Author: erinleighvt

I am sure that everyone reading this has heard the question “is the glass half empty or is it half full?” Unfortunately, it seems that these days most of us are seeing more situations from a glass half empty perspective. And I get it – I am there with you all in feeling that way. Our government is a mess. Our current administration is taking away much of the progress we have made as a country in regards to diversity and inclusion and is sending us back several decades. So many parts of the world are at war. Millions of people are homeless and starving. And from a more microcosmic perspective, it is the end of the semester, finals are coming, and life is stressful. It is really upsetting, sad, infuriating (insert any number of words here).

Growing up, whenever I was struggling with something, whether it be a fight with a friend, being sick, my car not starting, etc, my dad would remind me that there are so many people less fortunate than I. My dad ALWAYS has a glass half full perspective. It is one of the things I admire most about him. While I often was annoyed with my dad for telling me how lucky I was (as every teenage girl just wants someone to understand them and throw her a pity party), I see know that he was teaching me a valuable lesson – even in the darkness, there is some light. The light may be the size of a needle point, but something in our life is good, even when everything seems bad.

Over the past month, I had a contractor run away with over $2300 for a service not completed. I have been really mad about this. Not only am I out thousands of dollars, I still need the work ro get done, and I will have to pay for new materials and the labor of another contractor. Needless to say, I have been feeling pretty badly for myself lately. But, when I stop to think about things from a more positive perspective, I see this instead: I have learned a lot from this experience. I am fortunate enough to own a house and have a roof over my head every night. I have a refrigerator that maybe isn’t as full as it could be (need to go to the grocery store), but I don’t go hungry. I have the ability to do small projects on my house from time to time. I am extremely blessed. When I remind myself of this, I feel better. The issue of my contractor is trivial in comparison to the strife that millions of other are facing.

We need to remember that even though hate is spreading like wildfire as minority groups (race, religion, sexual orientation, etc.) are constantly under attack from ignorant people, we (us in this class) are fortunate enough to be in school. To get a higher education. To, presumably, have somewhere to live and food to eat. Some things suck. And it is okay to be angry (and in my opinion, we should be angry). Just don’t let feeling angry turn you into an angry person. We must stand strong and make sure that hate doesn’t win.

Last week, I did not raise my hand when asked if I felt like I could teach a diversity and inclusion course. This was not because I believe myself incapable of teaching a course like this. It has more to do with the fact that I wondered whether people would take me seriously in teaching a diversity class, as I am a white woman. I wondered whether my outward appearance of not being a minority would make people wonder about my qualifications to teach about diversity and inclusion. I am not exactly sure why I felt this way, as both Christian and Dean DePauw are more than qualified to teach this course (and do an excellent job!) – and they are both white.

Regardless, I felt that way. I asked the class how they felt about this. Would they take an African American Studies class seriously if it was taught by a white person? What about a Women’s Studies course taught by a man? Or a Native American Studies course taught by someone with no Native American background? My initial thought was that it would be harder to take the professor seriously. After all, if you are not a member of a given minority group, it is not truly possible to know exactly what it feels like to be a member of that minority group (not that that is anyone’s fault). At first, it seemed to me that students would take the attitude of “why should I listen to you, when you don’t even represent what you are teaching?”

However, it was really interesting to hear about another side of the story. The other view was that if a man teaches a Women Studies course (for example), it brings more credibility to the topics discussed in class. For if a man (in this example) is teaching about the history, issues, etc, women have and do face, it is more likely to be seen as true. If a woman teaches it, perhaps male students (in particular) would feel it was just the teacher expressing opinions and pushing these opinions upon her students.

I could see how this could happen. But I can also see the side that I thought at first. Personally, I believe that this is largely a very individual topic. Some students may feel one way and others another. Regardless of which stance someone takes, I believe that teachers in general typically need to “prove” themselves to their students in order to be truly successful at teaching. “Proving” oneself as a teacher could include demonstrating extraordinary knowledge on the topic, being able to handle difficult situations within the classroom, being able to relate to the students and the questions they have, etc. The figure below gives a good description of how teachers come across as being credible to their students.

What are others’ thoughts? Which side would you be on in this case? Or would it completely depend on the specific teacher and specific class? What can teachers do to overcome feelings of incredibility in the classroom?

In primary and secondary school (K-12), I had one teacher who was not white. One. Out of how many? Probably well over 100, as once in middle and high school, I had as many as 8 teachers a year (1 for each course). Sadly, I highly doubt I ever really thought about this growing up because I am white. Thus, having only teachers that looked like me seemed normal and not something to cause second thoughts.

