate pieces of information into a coherent whole. Their 'prestigious' degrees taught them how to write C++ and Java. Neither of those skills are useful on my team. > "Do more STEM" Not everyone does well in STEM, nor does tech require a heavy STEM background. Also, it's a little difficult to get help on trigonometry when your parents are under educated. > "Start a small business." Creating small businesses take time and money. So does your 'Teach your kids more' and 'be more involved with them'. Where are you going to find all this extra time? Not to mention you have to have some cushion failures in business. If you don't have generational wealth (which people who go to HBCU's typically don't), creating a small business is a perilous enterprise that can ruin you easier than it can pull you out of poverty. > "Eat better food" Takes more money (non-processed food is by in large more expensive) and time (non-processed food has to be cooked). So that's 4 things that take more time. > "Exercise" The fifth thing that takes more time. --- Where are low income families supposed to get all this extra time when they're spending most of their time simply trying to make it to the next paycheck? This advise may make a good self-help book. You might even make a bit of money (see how successful Dale Carnegie got with his tripe!). But simple fix ignores the realities of growing up in a generationaly poor family with under-educated parents.