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US Dept. of Education Teams With Microsoft-Led Teach.org On Teacher Diversity

theodp writes: Citing a new study that suggests academic achievement can benefit when children are taught by a teacher of their own race, the NY Times asks, Where Are the Teachers of Color? Towards that end, the Times reports that "Teach.org, a partnership between the Department of Education and several companies, teachers unions and other groups, is specifically targeting racial minorities for recruitment." Teach.org describes itself as a "public-private partnership led by Microsoft, State Farm and the U.S. Department of Education." To the consternation of some, the U.S. Dept. of Education delegated teacher recruitment to Microsoft in 2011. With its 2.2% African American/Black and 3.9% Latino/Hispanic tech workforce, who better to increase diversity than Microsoft, right?

13 of 148 comments (clear)

  1. Minorities by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    in teaching or in the broad population? One might as well ask where are the white male school teachers, while we're at it.

  2. Discrimination by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Skin colour should never matter when hiring people. Never.

    1. Re:Discrimination by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      So, you're giving Microsoft an A for effort, and that's good enough for you. They're the go to guys since they've been trying really hard, right? No, it wasn't a cheap shot, it was spot on.

  3. That 'study' is full of shit ! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    My parents are from the Indian sub-continent, and I was born in America

    Yes, technically I am qualified to be a 'minority' in America, but as a Minority I do not necessary benefit more from being taught by 'minority teachers'

    All I need is a teacher who is qualified, who is enthusiastic, who wants to share whatever knowledge he or she has with me, who knows how to communicate clearly and who is cheerful --- As for the race of that teacher, I do not care

    That so-called 'study' is thus shipload of turd

    How come my government is listening to those turd suckers in the first place?

    Political correctness has no place in education !!

    1. Re:That 'study' is full of shit ! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Equality...diversity..ever wondered how liberals can ask for both of these at the same time???

    2. Re:That 'study' is full of shit ! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Your opinion on this subject is equally irrelevant as the opinion of people 18 when MADD or [insert some other lobbyist organization here] starts shrieking "won't somebody think of the children".

      This is about buying influence. Actual benefit to minorities is moot. The study was contrived for the purpose of greasing this form of pandering. Now the Dept. of Education can do what they wanted to do and the influence brokers can get what they want: power to make people jump when they say "jump" using race-baiting tactics to manufacture an environment for their economic rent-seeking behavior.

      It's nothing more than a form of political-correctness racketeering and just like a police department will happily pay bitcoins to ransomware or a local government will happily funnel "tomorrow-money" via pension commitments and rotating fire-chief games, it's easy for public sector workers to make their lives easy in the short-run by acquiescing to the extortioner's demands when they are in-charge of "other-people's-money" and the voters are dumb enough to gobble up the pandering like hungry hungry hippos.

      Now that I've expressed my opinion in-practice(an equally irrelevant one due to the fact that these games aren't intended for populations educated &/or intelligent enough to see through them), I wanted to weigh in on two other implications:

      A) normally I would consider your opinion to be anecdotal vs. scientific method and therefore largely unimportant as a data point however since I agree with you, I'm leaning towards confirmation bias and attacking the studies merits instead(frankly, I am not surprised by the results that racial segregation DOES lead to more positive education outcomes, but a one-dimensional analysis fails at application of holistic impacts/considerations such as achieving an integrated &/or diverse society).

      B) This study highlights the importance of an education in statistics by the general public as well as the danger of appeals to authority, lack of critical thinking, and anti-intellectualism.

      C) I'm realizing something that many conservatives and the uneducated seem to have trouble eloquently communicating which is the cheapening of the "scientist says WHAT!?" brand of fact-politicking where ambitious whores of intellectuals will abuse the academic publishing process to compete for increasingly sparse funds(based on MBA-land "metrics" like influence scores). The academic yellow journalism industry is turning in to a product available to the highest bidder with no integrity. The product of this is canon-fodder for anyone who has the money to sway the tide of public sentiment.

