First article (from 2018) I came across adds relevant context:




It seems this has been in the works for some time now.

If not a policy like what the union and district have agreed upon, how do you propose they increase qualified minority educator retention to bridge the massive underrepresentation gap and the consequences for underperforming students?

Or does that gap not matter, in your opinion?

I don't love the idea of considering skin color in hiring or firing decisions, at all. But if the primary goal is to educate children and prepare them for success in life, and not simply to preserve as many white teaching jobs as possible, and the evidence suggests that districts with more minority children will perform better with more minority teachers, I'm not sure how you ignore that and maintain the status quo.

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The devil made me do it the first time, second time I done it on my own - W

Doubtless many well educated individuals would defend this position, particularly those whose viewpoint is driven by the best interests of the students.

There's a mountain of evidence (mostly derived from the USA, so I'm sure you're aware of it) that students perform better (on every metric) when the demographics of the teaching force approximates that of the student body. If not, at the minimum, students from minority groups will perform better when there is at least one teacher from that minority group. This might not the way the world should be, but there is compelling empirical evidence that it is how the world is.

The observation is so strong that it is the basis for a counter-intuitive objection to the results of school integration in the US South. Data shows that many black kids performed worse when shifted from "black" schools with a predominantly black student body and predominantly black teaching cohort, to "integrated" schools with a majority white student body and 100% white teaching staff. In fact (as I'm sure you are also aware) there are many documented cases where under the forced integration of schools, black teachers were sacked, not because of seniority or skills, but in deference to racist white parents who did not want little Windy-Bob taught by black teachers. As a result, the under representation of minorities in the teaching profession was made far worse, and has not recovered.

The effects of this have been so damaging, and are now so well understood, that many school districts have been undertaking enormous efforts to attract and retain more minority teachers, and achieve a more balanced faculty. Of course, even when they succeed in this, the newly recruited teachers will have less seniority, and be more vulnerable to retrenchments based only on seniority if required, thus undoing these efforts. That is why the agreement you refer to both acknowledges that layoffs will generally respect seiority, but can also consider if a teacher is a member of an underrepresented population. It is an attempt to "To remedy the continuing effects of past discrimination" and is done for the benefit of the affected students.

There's no need to be "mentally disturbed" to acknowledge a defence of that policy. It only takes a knowledge of US race history and its ongoing impacts, coupled with a willingness to do something to address that.

My only interest is as a parent of school kids from the other side of the world, yet I'm aware of the nuances of this issue. Your only interest is to be a far-right troll. Its not surprising that our takes on this, as almost everything, are a world apart.

It’s not. It’s racist. Just like CRT. Just like 1619. Just like BLM.

The state and the teachers union are looking at the wrong side of the equation. Instead of finding ways to get more minority teachers into the school in the beginning, they are culling at the end. And proposing the culling based on race. Yuck. What they need it to incentivize minority students to become teachers. Provide scholarships and recruit to their target base. Work with local colleges and universities to find talent and get them in the profession.

If this policy were to be put in place in a predominately white school district where minority students represented, say 5% of the student population, and there were 10% minority based teachers, the backlash to a similar policy would be strong. And rightfully so. It should be equally strong when the policies are anti-race of any race.

In the end, with a teacher shortage hitting the States that'll be here for the foreseeable future, it's unlikely that the policy in the OP will be enacted. Most schools are desperate for warm bodies of any race, any creed, or (in Florida's case) any level of education past the 3rd grade. Unless, of course, they continue the trend of cutting education budgets, which isn't out of the question.

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Take a short break from ST and read my blog:
http://tri-banter.blogspot.com/

I don't understand how that could hold up in court. He seems like blatant race-based discrimination in hiring/firing.

Coming back to LR from stormfront I see? Life too easy over there?

It holds up in court because being white is not a protected class. Now if they were firing women to hire men of color or firing old to hire younger teachers of color then they would have a problem.

torrey wrote:

It holds up in court because being white is not a protected class. Now if they were firing women to hire men of color or firing old to hire younger teachers of color then they would have a problem.

Is that true? I thought employers were not allowed to discriminate based on race, not just if it was a minority?

https://www.eeoc.gov/...crimination-faqs#Q10


That doesn't say anything about it not applying to whites.

A less suspect way of doing it would be to offer better retirement/ buy outs to white teachers but I also suspect that would invite lawsuits as well.

Invert the situation. A bunch of white people move into a black town and decide to fire black teachers so there are more white teachers.

Either way it is straight up discrimination based on race.

I am still surprised any lawyers were like, yeah this'll fly no problem.

Ya think

Which invites another question.

For hiring has the district essentially put out a whites need not apply sign?

