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A math professor who objects to diversity statements

theatlantic.com

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Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#161

Post by verve_rat »

_gabe_ wrote: post #115
koolba wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not always true. Look at the SHSAT. If you looked at the poor kids and took the top scores, it would be mostly Asians. But they’re simply gaming the admission systems by studying rather than spending all their waking hours on TikTok and Fortnite.

> But they’re simply gaming the admission systems by studying rather than spending all their waking hours on TikTok and Fortnite. That is the point, is it not? The whole reason for higher education is to study and research . The point of higher education is not to spend all your waking hours on TikTok and Fortnite. Shouldn’t the people dedicated to studying get in? I’m unsure how that’s gaming the system. It seems li…

I think you missed something there...

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#162

Post by Jensson »

boolemancer wrote: post #153
bigstrat2003 wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As an example, a whole bunch of people, for some reason, took "Black Lives Matter" to mean "Only Black Lives Matter", as if that was said or as if that was the point. That was never my issue, or the issue of anyone I encountered. My issue (and those other people's issue) was the implicit bad-faith assumption that we didn't already think black lives mattered, and needed to be scolded about it. Such rhetoric is needl…

Why would you feel that anybody was personally scolding you by saying "black lives matter" if you already believed that black lives matter? Clearly, plenty of people, through both their actions and their words, have made it very clear that they don't believe that black lives matter, and the movement was always aimed squarely at them.

People think that black lives matter, you trying to say they don't if they don't agree with the BLM movement is just making things worse. There is no reason to turn allies into enemies.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#163

Post by amluto »

Jensson wrote: post #109
throwaway288112 wrote: post #89

Look, if you don't want an echo chamber on this topic, maybe consider the point of diversity statements. I can't put it better than Stephen Jay Gould: "I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops." Consider that a diversity statement is a way to evaluate if the applicant has…

> Consider that a diversity statement is a way to evaluate if the applicant has even given a moment's thought to the fact that Gould raised, by seeking to cultivate talent among folks otherwise shut out of the top tier of academia. But that isn't the job of a professor, they are there to cultivate the talent of people who are already privileged enough to be a part of academia.

For better or for worse, universities assign a lot of their duties to the faculty. So professors really are involved in outreach to prospective students.

But Gould’s point, however true, is about a situation that exists far back in the pipeline, and most faculty have absolutely no ability to airlift people out of cotton fields so they can do research.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#164

Post by zmgsabst »

ltbarcly3 wrote: post #138
zmgsabst wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s because DIE is just apologetics for modern racism and colonialism: Poor Whites, Jews, and Asians are acceptable sacrifices to the racists behind that movement — which resembles modern colonialism, eg, dividing a population by providing special privileges to an ethnic minority to ease your rule. Increasing rape and murder against natives in European countries is fine, as long as it disrupts their cultural coher…

This stuff you are saying is just ludicrous nonsense. The people you list are stupid assholes, especially Vivek who is a complete moron. There are plenty of reasons to worry about diversity, my point is it is done lazily as a game of 'less whites' because DEI programs are poorly run and it's easier for the low-iq, incompetent commissars who have been hired to run these programs to just go by what people look like. I…

I’m moved by your deep argument of baldly asserting things are “ludicrous nonsense” and calling people “stupid assholes” or “morons”. You’ve wowed me with the depths of your insight.

Never mind that there’s an openly stated coordinated agenda by the largest financiers, such as BlockRock, to promote exactly those ideas through ESG programs — or that large international gatherings such as the one in Davos happening this week pointedly discuss how they’ll coordinate to implement that agenda.

Your ad hominems clearly discount those facts with sophisticated argument.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#165

Post by rayiner »

cjohnson318 wrote: post #140
ltbarcly3 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll support your theory when I hear, even one time, a DEI leader mention poor white people. I grew up in a home with a mother who was an alcoholic and drug addict, and who had a parade of abusive boyfriends. There were times we didn't have electricity or water because it was turned off. We never had a telephone in the house or a working car. I studied Math in college. Literally every single other math major I knew h…

I'm a white male from a very similar background. The thing that separates us from black and hispanic colleagues is that the white guys that are hiring automatically trust us 10x more than a black or hispanic candidate, regardless of where we came from, where we went to school, or how much money we had growing up. You might see a lot of diversity in PhD programs, but as soon as you step into a high paying professional…

