Forced Diversity
October 28, 2007
Forcing diversity in public schools needs to end.
We could generously call it a noble experiment, but it’s become clear that after two decades of redistricting, faculty and student diversity training, and holiday free-for-alls, we’re not a tighter-knit population than we were before. In fact, these examples of forced diversity have often led to MORE tensions among the people who were made to suffer through them.
Forced diversity is why the National Football League mandates that every team hiring a new coach must interview a black candidate. Forced diversity is why the president of Harvard University was forced to resign after musing that innate preferences or ability differences might be part of why there were more men than women in high-end science and engineering positions. Forced diversity makes otherwise intelligent people believe that all school systems, businesses, and occupations should have demographics that exactly mirror the demographics of our entire country.
In addition to the fact that forced diversity doesn’t work, it cheats our students out of valuable instructional time. It’s time for all of us to cancel the Kwanzaa/Hanukkah/Christmas units this year and use the time we’ve saved to teach more reading, writing, and arithmetic.
It was interesting while it lasted, but forced diversity has proven to be a failure.
Entry Filed under: Education, Elementary Education, Learning, Public Schools, Secondary Education, Students, Teaching, diversity, school. .
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1.
Matthew K. Tabor | October 28, 2007 at 1:42 pm
Sounds like you might be anticipating Robert Putnam’s new book as much as I am.
2.
Jenny | October 28, 2007 at 1:48 pm
I don’t think most people feel that all of our schools, etc must match the demographics of our country. It would be nice if they simply came close to the demographics of their own area.
I agree with you that we spend valuable time on various units regarding diversity. But, couldn’t we teach about those things through reading, writing, and math. These children are growing up in an increasingly diverse, global world. Having a better understanding of the people in that world seems like a critical skill.
3.
thirdgradeteacher | October 28, 2007 at 8:36 pm
Help me out, Matthew… what’s this upcoming book you mentioned?
Jenny, why do schools and businesses need to match the demographics of their area? Trying to force that leads to things like quotas, redistricting, and illegal hiring practices. What if the best elementary teachers that apply to teach at a certain school keep happening to be white females?
4.
Mathew | October 29, 2007 at 8:05 am
I work at a magnet school where students are bussed in to attend. The ethnic makeup of the school is constructed so that it reflects the diversity of the population outside the school. Currently 23 languages are spoken among the student body. I don’t know if you would call it “forced diversity” as parents only send their kids if they want to.
As a former student of the school, I must say that it did work in teaching diversity and shaping my outlook on getting along with people who are different for my entire life. Rather than teaching a multicutural unit, attending the school is your multicultural unit.
5.
Matthew K. Tabor | October 31, 2007 at 11:37 am
Putnam’s recent work finds some serious problems with diversity - few will want to admit it, but diversity can create, perpetuate or exacerbate negative things, too. There’s a brief summary on Putnam’s wiki entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Putnam#Diversity_and_Trust_within_Communities
6.
cityteacher | October 31, 2007 at 10:03 pm
Interesting topic as LAUSD is considering separating the 44 lowest performing schools into its own district. How do you feel about forced segregation at this time and age? And since we constantly talk about the “achievement gap”, these 44 schools are probably all of ethnic minorities, we are talking about segregation based along the lines of race and ethnicity.
7.
thirdgradeteacher | October 31, 2007 at 10:52 pm
Cityteacher — that is very interesting, as it basically is the opposite of what I posted. Maybe we could call it “forced sameness” or perhaps your term, segregation. I want to look more into the reasons for that proposal before I yea or nay it — thanks for bringing it to my attention.
8.
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