Diversity

US Cities Need More Diverse Teachers; Philadelphia Has An Answer

May 7, 2025 Michelle Palmer and Sharif El-Mekki, Next City. Create! Diversity, Education, Philadelphia, Public schools, Schools, Teachers, workforce development

Public education is at a crossroads. Federal funds for public education have been threatened over the Trump administration’s war on DEI. Mental health funds for schools have been cut. The federal government’s move to slash AmeriCorps programs is already hitting classrooms in low-income ZIP codes hard. And all the while, teacher shortages continue to rise, and stark disparities in educational opportunities persist. The future of our students depends on how we invest in and support our educators, especially teachers of color, who face systemic barriers to recruitment and retention despite their vital role in student success.

FSU Students Crash President McCullough’s Ice Cream Social

April 6, 2025 Fight Back! News. Resist! Diversity, Florida, Free Speech, Higher Education

Tallahassee, FL – On Thursday, April 3, Students for a Democratic Society crashed the FSU president’s ice cream social, demanding answers about the university's subservience to President Trump’s and Governor Desantis’ attacks on DEI initiatives and free speech. Four members of SDS approached President Richard McCullough with a banner reading “Fight Trump and the GOP agenda! Stand with Palestine! Stop attacks on immigrants! Defend women’s and LGBTQ+ rights!” After waiting in line for ice cream, SDS member JJ Glueck was refused service by McCullough. The president hid behind student volunteers upon seeing SDS.

Individualism Is Making Public Transit Worse

February 11, 2024 Jarrett Walker, Next City. Create! Diversity, Public Transit, Transportation, Urban Design

When you complain that transit doesn’t start where you want it to start, doesn’t end where you want it to end, and doesn’t go all the time, you’re describing inadequate public transit. With adequate funding and in the context of good city planning, public transit can do all of these things for vast numbers of people, though not for everyone and possibly not for Elon Musk. But Musk’s other point is fundamental. Public transit does expose us to a bunch of random strangers, and this is its superpower. In the most effective public transit, different people with different purposes and destinations find the same vehicle useful at the same time. At its most successful, a transit system’s ridership is as diverse as the city or community it serves.

The Tampa Five: An Assault On Free Speech

August 28, 2023 Stephen F. Eisenman, Counter Punch. Educate! Diversity, Florida, Free Speech, Police abuse, Tampa Five

On March 6, 2023, a small group of protesters belonging to the University of South Florida chapter of Students for a Democratic Society, trooped across campus to the Patel Center where the university president, Rhea Law has her office. The marchers were mostly young women carrying nothing more sinister than a megaphone, a banner reading “we want increased Black enrollment” and the water bottles ubiquitous among students on Florida campuses. In addition to their demands for higher Black enrollment, they wanted President Law to speak out in opposition to proposed Florida HB999 which banned diversity initiatives, and a meeting with her.

The WGA Strike Is More Than An Issue Of Pay

May 14, 2023 Jireh Deng, In These Times. Resist! Diversity, Hollywood, Strikes, Workers Rights and Jobs, Writers

When Caroline Renard moved to Los Angeles 10 years ago, she had zero connections to Hollywood. But she was determined all the same to break into the industry and did all sorts of side gigs — from working at Veggie Grill to driving for DoorDash and Lyft to babysitting — all to pay the bills while she worked on her craft. And that hard work eventually paid off. She moved up from production assistant on set to an executive assistant at Disney before becoming a writer’s and showrunner’s assistant until she became a staff writer on a show. But throughout that decade breaking into Hollywood, she oftentimes noticed she was one of the few or only Black women in the room.

What Journalism Needs Is Not More Diversity, But Less White Supremacy

June 21, 2020 Janine Jackson, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting. Create! Black Working Class, Diversity, Media, White Supremacy

As police violence against Black people and those who would rise in their defense forces a national engagement—of a sort—with the reality of white supremacy in our institutions, the widening recognition that the batons and tear gas are just one part of it, that there is more than one way to choke the life out of a people, meant that it was just a matter of time before news media would need to acknowledge the call coming from inside the house. So we have the week just past—wherein we learned that numerous powerful media figures have not just tweeted, joked or dressed up as…but have enforced policies and practices and pay differentials that, deepbreath, do not reflect the values they now hold, they now understand to be deeply hurtful, they only wish they’d been alerted to sooner, they are taking time to reflect deeply upon, they are committed to doing better about going forward, they look forward to be challenged on, and about which, heaven only knows, they are listening.

The Con Of Diversity

July 9, 2018 Chris Hedges, Truthdig.com Educate! Diversity, History

In 1970, when black students occupied the dean’s office at Harvard Divinity School to protest against the absence of African-American scholars on the school’s faculty, the white administration was forced to respond and interview black candidates. It asked James Cone, the greatest theologian of his generation, to come to Cambridge, Mass., for a meeting. But the white power structure had no intention of offering Cone a job. To be black, in its eyes, was bad enough. To be black, brilliant and fiercely independent was unpalatable. And so the job was given to a pliable African-American candidate who had never written a book, a condition that would remain unchanged for the more than three decades he taught at Harvard.

Diversity Revolt At The Wall Street Journal

March 29, 2017 Nathan McAlone, www.businessinsider.com Create! Diversity, Journalism, Wall Street Journal

By Nathan McAlone for Business Insider - Reporters and editors at The Wall Street Journal have signed a letter to management expressing concern about the roles of women and people of color in the newsroom. "Diversity in the newsroom is good for business and good for our coverage," says the letter, which was obtained by Business Insider. "We would like to see The Journal undertake a more comprehensive, intentional and transparent approach to improving it." The letter comes at a time of dissent at The Journal, when leadership has been internally criticized for being soft on President Donald Trump, and over a year after the employees' union published details of pay disparities in the newsroom.

Diversity Is Not Enough And, Done Alone, It Can Be Counterproductive

February 14, 2017 Jacqueline Patterson, www.huffingtonpost.com Strategize! Diversity, Racism

By Jacqueline Patterson for The Huffington Post - Three days ago I had yet another conversation where well-intended, but poorly implemented diversification efforts have fallen short and resulted in harm. I’ve either directly experienced, or have been the listening ear for, way too many stories of lamentation from the sole person of color employee, board member, steering committee/advisory group member, coalition member, or even panelist/speaker in various environmental organizations/coalitions/settings. The divisions in our society, exposed and rubbed raw by recent events, urgently call for a deeper level of intent and action on building processes, organizations, movements, and systems that are rooted in anti-racism and anti-oppression.

After Days Of Protests, Students Occupy Building At Occidental College

November 18, 2015 Jason Song and Teresa Watanabe, www.latimes.com Resist! Diversity, Higher Education, Student Protests

By Jason Song and Teresa Watanabe for Los Angeles Times - After several days of protesting Occidental College's handling of diversity issues, students occupied an administrative building Monday, demanding that the school president step down if officials don't take such steps as creating a black studies major and hiring more minority faculty. The actions come after weeks of student protests throughout the nation, including at the University of Missouri, where the president and chancellor resigned, and Ithaca College in upstate New York and Yale University.

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