      Overall, I'm left drifting in a universe free of the black and white clarity of scientific credibility available to justify whatever bias I wish to confirm. I'm now forced to cope with the idea of no objective truths. A world where people like Steven Colbert, Jesse Jackson, and Rupert Murdoch can conjure reality with words and money and influence. A world where British Petroleum, Chevron, General Electric, and Boeing can bend the very fabric of reality to justify foreign intervention and the immunodefense of society(the ETHICAL educated public) is overwhelmed by the volume of the loudspeakers and the quantity of the propaganda.

      The corrupting influence of money can liquidate credibility, and the consolidation of media ownership has increased the price efficiency of the process to where truth-bending and spin can now be had with economies of scale:
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Powell_%28lobbyist%29
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope
      http://www.freepress.net/press-release/2011/7/7/court-rejects-fcc-attempt-weaken-media-ownership-rules

      The subtle erosion continues over time and you can tally victories at the same time as losses to infer the overall trend's direction.

      The disturbing aspect is that these perversions of science seem to universally favor the interests of people who want to make the world a worse place. There just doesn't seem to be very much profit in making it better.

  4. Apartheid Education by rtb61 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Seriously sounds like they are drifting towards an apartheid education system. That students tend to do better in the US with teachers of the same race (what ever the fuck that is meant to really mean, like human teachers or dog teachers or bird teachers or dolphin teachers), is a solid indication or problems of racism in the society at large and how it is brought into the education system. Race - biological http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Rac... was only extended into arbitrary human http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Rac... classification purely as a result of rampant prejudice and a specific desire to exclude people from competitive access in capitalist societies. Those statistics are not a measure of better teaching that are a measure of a fractured and failing society, as people within that society seek to avoid failure and drowning in poverty by pushing others down via what ever distinctions they can craft based upon, appearance, language, religion and culture. Those results should be a real wakeup moment of a serious problem.

    --
    Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
  5. Bring back segregated schools . . . ?!?! by PolygamousRanchKid+ · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So segregated schools would be the obvious (and wrong) answer? Black students go to a school with black teachers, and white kids go to a school with white teachers ?!?!?!

    Ah, what ever happened to folks who thought like this:

    I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

    I have a dream today!

    I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of "interposition" and "nullification" -- one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

    I guess Martin Luther King Jr. wasn't dreaming . . . give the current state of race relations in the US . . . he was fantasizing.

    --
    Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
  6. You are so right ! by Taco+Cowboy · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If I can mod you up 1000 times, I will !

    I came from China. Back in China all my teachers are Chinese - as China is full of Chinese naturally my teachers (good and bad) are Chinese

    But when I landed on US of A none of my teachers / lecturers / professors (good and bad) happened to be ethnic Chinese

    Did I ever fail to learn just because my teacher / lecturer / professor happened to be not of the same ethnic / racial background as me? Nope !

    In fact, I find it utterly ridiculously to claim that students learn better with teachers of the same racial background, and you are so right --- Political Correctness has no place in Education!!

    --
    Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
  7. Outsiders will forever be outsider if ... by Taco+Cowboy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ... that's what they want

    I am a Chinese, born in China

    In the US of A I am an *outsider* --- and if I want to forever remain an *outsider*, I can

    In other words, if I remain an *outsider* that is because I choose to be an *outsider*

    Look, man ! In this thread there is an Indian American (who was born in America) and a Chinese American, who was born in China already chimed in, and we share the same view, that the idea in which students can learn better from teachers who share the same racial background as them (the students) as a totally ridiculous notion

    Political Correctness has no place in Education!!

    --
    Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
  8. Male teachers by itzly · · Score: 3, Insightful

    So, using the same line of thinking, they are also promoting hiring more male teachers to properly educate the boys in the classroom ? The elementary school that my kids went to saw their last male teacher leave a few years ago.