> The thing that separates us from black and hispanic colleagues is that the white guys that are hiring automatically trust us 10x more than a black or hispanic candidate

I just don’t think that’s true. I spend a lot of time around elite whites, and I think being a poor white is just about the worst thing in their eyes. God help you if you have a hick accent or something like that. I think they’re much more likely to trust non-white people from the right social class.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#166

Post by Jensson »

cjohnson318 wrote: post #160
Jensson wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the white guys that are hiring automatically trust us 10x more than a black or hispanic candidate Doesn't help when you get filtered out from attending college. Poor white men is the least represented group at colleges among all race/class/gender combinations, it isn't a privilege.

> Doesn't help when you get filtered out from attending college. Please provide evidence of high application rates for underprivileged white males and then abnormally low acceptance rates to support your claim of white men being turned away at the door. My experience was that college was more than happy to sign me up for financial aid, due to my family's lower income, and then student loans, to boot. They don't even…

> Please provide evidence of high application rates for underprivileged white males and then abnormally low acceptance rates to support your claim of white men being turned away at the door.

Why? The fact that they are under represented is enough evidence, at least according to the left.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#167

Post by amluto »

cjohnson318 wrote: post #160
Jensson wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the white guys that are hiring automatically trust us 10x more than a black or hispanic candidate Doesn't help when you get filtered out from attending college. Poor white men is the least represented group at colleges among all race/class/gender combinations, it isn't a privilege.

> Doesn't help when you get filtered out from attending college. Please provide evidence of high application rates for underprivileged white males and then abnormally low acceptance rates to support your claim of white men being turned away at the door. My experience was that college was more than happy to sign me up for financial aid, due to my family's lower income, and then student loans, to boot. They don't even…

> high application rates

Unfortunately, for a lot of groups, low application rates are part of the problem. Not enough people are encouraging members of these groups to apply and not enough members of these groups figure out on their own that applying to things are worthwhile.

Everyone I met in college applied to college (of course!), but far too many had stories about how their high schools actively discouraged them from applying to fancy colleges.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#168

Post by ttyprintk »

ltbarcly3 wrote: post #106
throwaway288112 wrote: post #89

Look, if you don't want an echo chamber on this topic, maybe consider the point of diversity statements. I can't put it better than Stephen Jay Gould: "I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops." Consider that a diversity statement is a way to evaluate if the applicant has…

I'll support your theory when I hear, even one time, a DEI leader mention poor white people. I grew up in a home with a mother who was an alcoholic and drug addict, and who had a parade of abusive boyfriends. There were times we didn't have electricity or water because it was turned off. We never had a telephone in the house or a working car. I studied Math in college. Literally every single other math major I knew h…

I’m from very similar circumstances and I’m sure you don’t want to see that harm perpetuated on the total 11M poor kids in America.

The solutions to child poverty are a mindmap of unpopular and politically-difficult policies. Nowhere is DEIB mentioned as even partially helping any poor child, non-white or otherwise. Currently, DEIB serves a different purpose than rescuing vulnerable people.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#169

Post by Jensson »

tmyklebu wrote: post #149
bawolff wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks,i agree its best to look at it directly. But i do wonder what lines like "Clearly formulates new ideas for advancing equity and inclusion at Berkeley and within their field, through their research,..." mean What does it mean for a math professor to advance diversity through their research? Like i could maybe get it for the arts or even some social sciences, but what does that look like for math?

Not research, but Jelani Nelson at Berkeley ran programmes in Ethiopia to expose schoolchildren to programming. (In case it needs to be said, Jelani is a top-shelf theoretical computer scientist.)

Why should a STEM professor be required to devote time to such activities? It doesn't seem to be their specialty, humanity does better when we are allowed to specialize, other people can do such things.

Re: A math professor who objects to diversity statements

#170

Post by beej71 »

janalsncm wrote: post #38

It seems a bit silly to ask academics to enhance DEI initiatives. These are initiatives created by administrators to solve issues that administrators have caused. I also don’t like the surface level diversity metrics that schools target: reported race and gender. Of course these are historically important, but they’re also proxies for class which is a far more important type of diversity in my opinion. I see educatio…

The issues DEI tries to solve run far deeper than being caused by administrators.
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