I am now a retired schoolteacher. I first heard about diversity in multiples of my grad school classes. There I was taught the idea that black children learned best from a black teacher. I was horrified. As a teacher who happened to be white, I worked incredibly hard to reach and teach all my students. My last teaching assignment was chemistry in a title one school that was traditionally an African-American school. First day of class, what did I see? A room full of black faces. What did my students see? A middle-aged white guy. After one week of classes, what did I see? My students. What did my students see? Their teacher.
A couple of weeks ago, I had the opportunity to speak to a large class of first year medical students. I looked and saw a former student. We had a great meeting. During our question-and-answer session, he shared with the entire class that he chose medical school because of me. How honored I was to have made that impact and the color of our different skins made no difference.
The Oppressor class always seeks to defend itself. Statistics indicate that while you had one black student excel enough to get to med school, they are and have been for decades much further behind than Asians and Hispanics on STEM scores. And the reason is obviously because they have not had the benefit of teachers that look like them and can relate to them on a way the Oppressor cannot. The solution is simple; Affinity based classes where the teachers look like the students.
I am now a retired schoolteacher. I first heard about diversity in multiples of my grad school classes. There I was taught the idea that black children learned best from a black teacher. I was horrified. As a teacher who happened to be white, I worked incredibly hard to reach and teach all my students. My last teaching assignment was chemistry in a title one school that was traditionally an African-American school. First day of class, what did I see? A room full of black faces. What did my students see? A middle-aged white guy. After one week of classes, what did I see? My students. What did my students see? Their teacher.
A couple of weeks ago, I had the opportunity to speak to a large class of first year medical students. I looked and saw a former student. We had a great meeting. During our question-and-answer session, he shared with the entire class that he chose medical school because of me. How honored I was to have made that impact and the color of our different skins made no difference.
The Oppressor class always seeks to defend itself. Statistics indicate that while you had one black student excel enough to get to med school, they are and have been for decades much further behind than Asians and Hispanics on STEM scores. And the reason is obviously because they have not had the benefit of teachers that look like them and can relate to them on a way the Oppressor cannot. The solution is simple; Affinity based classes where the teachers look like the students.