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[pandora]

sciencephd:  are you trying to turn this thread into a free-association thread, just like -- pretty much any thread getting much action at the moment?

ps:  check your cat's left front tire

[voxprincipalis]

sciencephd:  are you trying to turn this thread into a free-association thread, just like -- pretty much any thread getting much action at the moment?

ps:  check your cat's left front tire

It's interthreaduality:

http://chronicle.com/forums/index.php/topic,47900.0.html

VP

[concordancia]

Ok, before we jump all over the OP, let's have a look at the self-congratulatory information that BU lists on its own website:

Celebrating our legacy

Boston University was chartered in 1869 by Lee Claflin, Jacob Sleeper, and Isaac Rich, three successful Methodist businessmen whose abolitionist ideals led them to envision and create a university that was inclusive—that opened its doors to the world—and engaged in service to and collaboration with the city of Boston.

From the day of its opening, Boston University has admitted students of both sexes and every race and religion. It is with pride that we count Martin Luther King, Jr. among our alumni. What makes us prouder still is the fact that when he received his doctorate from the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in 1955, Dr. King was taking his place in a long line of individuals that stretches back to the University’s founding. Other notable alumni include the first woman to earn a Ph.D., the first woman admitted to the bar in Massachusetts, the first Native American to graduate with a doctorate in medicine, and the first African-American psychiatrist in the United States.


Here's the link:  http://www.bu.edu/info/about/

Some of us might call this lip service.  I know this is perhaps my hobby horse on these pages, but higher education is all too self-satisfied with just how diverse and inclusive our profession is.  I wouldn't call the numbers posted above the sign of active discrimination, but in my experience, the departments that can show off a truly diverse faculty have made an active effort to recruit such faculty.  Most departments I've seen don't aspire to that.

This legacy doesn't say much about faculty. Or anything, for that matter. I mean, given its origins, it sounds like they expected a bunch of white guilt to educate the poor diverse masses.

[windchimes]

Have you no shame? Come back with some research that has depth and meaning.

You mean the kind that you provided?

Absolutely correct.  The OP would need to know how many non-whites applied for each position, how candidates were chosen for interviews, and all of the candidates performed in interviews to figure out whether or not shame is justified.  Maybe it is.  But the list alone doesn't reveal that.

Absolutely incorrect. Yours is a classic boilerplate response that people churn out without thinking of the context.

If you look at the list in the context in which it "exists" you too should conclude that these people (BU) have a problem.

We are not talking about some obscure fields, or insistence on stellar scholarship, or some other high benchmarks or barriers to entry that will traditionally preclude majority of (visible) minorities to even apply for these positions, let alone obtain employment. We are talking about "college" that employs faculty with mostly relevant professional industry experience, plenty of whom don't even hold a master's, let alone doctorate.

Are you telling me that they couldn't find (even if they had to actively recruit/leave no stone unturned) more than three minorities with bachelor's or master's with a few years of professional media experience? And what is industry experience anyway here? It could mean as low as few years of low to medium level work at local ad agencies, news stations or community newspapers.

That they unashamedly don't even bother with it speaks volumes to me.

Not even one "token" black person!? Not even one "token" Latino?? In what kind of 21st century America does Boston University thinks it exists? Just when one starts to hope that we are making progress as a nation, you stumble upon curiously deliberate "old boys club" in the midst of us all.

[sciencephd]

For an old boys club, they sure have alot of girls !

[collegekidsmom]

have you ever spent any time at Boston University, OP? Is this just coming out of left field, or are you affiliated with them in some way?

[sciencephd]

Someone already asked that...didn't bite.

[windchimes]

have you ever spent any time at Boston University, OP? Is this just coming out of left field, or are you affiliated with them in some way?

Please tell me honestly how's that relevant to the >3 out 69< fact?

[concordancia]

have you ever spent any time at Boston University, OP? Is this just coming out of left field, or are you affiliated with them in some way?