The amount of money they're going to piss away on lawsuits and settlements would probably offset the amount needed to not fire people

I'm not quoting your posit simply for readability.

The article claims 33% students of color throughout the state and 66% in Minneapolis. But the quick search I just did shows MN demographics having whites as ~80-83% of the population statewide and ~61% whites in Minneapolis.

Thats a cursory search but still has the populations of students of color well below the 33% or 66% marks.



Whenever these discussions come up I think about application numbers. While I realize X percentage of the students are of color/minority they will represents 100% of the families that must send kids through education. So 100% of the children must go through the schools but not 100% of the families will go into a single job sector.

I haven't looked yet, but Id be curious of the employment demographics. Article said over the last 8 years MN has licensed and hired ONLY 1600 educators of color. Alone, what does that number show us? How many pursued education? How many applied?

There was the thread in the other forum about getting triathlon participation numbers up for minorities. I just don't know what the numbers show.

The context is nice, and it's laudable to want to influence the hiring and retention of a diverse teaching cadre, especially if that has been demonstrated to result in better educational outcomes. But racial discrimination is not an acceptable means of achieving the desired ends.

If there's a concern about defaulting to seniority, then maybe layoff based on classroom results or performance appraisals. Making a firing decision that relies substantially on the race of the teacher can't possibly pass a Constitutional discrimination test.

Right now, we have a massive shortage of teachers nationwide. I'm not sure how Minneapolis is doing, but I'll assume they're in the same boat as everywhere else, so this may not actually be tested any time soon. But I'd be shocked and very disappointed if it stood up to any judicial scrutiny.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

Tucker was right, they are trying to replace us!

I was on a diversity committee about a decade ago at another university, where we were tasked with figuring out how to get more black professors since we lived in an area with pretty high percentage of black people and very few working as faculty at the University. It never went anywhere, not really much to you can do when you get so few applicants who are black because there just aren't that many black people out there getting advanced degrees.

We have a similar issue in our student applicants. If we accepted every minority applicant we get, we'd still not be reflective of nation-wide race percentages. The ironic thing is we tend to get a number of white students from the west coast who apply, at least according to them, because there are too many strong Asian students taking up many of the slots at west coast Universities.

Remember, there are lots of old white people no longer of school age. Also, lots on non-white folks having children that are coming into school age so that likely explains why school age population and overall population percentages do not match for the state and Minneapolis as a whole.

Also, not sure how the school district calculated their students of color but would assume it is an actual number. If true, it should be noted that the population of white students in the city proper might lean heavier to going to private school rather than public school (lots of high end condos downtown and expensive homes around the lakes and all). So again, that could be a reason you have a higher percentage of the total population of students in the Minneapolis area as white while less are white in the Minneapolis public schools.

Just curious if anyone has any good ideas on how school districts could work on increasing the number of minority teachers in their ranks? You know, quit bitching about this solution unless you have some ideas that are better?

My 17 year old is starting at a "feeder" CC in CA because she wasn't accepted at UCLA or UC Irvine. Being a HS valedictorian didn't offset blonde hair, blue eyes and a Scandinavian last name. Luckily, it just adds fuel to the fire to kick butt academically.

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I saw this on a white board in a window box at my daughters middle school...
List of what life owes you:
1. __________
2. __________
3. __________

Huh? I thought that California didn't have race based admissions anymore? Did I miss something?

Quote:

“It makes very clear that we do not engage nor will we engage in race-based quotas and caps,” Board of Regents Chairman John A. Pérez said of the new policy. “This puts this on the record squarely.”

Yea this is what I was thinking was the likely scenario. I was just trying to square that much of a difference in school-aged pop/families. I know Minneapolis and St. Paul are two of the cities with the largest minority populations.

With a teaching shortage it really seems to be a discussion about how to we encourage diversity in pursuing education IF this is something that needs to be fixed. I say IF because I have no idea if its necessary/realistic to make every industry representative of the population breakdowns. Some industries are heavily slanted compared to others.

Yes, The Trump administration did bring a lawsuit against Yale saying their admissions was biased against whites and Asians but the DOJ later dropped it.

My question was about California. I was under the impression that they no longer factored race into admissions.

Based on what I saw in our public schools, I agree with your second paragraph. The ethnic stats of public school students in some locations might seem skewed given the number of "wealthy" white parents who choose the option of sending their kids to private schools.

We have a significant black and a large hispanic population in our area. There are relatively few minority teachers (and even fewer administrators) in our public schools. I don't think the teachers short changed their minority students as far a how they taught and how they treated their students. However, the lack of teachers/administrators as role models for minority students could be a problem. "Why would I want to become a teacher? It's just for white people."

