Mostly White Forces in Mostly Black Towns: Police Struggle for Racial Diversity; New York Times, 9/9/14

Shaila Dewan, New York Times; Mostly White Forces in Mostly Black Towns: Police Struggle for Racial Diversity:

"The obstacles to diversity are many, Dr. Lim, the sociologist, said. Candidates usually must pass written tests, physical agility tests, psychological tests, polygraphs and background checks, some of which can have a disparate impact on minority candidates. Qualified black candidates are sought after not just by competing police departments, but also by employers in other industries. And some police chiefs have cited a negative attitude toward law enforcement among blacks that hinders recruiting.

Police departments have tried all kinds of remedies, from personal trainers to help with physical fitness tests to tailored recruiting. (A RAND survey found that women were attracted to the good salaries in policing, blacks to the profession’s prestige and Asians to the excitement of the job.)

But many small departments lack the resources, or the will, to conduct an exhaustive review of their hiring practices."

Top Colleges That Enroll Rich, Middle Class and Poor; New York Times, 9/8/14

David Leonhardt, New York Times; Top Colleges That Enroll Rich, Middle Class and Poor:

"To see which selective colleges are doing the most, and the least, to change the situation, The Upshot has analyzed data for every college with a four-year graduation rate of at least 75 percent. We combined data on enrollment and tuition costs to measure how hard each college is trying to attract and graduate poor and middle-class students. The result is our College Access Index.

Recruiting more high-achieving students from modest backgrounds, says Raynard Kington, the president of Grinnell, in central Iowa, “is the smart thing to do, because the country needs as much brainpower as we can get. And it’s the right thing to do, because it’s not fair that your ability to get a college education can be determined by your ability to buy an education.”

Vassar, the once all-female college in the Hudson River Valley, tops our index, with Grinnell placing second. About 23 percent of Vassar’s freshmen in recent years have received federal Pell grants (which mean they come from roughly the bottom 40 percent of the income distribution), up from 12 percent in 2007. After taking scholarships into account, the average annual cost of attending Vassar for lower-income students is about $6,000. Students cover much of that cost through campus jobs and loans.

The biggest theme to emerge from our analysis is that otherwise similar colleges often have very different levels of commitment to economic diversity. In this area, endowment is not destiny, and prestige is not destiny."

Corner Closet Opens Up a Bit Wider; New York Times, 9/5/14

James B. Stewart, New York Times; Corner Closet Opens Up a Bit Wider:

"Several of Mr. Burgess’s friends pointed out that once his bank went public, he’d be one of the first publicly gay chief executives. “I didn’t really think it was a story,” he said. “It just is what it is. But I did feel a sense of obligation to the generation behind me. We have good gay role models now in professional basketball and football, but there just weren’t many in business. I thought if I could be helpful to somebody, that would be great.”

Mr. Grenfell-Gardner expressed similar sentiments. “I hope the next generation realizes they can be whoever they want to be,” he said.

Mr. Sears said he encouraged Mr. Burgess to speak out. “It’s incredibly important for people to see that there are gay C.E.O.s,” Mr. Sears said. “So for Trevor and Jason to come out publicly as gay, that’s historic. At the same time, it’s mundane. They’re both C.E.O.s with partners and families and they’re just doing their jobs like everyone else. There’s nothing unique about that.”

Even now, Mr. Grenfell-Gardner said: “I don’t really want to be the poster child for gay C.E.O.s. There are so many talented people who have been mentors to me, both gay and straight. I want an environment where diversity is woven into our DNA as an organization. It makes us stronger. Forty percent of my leadership team is female. In the high-performance culture we’re trying to build, respect and tolerance is hard-wired. That’s what’s important to me.”"

Jesse Jackson targets Amazon.com over diversity; USA Today, 9/3/14

Jessica Guynn, USA Today; Jesse Jackson targets Amazon.com over diversity:

"Rev. Jesse Jackson is calling on Amazon.com to release its work force diversity numbers.

The Seattle technology giant is one of the lone holdouts among major technology companies.

Google, Facebook, Twitter and other leading Silicon Valley companies have publicly disclosed the racial and gender breakdown of employees in recent months.

The reports have shown what many have long suspected, that the technology industry is overwhelmingly white, Asian and male."

Gay Groups to March in St. Patrick’s Day Parade as a Ban Falls; New York Times, 9/3/14

Marc Santora, New York Times; Gay Groups to March in St. Patrick’s Day Parade as a Ban Falls:

"The organizers of the New York City St. Patrick’s Day parade said on Wednesday that they were lifting a ban on openly gay groups marching under their own banner, bringing to a close more than two decades of bitter protests and controversy that thrust an annual celebration into the national gay rights debate.

