WSESU Diversity/Equity Committee minutes- October 8, 2010
Present: Mary Goodemote, Scott Tabachnick, Ron Stahley, David Schoales, Stuart Strothman, Nancy Johnston, Mikhaela Simms, Curtiss Reed, Andy Davis
Absent: Carole Rayl, Green Street, EES, Academy
Approved minutes of September 10.
Ideas for new meetings. We discussed the Maniac Magee archtype of the white protagonist, and some of the problems with this narrative. We discussed the need to study the rubric we’ve used for judging books for sexism, racism, and classicism. Karen will show us this document in November.
Paul Gorsky’s critique of Ruby Payne’s work helps to bring together some powerful insights on bias in textbooks.
Stuart will present PRIDE again in December.
Mary suggested meaningful inclusion as a topic for January…she will present some case studies in January. A wide variety of lenses/perspectives on this topic.
We discussed posting our agenda and action plan and inviting others from the community to attend our meetings for a learning process.
We would like more participation from district schools, currently unrepresented.
October 29—Undoing Racism workshop by Partnership for Fairness and Diversity. Also Thorne Gallery Af-Am history and culture photo exhibit.
Discussed articles relating to hiring practices and diversity. Various issues. Census data dubious, extrapolated from employment occupational categories. Vermont data skewed. Phone survey in 2007 saw a jump in licensed minorities in the classroom in Vt, from 40 to 60. 40 of the 63 supervisory unions responded to the survey. First year teachers are more likely to leave. Nationwide the percentage dropped dramatically, even as other areas opened up. Here in WSESU the staff doesn’t change so much, even as the minority population increases. Retirements will help a bit, but we have one of the lowest percentages of minority staff in the entire country. We should try to lead our push for diversity by example—by modeling a diverse workforce. The challenge around the state has to do with attitudes of school boards and administrators, and also hiring committees who are comfortable with what is known. Not just recruiting fairs, but internal factors need to be looked at to address this issue. Studies show that most people are moderate in their view of the importance of diversity. One view is that if the population isn’t represented, then we have a moral obligation to make that a comparable distribution. The argument isn’t necessarily social/moral, but economic. Our workforce is underprepared to be effective in a multicultural marketplace. How can we ensure the economic survival of our grandchildren? Not with a Eurocentric staff. Students need experience with different cultures. Studies show that all students benefit from a diverse pool of teachers. School Spring is a tool we use, that has a national, broad search…this brings in large numbers of applicants, with many (a third?) unqualified.
Two specific suggestions: We can bring materials from Burlington—recruitment questionnaires. Also, we can train hiring committees.
Maybe we could get our schools to become a training site for education programs for students from diverse schools. UMass? We have tried this, but we’d like to look again. The easiest piece is getting a diverse candidate pool…the hard part is taking it to the final interviews. The implicit bias tends to narrow the pool unfairly. We discussed bringing in principals Feb 2 to discuss this issue, and preparing tools.