Hiring or retaining people to teach who can't do the job isn't the answer. But if a district has too many teachers and they're going to have to lay off/furlough/early retire/etc some of their teachers, there needs to be a procedure in place. For districts where there are relatively few minority teachers compared to the student population, keeping their qualified minority teachers should be a priority,

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"Human existence is based upon two pillars: Compassion and knowledge. Compassion without knowledge is ineffective; Knowledge without compassion is inhuman." Victor Weisskopf.

Shrugs shoulders...
Sometimes there is a difference between de jure and de facto.
As far as the UC admissions system goes, I'm not able to lift up the hood and see what things are really like.

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I saw this on a white board in a window box at my daughters middle school...
List of what life owes you:
1. __________
2. __________
3. __________

This is an interesting situation. The school admits to past discrimination.

"To remedy the continuing effects of past discrimination, Minneapolis Public Schools and the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT) mutually agreed to contract language that aims to support the recruitment and retention of teachers from underrepresented groups as compared to the labor market and to the community served by the school district," a spokesperson for Minneapolis Public Schools told TND in a statement.

It is safe to assume that they have hired a number of minority teachers in response. And since they just got around to hiring minorities, those people will have less seniority.

Let's use round numbers and approximations. Say they have 1000 teachers. Prior to stopping their past discrimination lets say 10 were minorities or 1%. They get caught discriminating and in their next 50 hires they bring in 30 minorities. And now they have approx. 4% of their teachers as minorities. It just so happens the next year they decide (whether correctly or nefariously) they need to lay off 50 teachers and do it by seniority. After getting rid of the last 50 hired incredibly they are back to 1% minority teachers.


I'm not a huge fan of how they are doing this. I feel like there should be a better way. But I admit I am not seeing an easy one off the top of my head.


If they have historically discriminated against minorities, have a workforce that is very heavily weighted towards the majority, and frequently go through cycles of hiring, laying off, recalling, etc. how do you not immediately get back to the discriminatory levels they had before when the hires you made to fix the prior levels are the first laid off? Giving extra money to get people to retire early seems like paying the people who benefitted from the prior discrimination even more for having benefitted from it.

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I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

I'm not so sure that is saying the school district admits to discriminatory hiring practices or that they are just referring to past discrimination in society general? They very well may have been but it's been illegal to discriminate based on race in hiring since 1964, so getting close to 60 years ago.

Which would be a reason to put a policy like this in place. Make this concession or be sued.

Yes, I am making assumptions. As is everyone because the articles are meant to enrage. This contract was collectively bargained, presumably with white people in the union as well. There had to be a reason for them to ratify it. Unless the union was suddenly made up with minority teachers being in the majority there had to be a reason the white teachers went along with it too.

We aren't getting that explanation because the people putting this out there want Windy to be mad.

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I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

I don't know how the hired teachers would know if discrimination took place? At least when I was on the school board, it was us and the Superintendent who did the hiring. They would need access to the applicant records over the years to know, correct?

That is pretty much always the case with discriminatory hiring practices. And that is why they are hard to prove. It is really really hard, short of a lawsuit with discovery, to know who was in the applicant pool. I just went out to my old high school. They have one hispanic teacher (ETA - I just noticed she teaches Spanish, which made me laugh but I am not sure why) out of around 25 or 30 staff. I'm not sure they have ever had an African American teacher. But given the location and the demographics of the area I wouldn't be surprised if there has never been an African American applicant. So no minority teachers isn't proof of discrimination by itself. But at some point you need to look at how they are recruiting too. Only posting jobs in Blonde Scandinavians Weekly would be an issue for instance.

But in a large school district looking around the staff room would be a good start.

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I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

“Yes, I am making assumptions. As is everyone because the articles are meant to enrage. This contract was collectively bargained, presumably with white people in the union as well. There had to be a reason for them to ratify it.”

Two quick points.

One, the article appeared to be produced by a mainstream local network news site, though I’ll admit I didn’t scrutinize very closely. It did not appear to sensationalize, though it was thin on context (reference the article I posted in my first response).

Two, I don’t know the legal implications of a collective bargaining agreement that implements race based policies like this. I can see the district getting sued to high heaven if it were not a collectively agreed upon policy, but I don’t know if that in and of itself obviates the possibility of disgruntled union members taking it to court. My assumption in general is that state or federal law supersedes these agreements if a dispute is brought to the court, but again, not my wheelhouse.

I do understand the rationale behind it and I assume good intentions. I hate that it sorts out by race and not merit, but then I also hate our long established history of the same calculus being used to keep African Americans out of the education workforce.

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The devil made me do it the first time, second time I done it on my own - W

"I hate that it sorts out by race and not merit, but then I also hate our long established history of the same calculus being used to keep African Americans out of the education workforce."

This is pretty much exactly where I am.

As well as bieng right there with you wanting more context and information.