The decision is a striking reflection of the evolution of gay rights in the city and in American society, and is a measure of changing attitudes in the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church."

This Man Changed His Name From José To Joe And Immediately Got More Job Interviews; Yahoo.com

Yahoo.com; This Man Changed His Name From José To Joe And Immediately Got More Job Interviews:

""I had to drop a letter to get a title.""

Why Was Michael Sam Cut By The Rams? Personnel Decision, Not Homophobia; International Business Times, 9/2/14

Thomas Barrabi, International Business Times; Why Was Michael Sam Cut By The Rams? Personnel Decision, Not Homophobia:

"The St. Louis Rams’ decision to cut openly gay rookie defensive end Michael Sam despite a strong statistical performance this preseason led some to question whether his sexuality played a role in his dismissal from the team. But from a football perspective, Sam was always a long shot to make the Rams’ final squad...

Sam cleared waivers on Sunday and is currently a free agent. Still, Meltzer believes that he has both the talent and the fortitude to make it in the NFL.

“I think he has the right perspective. I think he does have enough talent to make the league. He may have to play on a practice squad, but he has the right speed and football intelligence," he told IBTimes. “I don’t think there’s very many teams, if he has the talent, that will stray away from him. I think the biggest problem, which was that initial fanfare, is over now. The next team to take him, it’s not going to be as big of a story.”"

Op-ed: In The Long Run, Michael Sam Being Cut Was About Homophobia; Advocate, 9/2/14

Michelle Garcia, Advocate; Op-ed: In The Long Run, Michael Sam Being Cut Was About Homophobia:

"Did the Rams cut Michael Sam out of sheer homophobia? I doubt it. But it was homophobic reasons that got him to such a precarious position in the first place.

While the Rams were able to at least push this dream of having an out player a little further, and he was given a platform to show the entire league that he has potential for the pros, at the end of the day, the Rams did not have any use for him — they already had a nearly-full slate of defensive linemen, minus the one spot that undrafted rookie Ethan Westbrooks now has. And when 31 other teams had the chance to pick Sam up, it seems none of them needed him (and according to Outsports, at least six teams could probably use his talents right now).

Just in the last year, all of the the professional leagues (the NBA, WNBA, MLB, NHL, and even the NFL) have made several outward attempts to appear more welcoming of LGBT athletes, staff, and fans. I don't want to believe that homophobia still persists in this way in the NFL. Like I said, I don't think Fisher and the Rams are a homophobic bunch; they're the ones who took a chance on Sam, and undeniably stood by him. But looking back, all of the fanfare from these pro leagues feels like simple lip service."

Generation Later, Poor Are Still Rare at Elite Colleges; New York Times, 8/25/14

Richard Perez-Pena, New York Times; Generation Later, Poor Are Still Rare at Elite Colleges: "A series of federal surveys of selective colleges found virtually no change from the 1990s to 2012 in enrollment of students who are less well off — less than 15 percent by some measures — even though there was a huge increase over that time in the number of such students going to college. Similar studies looking at a narrower range of top wealthy universities back those findings. With race-based affirmative action losing both judicial and public support, many have urged selective colleges to shift more focus to economic diversity."

Outdated forms leave same-sex couples confused; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 8/16/14

Mackenzie Carpenter, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; Outdated forms leave same-sex couples confused:

"Judge McGough has performed 59 same-sex weddings in Allegheny County since May 20, and while the couples uniformly praise the warm welcome they receive in the Marriage License Bureau, a few find the application form’s designation “unfortunate,’’ he said.

Other counties have not taken the same wait-and-see approach.

In Beaver County, money is tight and new forms weren’t in the cards, so “we just white out bride’ and ’groom’ and replace them with ’applicant,’ ” said Carol Fiorucci, the register of wills, While they wait for the new forms to arrive, “We want to be sensitive to the subject, and we want to be courteous,” she said.

“We had our software companies change our application forms the day after the law changed,” said Michael Ginsburg, register of wills for Westmoreland County, from bride and groom to “applicant.”

On the day a federal judge ruled the state’s ban on same-sex marriage was unconstitutional and the Corbett administration announced it would not appeal, couples started showing up in Mr. Ginsburg’s office for marriage licenses.

“We hadn’t had time yet to make the changes, and when they saw ‘bride’ and ‘groom’ on the forms, some of them were bothered by that,” Mr. Ginsburg said.

“A couple of them got excited, though and started arguing which one was the bride and which one was the groom.”