Although I only had one black teacher growing up, I had tons friends who were not white. And my schools were always pretty diverse in regards to the races/ethnicities of the students. By why was there little to no diversity in regards to the teachers? Is teaching not a popular profession for racial minority groups? Or is our society so messed up and prejudiced that it is harder for people of color to be hired as teachers? I don’t know the answer to this. But, kids tend to think about the careers they see people like them doing. So, if there are very few black, Hispanic, Asian, etc teachers, students who are black, Hispanic, Asian, etc may subconsciously think teaching is not a job option for them.

While pondering this, I came across an article published last month titled “Want students to succeed? Hire more teachers look like them, reports says.”

http://www.macon.com/news/specialreports/disintegration/article179945276.html

The article states that the percentage of students in K-12 is becoming more and more diverse, with 49% of public primary and secondary school students being from a racial minority. This stands in stark contrast to the mere 18% of public school teachers being from a racial minority. A school district in Georgia is specifically examined – the number of white students is decreasing, while the number of black, Hispanic, and Asian students rising. The number of non-white teachers has remained relatively stagnant in comparison.

This article states that having more diversity in the classroom is imperative to the success of ALL students. “It’s important for kids who are traditionally underserved to see people in positions of authority who look like them. You need to feel like you’re not relegated to the sidelines. You need to feel important” (Kate Walsh; http://www.macon.com/news/special-reports/disintegration/article179945276.html). The article also states that having a diverse group of teachers is imperative, even in schools that have a non-diverse student base. Teachers with diverse backgrounds and experience “can provide perspectives that children may not otherwise be exposed to” (http://www.macon.com/news/special-reports/disintegration/article179945276.html). While having teachers who are similar to the student base is also important, as it enables students to feel like their backgrounds are understood by someone in an authority position.

I, for one, agree strongly with the sentiments presented in this article. What are others’ thoughts and experiences about teacher diversity in K-12? In higher education? I am curious if my experience in school is as common as it appears?

A few weeks ago, I went to an Open Access night held at the library. Sadly, it appeared that only my peers from another class and library personnel attended. In order to get open access more utilized and accepted, more people need to (1) know about it and (2) care about it.

Open access refers to research published online that has no fees associated to them. These articles are available to anyone (with internet access) who wishes to read them, and are therefore a step in the right direction for making science available to a more diverse audience, and not solely to either academics or those with the financial means to purchase subscriptions. Currently, it appears to me that when people think of scientific journals, they typically think of those that are only available to journal subscribers. In this case, the publishers of the journal own the rights to all the articles they publish.

Open access is a great strategy for bridging the gap between scientists and the pubic and for making the distribution of information more inclusive for all. That being said, I see a major issue with open access – not enough people know about open access and not enough researchers do or want to publish in open access journals.

Even though I believe open access is a positive movement and likely the wave of the future, it does not matter if open access exists if nobody utilizes it. In order for open access to truly make a difference in providing information to much larger and diverse groups of people (and thus make science more inclusive), more people need to learn about it and more scientists need to utilize open access. To be honest, I really did not know much about open access until I started graduate school. As an undergraduate, I remember being annoyed when I could not download articles that I needed for my classes when I was not on campus, but I did not think much about it or why that was. Nobody ever talked to us about what it means to have a subscription publication vs. an open access publication. In order to spread the word about what open access is, why it is important, how it is different than subscription publications, and the advantages it has over subscription publications in regards to topics related to diversity and inclusion, professors need to explain this to students as undergraduates (and teachers to high school students).

Why the norm is that people must pay to read others’ research does not make any sense to me. Why would people conduct research when 90% of the world cannot access it? With subscription publications, only people who subscribe to the journal can access the articles. This equates only to people who are interested in the journal’s topic (and therefore likely conduct research in the same, or similar, fields) and those with the financial means to pay for subscriptions. This creates a cycle of the same people, studying the same thing, and reading the articles written by the same scientists. Perhaps if we opened our research to the public, fresh, new ideas from people not so involved in the minute details of our work will enable break-throughs. When you read the same paragraph over and over again, it becomes easy to miss errors because you know what it says – I think this concept holds for publications as well.

Overall, open access could enable new ideas to circulate, could bridge the gap between scientists and the public, may increase the number of people interested in the topics we all hold so dear, and may even make our world more inclusive. We all know what it feels like when someone asks “what do you do,” and as you start talking, eyes glaze over, and a short response of “oh, that’s nice” ensues. People are more likely to care if they have some basic background in what is being discussed. Open access could grant the basic background needed to interest the public in our research, which, in turn, helps decrease issues with diversity and inclusion, as research and data are made accessible to more people. While millions of people will not benefit from open access, due to no internet access, I strongly feel the open access movement is heading us in the right direction for making education, science, data, etc more relevant to the masses.