  9. Quotas are prejudicial by Karmashock · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Where are the X percentage of race or gender in Y field? Enough with the quotas. Enough with people looking at statistics and saying "we need this ratio".

    Even if you're not saying "do this or you're breaking the law" what they're doing is effectively trying to get quotas in through the back door.

    There is a mixture of "oh you must be racist if you don't have X percentage" and then a little of "how about if we give you some money if you do X percentage?" and then maybe a bit of "show us how progressive you are by having X percentage".

    Fuck your fucking percentages and ratios. That is not how you fix race and gender issues... by mandating BY ANY FUCKING MEANS some sort of ratio.

    This doesn't help "people of color" which apparently only applies to black people because asians sure as hell aren't offered any affirmative action. There was that indian guy that wasn't' getting into medical school, then he got a different haircut and lied on his entrance application saying he was black... bam, got right in.

    That's fucked up.

    This racist bullshit needs to stop. I know what the idiots will say, "it isn't racist if you're biased against people "power"" ... which just means fuck white people and fuck Asians. It is bullshit and you're not going to make people trust the competence of people if everyone knows that X race or Y gender has to be hired at some ratio for SOME reason other than that they were ACTUALLY considered the best candidate for the job.

    Furthermore, there is a lot more to diversity then your fucking skin color or whether or not you have a penis. Not all people with one skin color are the same. You can have ten people of all the same race in the same room and have more diversity in that room of THOUGHT than if you had some rainbow of races in the same room. For all you know those 10 people of the same race could have radically different backgrounds, skill sets, philosophies, etc. To say that they're all the same because they all have the same skin color is incredibly offensive and racist. You might as well just walk around saying "all you people look the same to me so I assume you all are the same"... Are you fucking kidding me. Same thing with dicks and vaginas. You are not your dick or your vagina. If I have a room full of 10 dicks or 10 vaginas they could be more diverse in their thoughts, backgrounds, skill sets, philosophies than if we had some 50 50 split.

    What group of idiots out there thought that diversity was getting some mix of races and genders? This is a racist's idea of diversity. A non-racist doesn't see race as being relevant. They view who the person actually IS rather than what their skin color is... but a racist just sees "oh that's X race... and you know what they say about those people". THAT is how racists think. And these quotas arrive at a concept of "diversity" by that same logic. they say, well we have these people with these skin tones so obviously we have diversity. What the the actual fuck?

    This is easily one of the most disappointing things about politics in the 21st century. The race, gender, and identity politics are beyond toxic. This shit is going to destroy our society.

    We all have to see each other as individuals rather than pairing off into arbitrary meaningless racial groups and assuming that "oh I'm with the X race people which is my race so they've obviously got my back"... I can't speak for anyone else, but there are plenty of people in my own race that are utterly intolerable. Why would I reflexively associate with them when most of them are not people I especially relate... and they can't relate to me. I am as likely to find people I relate to in other races as my own. So where is this diversity through skin tone?

    If we were shooting a magazine cover or something... I'd get it. You might want to get some people with one skin tone here and another there and who knows what the photographer is doing. But if you're running a business or an education system... WHO THE FUCK CARES.

    The worst

    --
    I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
  10. Re:Race but not Gender? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    We will see males get kicked, err escorted, out of corporations. Men will end up fighting wars, firefighting, law enforcement, and construction. Women will take their rightful place as the bosses and the men will simply be used for procreation and cannon fodder.

    For those that believe that the world is stacked against women, open your eyes and take a good long look at all the HR policies, societal rules, and corporate programs. The pendulum has swung over the past 50 years from favoring men to favoring women. At this point it is out of control. There are so many examples.

    Recently a friend of mine worked on a youth program where kids were encouraged to program and work with robotics. He was successful. The youth program worked with young men and women, but needed more corporate support. When he started to bring it up the chain an executive pushed back and stated that the program should be changed to only support young women. He is now considering scrapping the program as we have entered the age where equal rights considered to be bad.