Please tell me honestly how's that relevant to the >3 out 69< fact?

I think it is a question of why we are taking Boston University as our sample when there is such a wide universe of American academia, little of which reflects the diversity of our country.

[windchimes]

I think it is a question of why we are taking Boston University as our sample when there is such a wide universe of American academia, little of which reflects the diversity of our country.

If one starts being non-specific the discussion gets too broad, goes too wide, becomes impersonal, and ultimately lost and therefore meaningless.

We are a nation of busy bees, multitasking wizards, and ADD patients (diagnosed or not). Samples are good. They are easily presentable, chewable and digestible.

[concordancia]

I think it is a question of why we are taking Boston University as our sample when there is such a wide universe of American academia, little of which reflects the diversity of our country.

If one starts being non-specific the discussion gets too broad, goes too wide, becomes impersonal, and ultimately lost and therefore meaningless.

We are a nation of busy bees, multitasking wizards, and ADD patients (diagnosed or not). Samples are good. They are easily presentable, chewable and digestible.

...which in no way addresses the issue of how we arrived at this particlar sample. Nor does it accept the fact that most people who will read this thread are able to concentrate and to process data. People who want more than one fact, or at least want to know its source when there is only one data set provided. In short, people who are more than willing to participate in a virtual mosh pit, but rarely drag others, and especially institutions, into the mix without knowing why.

[jonesey]

Don't women count as minorities for EEO hires? 

Or, maybe, BC hired the best qualifed people, and they just happened to be white.  Not everything is a conspiracy. 

[windchimes]

...which in no way addresses the issue of how we arrived at this particlar sample. Nor does it accept the fact that most people who will read this thread are able to concentrate and to process data. People who want more than one fact, or at least want to know its source when there is only one data set provided. In short, people who are more than willing to participate in a virtual mosh pit, but rarely drag others, and especially institutions, into the mix without knowing why.

Your post is pure academia. Writing for the sake of writing. Quasi questions and points that are irrelevant to the real issue at hand. And the issue at hand is not how I came to this sample. It is why such sample even exists in today's America?

And "I" did not provide this "data set", it is rather "they" who did it. Or I should say "they" provided the "end results" of a suspect policy and a questionable attitude. Particularly when is more than clear that they could draw abundant numbers of highly qualified candidates from this professional field. In fact, they could easily have 3 whites, and 66 best qualified people, who just happened to be visible minorities, if they really wanted.

"We" arrived at this particular sample randomly. By browsing faculty pages, one fact was overwhelmingly clear and consistently reinforced. A clear lack of diversity. And this fact "jumped out" at you rather glaringly.

According to the implications of one of your comments previously, I suppose I could have found a few, perhaps even plenty, of colleges and departments across the country that are similar to this one. I suppose I could have. But that is/was not my intention, or aim (not even in this case). And even if I did find others like this, your posts wouldn't have changed at all as you would have still asked me the same things about any/every one of them. Which only shows the level of your personal or human ignorance, mirroring that of a deeply rooted, pervasive and systematic set of attitudes still prevalent in today's America. That rigid, stubborn, defensive kind that always tries to shift the blame and question the motives of the messenger, instead of confronting the particular message.

[canadatourismguy]

Also how many of their staff is international?  A person could be white but from Russia? Does that not count for anything related to the promotion of diversity or is it merely the color of your skin?

CTG

[windchimes]

Also how many of their staff is international?

I would venture to say that all of their 3 "visible minorities" are in fact international (or at least foreign born, if there's a difference between the two?).

A person could be white but from Russia?

None of the names of their faculty members sound or look Russian (or Italian, or French, or Greek...). Sure one or more are probably British. But is the concept of "diversity" yet another white guy with Oxford degree, or is that just  another mask for one's b.s.?

Does that not count for anything related to the promotion of diversity or is it merely the color of your skin?

Is this a rhetorical question aimed at no one in particular? If it is I'd like to know the answer too.