Late Friday, Holli Senior, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Health, emailed a statement that said since the ruling in May, the department “has been exploring options to determine what changes may be necessary to the state’s marriage application and other vital records forms. We will continue to work with all counties and ensure that they are provided with information as it becomes available.”

Web Trolls Winning as Incivility Increases; New York Times, 8/14/14

Farhad Manjoo, New York Times; Web Trolls Winning as Incivility Increases:

"But Dr. Phillips, of Humboldt State, pointed out that many efforts to curb trolling ran into a larger problem: “To what extent do you want to make it harder for people to express themselves on the Internet?” she asked.

“This is not the good-faith exchange of ideas,” she said. “It’s just people being nasty, and if anything, it might encourage marginalized groups to not speak up.” She added, “On the other hand, by silencing that valve, there’s a lot of other stuff that is important culturally that might also be minimized.”

If there’s one thing the history of the Internet has taught us, it’s that trolls will be difficult to contain because they really reflect base human society in all its ugliness. Trolls find a way.

“It’s not a question of whether or not we’re winning the war on trolling, but whether we’re winning the war on misogyny, or racism, and ableism and all this other stuff,” Dr. Phillips said. “Trolling is just a symptom of those bigger problems.”"

Tallying Female Workers Isn't Enough to Make Tech More Diverse; Atlantic, 8/11/14

Adrienne LaFrance, Atlantic; Tallying Female Workers Isn't Enough to Make Tech More Diverse:

"This drumbeat of diversity data has been anticlimactic, not least because it shows what most people already expected: that leaders in technology are overwhelmingly hiring white men. Often, when companies offered more granular detail, the gender divide was even more pronounced. Company-wide representation of women might be 30 percent, but the percentage of women in tech and engineering roles at Google and Yahoo, for instance, was about half that.

All the companies say they need to do more. Few are willing to talk about the issue beyond what they've released in charts and blog posts. Plenty of people say, or whisper to themselves, that individual companies can't fix the industry-wide "pipeline problem."...

If the industry cannot agree that there are obstacles to women entering the industry in the first place, it's no wonder the scope of the conversation is limited. Even those who fixate on diversity in tech often focus too narrowly on gender. "We'll talk about the fact that there's sexism in tech, but we won't talk about the fact that there's racism," said Tiffani Ashley Bell, CEO of scheduling app Pencil You In. "I feel like that's the safe conversation. And mostly white women are highlighted, and mostly white women are talking about the issue—and they're going to see it from that perspective."

Bell says that without a more open and inclusive conversation about diversity in tech, a few high-profile blog posts about workforce numbers isn't going to make a difference. "You can be well intentioned, but if you don't act on it—if you're not actually doing anything—change is not going to come about just from you wanting to be inclusive," Bell said. "It has to be something you're actively doing. If you want to be more inclusive there are ways to do it."

Sharing data is part of the solution, but it has to be linked with meaningful initiatives to change corporate practices. Companies should release annual reports detailing their progress and publicly assessing the workforce diversification strategies that have and haven't worked. That's the next step."

Many Women Leave Engineering, Blame The Work Culture; NPR, 8/12/14

Nicholas St. Fleur, NPR; Many Women Leave Engineering, Blame The Work Culture:

"Over the course of three years, , a psychologist at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, surveyed 5,300 women who earned engineering degrees within the past six decades in order to figure out why so few stayed in engineering. Fouad reported that only 62 percent of respondents were currently working in engineering. Those who left the field provided their reasons for doing so in the survey.

The answer, Fouad said, was simple:

"It's the climate, stupid!" she said during her presentation, referring to the "old-boys club" workplaces that she says still exist in many engineering organizations.

Respondents in her study reflected her sentiments, with many calling the engineering workplace unfriendly and even hostile to women. They also said they felt that many of these companies did not provide opportunities for women like them to advance and develop.

"Women's departure from engineering is not just an issue of 'leaning in,' " said Fouad, lead researcher of the study. "It's about changing the work environment.""

Apple’s Diversity Mirrors Other Tech Companies'; New York Times, 8/12/14

Brian X. Chen, New York Times; Apple’s Diversity Mirrors Other Tech Companies’ :

"Similar to other Silicon Valley tech companies, Apple has a work force that is composed mostly of men, and most of them are white.

The company on Tuesday published statistics on the makeup of its work force of 98,000 employees in terms of race, ethnicity and sex. It said 30 percent of its employees worldwide were women. In the United States, where Apple is based, 55 percent of the employees are white, 15 percent are Asian, 11 percent are Hispanic and only 7 percent are black...