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I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

If I remember the text correctly, they've collectively agreed that in the event of a layoff, working from least to most experienced, they would retain the minority teacher and lay off the next non-minority teacher instead. I don't know how that plays out if the next five in line are minorities as well.

I assume all teachers are considered to be competent with satisfactory performance evaluations, so merit doesn't really play a factor.

If meeting the needs of students is the primary goal, then how is time in the system assumed to be the primary consideration? The collective agreement certainly changes the status quo in that regard. I think we need to temper that reflex somewhat and think about what's best for the students, not what's best for the teachers, or white educators.

I'm not saying that is the correct answer, I'm saying I'm willing to examine the problem through a different lens, one that prioritizes students over employees. And in that paradigm, I understand the decision.

Is it unfair to white educators with equally good performance reviews and history of service? Yes. Should that be the determinant? I don't know. Possibly not.

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The devil made me do it the first time, second time I done it on my own - W

I will find it incredibly funny if the organization teachers have created to protect them no matter what turns on them.

I hope every teachers union in the country implements this.

Employers have some room to use affirmative action to remedy prior discrimination. And, that’s what they’re saying here: the most senior people were hired at a time of racial discrimination. But, this agreement looks way too blunt to survive a lawsuit. There might be nuanced ways to consider whether an employee was once the beneficiary of discrimination, but this agreement does not even try to be nuanced about it.

Might say more about your school district and students, than UCLA or UC Irvine selection process. Was her ACT score 30 or higher? How many extra circulars did she do? and on and on and on

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Just Triing
Triathlete since 9:56:39 AM EST Aug 20, 2006.
Be kind English is my 2nd language. My primary language is Dave it's a unique evolution of English.

so here is the line in the contract

However, in the case that a teacher is “a member of a population underrepresented among licensed teachers in the District,” the district may “excess,” meaning lay off or relocate, “outside of seniority order.”

What I want to know is does the contract describe population description. I mean you could argue that white males between 5'2" and 5'3" with red hair is an underrepresented population.

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Just Triing
Triathlete since 9:56:39 AM EST Aug 20, 2006.
Be kind English is my 2nd language. My primary language is Dave it's a unique evolution of English.

Wouldn't they have to demonstrate that prior discrimination in court with some sort of data if an employee sued them? Even the oldest employees were almost certainly hired after the Civil Rights Act.

Not able to lift the hood, but comfortable enough to blame your daughter’s denials on blonde hair, blue eyes, and a Scandinavian last name? That’s a bold strategy, Cotton.

We should not temper the reflex so much that we violate the Constitutional rights of white educators. It's great to seek the best outcome for the students, but we do so within the left and right boundaries of our guiding legal documents.

You don't fix racial discrimination by applying more racial discrimination.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

Not blaming, observing and commenting, yes.
I'm certain that their are reason(s) why, but find it odd that she had classmates with weaker CV and did get accepted.
I haven't the wherewithal to examine what really goes on in the admissions department, do you?
All said and done, it will work out great.
Nothing too bold, really. But thanks.

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I saw this on a white board in a window box at my daughters middle school...
List of what life owes you:
1. __________
2. __________
3. __________

Asians are "white" for college admissions purposes

I always knew teachers' unions were out to get me

UC schools aren't doing standardized tests these days (and a 30? Puh-lease)

Good questions, ACT and SAT are no longer used. Class rank is a big driver, grades, etc. To be fair, Covid has created a significant backlog of students now wanting to enter into various colleges; so, the pool (at least for some schools) is quite large. They have to limit the numbers of freshman more than a "normal" year. She's not the only kid with a strong CV that's frustrated, that's for sure.

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I saw this on a white board in a window box at my daughters middle school...
List of what life owes you:
1. __________
2. __________
3. __________

Did any blonde hair, blue eyes, Scandinavian women get accepted?

But good for her to take the CC route with a positive attitude. I had quite a few students who went that route and with an aggressive attitude they seemed to do better than some of the students who simply fell into a 4-year college.

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"Human existence is based upon two pillars: Compassion and knowledge. Compassion without knowledge is ineffective; Knowledge without compassion is inhuman." Victor Weisskopf.

It actually doesn’t take that much effort. If you do a little bit bit of research you’ll find that race does not factor into California state school admissions. You will also find that income does.

Yes. They would not need to prove that a specific white teacher was hired due to racial discrimination back in the day, but they would need to prove that there was fairly pervasive discrimination back then.

They collude with Binny's to make you drink more.

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I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

Does she row by any chance? There may be an opening on the team.

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I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

For years we've argued our program's diversity is represented by rural, first in family to attend college students. That being said it does seem like we are getting a few more non-white students the last couple of years.

Homeschool