4 ms·

Why is this a bad thing? Part of a faculty’s job is to do community service and to manage a diverse classroom. Faculty who have a good handle on the issues that

Why is this a bad thing? Part of a faculty’s job is to do community service and to manage a diverse classroom. Faculty who have a good handle on the issues that arise through teaching such a diverse classroom are better equipped to handle the job. It’s no different than judging them based on the their research or teaching experience, which are also part of the job. If an applicant doesn’t understand the salient DEI issues, they are literally unqualified.

zozbot234 5y ago
The requirements are not limited to "understand[ing] the salient DEI issues" in an abstract, neutral sense; going by the scoring rubric, they're explicitly demanding a statement of ideological conformity-- as well as a personal commitment to an especially divisive, controversial, dubiously-effective approach to mitigating DEI challenges-- that goes further than what was previously "expected of all faculty". That's what makes it not OK.
- ModernMech 5y ago
  Again, that's not about belief, that's about the reality that the student body is diverse, the school wants the student body to be diverse, and the classroom itself will accordingly be diverse. What specifically about the rubric is the most troubling to you? By the way, as someone who hires faculty and reads many such statements (I have to ask, have you read any DEI statements? Do you have examples which you find especially troubling?), a discussion about how current efforts are dubiously effective would be welcome and would help your application at my institution. More often than not, what they are trying to do with these DEI statements is to weed-out applicants who have given no thought whatsoever to this part of the job. The most common failure here is to treat this job requirement as an afterthought and to focus 100% on the research portion. Someone who had genuine opinions about DEI education that run counter to the way things are done would be well received by the hiring committee at my institution.
  - zozbot234 5y ago
    > a discussion about how current efforts are dubiously effective would be a welcome and would help your application at my institution. A required statement as part of applying for any faculty position or promotion is simply not the appropriate place for such a discussion. You're expecting what amounts to a serious research effort in social science. This kind of intervention in effective leverage points of a complex system (even if perhaps only a "system of oppression", as often described by those most concerned about DEI) is the stuff that research papers are made of, not short statements of conformity. (Of course, this assumes that effective mitigation of DEI challenges is the actual goal of these requirements. It's not unreasonable to be rather skeptical about this, as the original professor who raised the issue - who is a social scientist - states in his blog post series.)
    - ModernMech 5y ago
      > not the appropriate place for such a discussion Why? We want to hire faculty who have experience managing a diverse classroom. We want a diverse classroom because our student body is diverse. Our student body is diverse because our applicants are diverse. Diversity is part of this whole thing, and experience as faculty teaching diverse classrooms tells us that it's not something that can be treated as an afterthought. > You're expecting what amounts to a serious research effort in social science. No, we are expecting a cogent discussion of the issues which one encounters through teaching diverse classrooms. It's a matter of experience, and yes sometimes it amounts to years of experience to understand the complex and subtle role that diversity plays in the classroom. But as I said in another post, the failure mode here isn't typically an inability to articulate a deep understanding of this area, it's an inability to articulate any understanding or thought whatsoever to these problems. Even just discussing the problems is more than enough to get you past any cutoff or filter I've encountered.
      - zozbot234 5y ago
        > Even just discussing the problems is more than enough to get you past any cutoff or filter I've encountered. Even assuming that this were true, the clear implication is merely that the scoring rubric for that part of the application is being disregarded, since it very explicitly says otherwise. The linked blog post series actually discusses the issue at length, so I'm not going to repeat what it says. Regardless, having scoring rubrics that explicitly demand ideological conformity to a specific point of view is still a recipe for significant problems in the future.
fallingknife 5y ago
DEI doesn't help you manage a diverse classroom. In fact it does the opposite by harping on racial divisions instead of just teaching the subject you're supposed to teach. No better way to foster animosity than to divide a group of people that is supposed to be equal and start enforcing different rules on the different groups.
funcDropShadow 5y ago
Because they are supposed to be top researchers in their field. And I doubt you'll find a world-wide renowned scientist in biology who believes sex is merely a social construct. So these goals are at least partially incompatible. Universities should be about research, science, teaching and teaching students to educate themselves. Following the dogma of DEI is incompatible with teaching students to educate themselves.
- SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
  I think you’ve misinterpreted the common meme. The common meme is that gender or race are social constructs. I haven’t heard the meme sex is a social construct.
  - funcDropShadow 5y ago
    Just my last encounter with the so called meme, that sex is a social construct: [1]. It was just 12 hours ago. [1]: https://twitter.com/x_mass/status/1488329923471319043 https://twitter.com/x_mass/status/1488329923471319043
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  - BeetleB 5y ago
    Sex has multiple meanings, one of which is gender. I don't know if it's an American vs British English thing, but in many countries they use the word "sex" this way much more frequently than "gender".

zozbot234 5y ago

The requirements are not limited to "understand[ing] the salient DEI issues" in an abstract, neutral sense; going by the scoring rubric, they're explicitly demanding a statement of ideological conformity-- as well as a personal commitment to an especially divisive, controversial, dubiously-effective approach to mitigating DEI challenges-- that goes further than what was previously "expected of all faculty". That's what makes it not OK.