In an interview, Mr. Jackson said he was glad that Mr. Cook had chosen to reveal the report under his signature. He said the publication of diversity reports by Apple and the other tech companies was a step in the right direction. In the fall, he plans to hold a public forum, which will include the tech companies that have disclosed diversity data, to talk about a plan of action to help close the diversity gap.

“We think Silicon Valley is the fastest growing industry in America,” he said. “We must be forward-thinking and inclusive in ways we have not been before.”"

MLB names Bean its first Ambassador for Inclusion: Former player to provide guidance, training in support of LGBT community in baseball; MLB.com, 7/15/14

Alyson Footer, MLB.com; MLB names Bean its first Ambassador for Inclusion: Former player to provide guidance, training in support of LGBT community in baseball:

"One year after Major League Baseball issued a policy prohibiting players from harassing and discriminating against others players based on their sexual orientation, Commissioner Bud Selig appointed former outfielder Billy Bean as MLB's first Ambassador for Inclusion.

The announcement was made on Tuesday at the T-Mobile All-Star FanFest, following Selig's annual Town Hall Chat on the set of the MLB.com stage at the Minneapolis Convention Center.

Selig and Bean were accompanied by Lutha Burke, the sister of the late former Major League outfielder Glenn Burke.

In his new role, Bean, who made public that he is gay in 1999, will provide guidance and training related to efforts to support those in the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community throughout Major League Baseball. He will work with Major and Minor League Clubs to encourage equal opportunity in accordance with the joint MLB-MLBPA Workplace Code of Conduct.

Bean also will develop educational training initiatives against sexism, homophobia and prejudice, and he will be present at annual industry events, including the Winter Meetings and the MLB-MLBPA Rookie Career Development Program.

"Diversity is a hallmark of our sport, which is fortunate to have an inherent ability to bring people together," Selig said. "The people of our sport have a responsibility to act with a kind of respect and sensitivity that our game's diverse players, employees and fans deserve.

"I wish that our game had someone in place to whom Billy and Glenn could have turned when they played; a friend, listener, a source of support. That's why I am so delighted to make this announcement today."...

Yogi Berra, behind the support of his museum and learning center in New Jersey, is an ambassador of Athlete Ally, and former manager and current MLB executive Joe Torre also offered his public endorsement, signing the Athlete Ally pledge to "respect and welcome all persons, regardless of their perceived or actual sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression."

And it all begins with education and enlightenment."

Posthumous Recognition: M.L.B. to Recognize Glenn Burke as Baseball’s Gay Pioneer; New York Times, 7/14/14

John Branch, New York Times; Posthumous Recognition: M.L.B. to Recognize Glenn Burke as Baseball’s Gay Pioneer:

"Glenn Burke was 27 when he walked out on Major League Baseball, his promising career as an outfielder undone mostly by the burden of being a semicloseted gay man. It was 1980, and it was more important, Burke later explained, to be himself than to be a professional baseball player.

“It’s harder to be gay in sports than anywhere else, except maybe president,” Burke said in 1982, when he came out publicly in an Inside Sports magazine article. “Baseball is probably the hardest sport of all.”

More than three decades later, and nearly 20 years after Burke’s death, Major League Baseball still has not had an active player publicly disclose that he is gay. There probably are several gay men currently playing, but the sport awaits its Robbie Rogers, its Jason Collins, its Michael Sam.

In the meantime, Major League Baseball is trying to ease the way for those surely to come. As part of a concerted effort to demonstrate an atmosphere of tolerance and inclusion, the league invited Burke’s family to Tuesday’s All-Star Game in Minneapolis — its first official recognition of Burke’s early role in a movement just now gaining traction across the sports landscape.

“He was a pioneer, and should be recognized,” Pat Courtney, a Major League Baseball spokesman, said....

“People are missing out when they decide to let a segment of our society not be what they can truly be,” Lutha Burke said.

But the past couple of years have seen a surge in coming-out stories in sports, as gay athletes recognize a shifting, friendlier environment. Major League Baseball, without an out active player, has decided that it should not idly wait. For more than a year, the league has worked with Athlete Ally, a group with a mission to stamp out homophobia in sports."

The Lost and Found Legacy of Barbara Ringer: Remembering one of the architects of American copyright law—and one of the legal world's pioneering women; Atlantic, 7/11/14

Amanda Levendowski, Atlantic; The Lost and Found Legacy of Barbara Ringer: Remembering one of the architects of American copyright law—and one of the legal world's pioneering women:

"Almost as soon as she joined the Copyright Office, Ringer set about updating the 1909 Copyright Law, an effort that had been tabled due to World War II. She reignited interest in reform, and spent more than two decades proposing legislation, negotiating among copyright owners, and lobbying Congress. She drafted most of the bill by herself.

