Affirmative Action/Discrimination in Education
The issue at The Quick and the Ed, and on Flypaper’s radar, is affirmative action. TQ&tE, in discussing Obama’s take on the issue, says:
“I’m in favor of racial preferences in college admissions as long as the goal is to help minority students who come from substandard K-12 schools and have to live with legacy of historical racism along with discrimination that still exists today.”
I’d go with cultural/intellectual diversity [useful] over racial diversity [useless], but I understand what Mr. Carey is saying. Flypaper is unimpressed.
A few years ago, I applied for a job at a well-known education bastion in New York City. I overheard one of the interviewers say to another that I was “too country.”
A year before that, I had a similar interview in Los Angeles, where an examiner expressed concern that a rube like me just wouldn’t be able to “fit in” in LA and that I “wouldn’t be happy in a big city” despite anything on my CV or in my testimony that might suggest otherwise. I wish that she’d told me about my happiness before leaving for the interview - it could have saved me a 3,000 mile trip.
Yes, maybe it was a mistake to wear overalls and a straw hat to these interviews. Maybe I should’ve brought my own spittoon, too, because the interviewers balked when I spat load upon load of tobacco juice on their carpets. And maybe the Hawken blackpowder rifle strung over my shoulder presented a mismatch with their cultures [really, it was only a .32 Davy Crockett squirrel gun - I figured a .50 or .58 would seem too aggressive, though I think they failed to make the distinction].
Ok, ok, the attire/accessories part was an exaggeration, but all the rest is true.
I’m not suggesting equivalence between different types of discrimination. We do, however, see suboptimal decisions made for all types of goofy reasons, whether in hiring, college admissions or routine social situations.
It’s an imperfect system, and some get the short end of the stick far more often than others, but it’s better than a doubly-goofy fix based on which racial box you check on an application.