ModernMech 5y ago
Again, that's not about belief, that's about the reality that the student body is diverse, the school wants the student body to be diverse, and the classroom itself will accordingly be diverse. What specifically about the rubric is the most troubling to you? By the way, as someone who hires faculty and reads many such statements (I have to ask, have you read any DEI statements? Do you have examples which you find especially troubling?), a discussion about how current efforts are dubiously effective would be welcome and would help your application at my institution. More often than not, what they are trying to do with these DEI statements is to weed-out applicants who have given no thought whatsoever to this part of the job. The most common failure here is to treat this job requirement as an afterthought and to focus 100% on the research portion. Someone who had genuine opinions about DEI education that run counter to the way things are done would be well received by the hiring committee at my institution.
- zozbot234 5y ago
  > a discussion about how current efforts are dubiously effective would be a welcome and would help your application at my institution. A required statement as part of applying for any faculty position or promotion is simply not the appropriate place for such a discussion. You're expecting what amounts to a serious research effort in social science. This kind of intervention in effective leverage points of a complex system (even if perhaps only a "system of oppression", as often described by those most concerned about DEI) is the stuff that research papers are made of, not short statements of conformity. (Of course, this assumes that effective mitigation of DEI challenges is the actual goal of these requirements. It's not unreasonable to be rather skeptical about this, as the original professor who raised the issue - who is a social scientist - states in his blog post series.)
  - ModernMech 5y ago
    > not the appropriate place for such a discussion Why? We want to hire faculty who have experience managing a diverse classroom. We want a diverse classroom because our student body is diverse. Our student body is diverse because our applicants are diverse. Diversity is part of this whole thing, and experience as faculty teaching diverse classrooms tells us that it's not something that can be treated as an afterthought. > You're expecting what amounts to a serious research effort in social science. No, we are expecting a cogent discussion of the issues which one encounters through teaching diverse classrooms. It's a matter of experience, and yes sometimes it amounts to years of experience to understand the complex and subtle role that diversity plays in the classroom. But as I said in another post, the failure mode here isn't typically an inability to articulate a deep understanding of this area, it's an inability to articulate any understanding or thought whatsoever to these problems. Even just discussing the problems is more than enough to get you past any cutoff or filter I've encountered.
    - zozbot234 5y ago
      > Even just discussing the problems is more than enough to get you past any cutoff or filter I've encountered. Even assuming that this were true, the clear implication is merely that the scoring rubric for that part of the application is being disregarded, since it very explicitly says otherwise. The linked blog post series actually discusses the issue at length, so I'm not going to repeat what it says. Regardless, having scoring rubrics that explicitly demand ideological conformity to a specific point of view is still a recipe for significant problems in the future.

fallingknife 5y ago

DEI doesn't help you manage a diverse classroom. In fact it does the opposite by harping on racial divisions instead of just teaching the subject you're supposed to teach. No better way to foster animosity than to divide a group of people that is supposed to be equal and start enforcing different rules on the different groups.

funcDropShadow 5y ago

Because they are supposed to be top researchers in their field. And I doubt you'll find a world-wide renowned scientist in biology who believes sex is merely a social construct. So these goals are at least partially incompatible. Universities should be about research, science, teaching and teaching students to educate themselves. Following the dogma of DEI is incompatible with teaching students to educate themselves.

SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
I think you’ve misinterpreted the common meme. The common meme is that gender or race are social constructs. I haven’t heard the meme sex is a social construct.
- funcDropShadow 5y ago
  Just my last encounter with the so called meme, that sex is a social construct: [1]. It was just 12 hours ago. [1]: https://twitter.com/x_mass/status/1488329923471319043 https://twitter.com/x_mass/status/1488329923471319043
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- BeetleB 5y ago
  Sex has multiple meanings, one of which is gender. I don't know if it's an American vs British English thing, but in many countries they use the word "sex" this way much more frequently than "gender".