Ringer’s efforts brought United States copyright law—previously, one that had been passed before the advent of commercial radio, television, and copyright machines—into the modern era. To the chagrin of many, her legislation sparked the trend in expanding copyright protection. The 1976 Copyright Act extended the length of copyright protection, from 28 years under the 1909 Copyright Act to the lifetime of the author plus 50 years. Her efforts also codified the fair-use doctrine, which permits some unlicensed and unauthorized uses of copyrighted works.

And, at her insistence, the Copyright Act used both “he” and “she,” making it one of the first pieces of federal legislation to include dual gender pronouns."

How diversity actually makes us smarter; Washington Post, 7/6/14

Gregory Rodriguez, Washington Post; How diversity actually makes us smarter:

"Successful navigation of this country’s diversity has always required extra thought, and more brainpower. The more diverse the location, the more brainpower required by the people who live there.

In more homogenous parishes, towns, states and countries, residents aren’t necessarily obliged to take that extra intellectual step. In places where the overwhelming majority of residents share a common background, they are more likely to maintain an unspoken consensus about the meaning of institutions and practices. That consensus, Dutch philosopher Bart van Leeuwen reminds us, is enforced “through sayings and jokes, in ways of speaking and moving, and in subtle facial expressions that betray surprise or recognition.” In other words, the way things are is so self-evident that they don’t require a second thought.

Diversity, however, requires second thoughts. When the consensus is challenged in a homogenous place by the presence of new people, things get interesting. The familiar signs and symbols that undergird our implicit understanding of the world can change in meaning. The presence of conflicting worldviews causes confusion, uncertainty, and alienation for holdovers and newcomers alike. These feelings can either cause people to draw back into themselves — or force them to articulate and justify themselves to those who don’t share their view of the world. Or both...

So it should follow that operating in a diverse environment makes you smarter. Not that that makes it any easier. Diversity doesn’t require us simply to learn how to celebrate our differences. It requires us to tax our brains by questioning our worldviews, our beliefs and our institutions."

Want to Brainstorm New Ideas? Then Limit Your Online Connections; New York Times, 7/4/14

Steve Lohr, New York Times; Want to Brainstorm New Ideas? Then Limit Your Online Connections:

"Clustering reduced the diversity of ideas.

The research paper, said Jesse Shore, a co-author and assistant professor at the Boston University School of Management, contributes to “the growing awareness that being connected all the time has costs. And we put a number to it, in an experimental setting.”

The research, of course, also showed where the connection paid off — finding information, the vital first step in decision making. “There are huge, huge benefits to information sharing,” said Ethan Bernstein, a co-author and assistant professor at the Harvard Business School. “But the costs are harder to measure.”

The virtues and drawbacks of connectedness, Mr. Bernstein added, vary according to the context. “It depends on whether the task is information sharing or information interpretation,” he said.

The research was just one experiment in a lab, but it does point to the larger subject of striking a balance between connectedness and isolation in the digital age.

“The connection facilitates the search and discovery process,” said David Lazer, a co-author and professor of political science and computer science at Northeastern University. “Then, you need isolation for most creative thinking.""

Program aims to attract black males into teaching: Teens encouraged to join the profession; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 7/4/14

Eric Boodman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; Program aims to attract black males into teaching: Teens encouraged to join the profession:

"Less than 2 percent of teachers in the U.S. are African-American males, according to Robert Millward, education professor at IUP. To try to increase those numbers, Mr. Millward started the Black Men Teaching Initiative, which led to the teens, male and female, from Homewood Children's Village attending a workshop at IUP.

Through workshops such as this one, billboards on buses and changes in admissions policies, professors and administrators at IUP, California University of Pennsylvania, Point Park University and Community College of Allegheny County are trying to persuade young black men to pursue higher education and to become teachers. The second task is more difficult than the first, Mr. Millward explained...

The organizers of the Black Men Teaching Initiative hope that providing African-American middle and high school students with mentors and role models will create a snowball effect. Stanley Denton, the professor in charge of the initiative at Point Park University, remembers being stared at as he walked the halls of Pittsburgh schools as the district's director of multicultural education...

While outside education experts applaud the effort, they also warn against viewing an increase in the numbers as the only solution. "It can't be seen as a panacea," Mr. Milner said. He mentioned inequitable funding, inadequate resources and under-qualified teachers as hurdles that can trip up black students, regardless of the number of black male teachers.

"Black male teachers can serve as role models, especially for black male students, but what are we going to do to support black male teachers who take on these other layers of responsibility?" he asked."