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Howard University, a historically black institution located in Washington, D.C., will open a branch located within Google's campus/HQ in Mountain View, California:
Silicon Valley's leading tech companies have long been stumped over how to diversify. Despite efforts to recruit and retain black and Latino engineers, the numbers haven't budged much, if at all. Google is trying a new tack. The company announced Thursday it is creating a college campus at its Mountain View headquarters that's geared toward students at historically black colleges and universities.
The campus, called Howard West, will launch this summer in partnership with Howard University of Washington, D.C. About 25 to 30 rising Howard juniors and seniors majoring in computer science will qualify for the program's first 12-week program, which will be taught by senior Google engineers and Howard faculty. "Howard West will continue Howard's tradition of providing historically unprecedented access to opportunity, only now with a 21st century twist: Literal real estate at the center of the digital economy," Bonita Stewart, Google's vice president of global partnerships, said in a statement.
Experts believe the partnership is the first of its kind within the tech industry. "At face value, it seems like Google is invested in this," said Jane Stout, an official with the Computing Research Association, a Washington group that studies diversity issues in tech. Google is "putting their money where their mouth is. They are trying something that is pretty revolutionary," Stout said. The program will take place at existing Google buildings. Students will not need to pay extra tuition to attend Howard West and will be given a stipend and support for housing, provided by Howard, which is well aware of the sky-high rental prices in Silicon Valley. The intention is for Howard West to be open to students at other historically black universities and colleges starting in the summer of 2018.
Google announcement. Also at CNN Money.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by AthanasiusKircher on Monday March 27 2017, @03:58PM (9 children)
Even relatively large companies will sometimes refuse non-white candidates because of concerns about "cultural fit" and other such nonsense.
Yes -- and I suspect you'll get a lot of push-back for your statements from people who want to say, "I've been in tech for decades and I've never seen racism!"
But part of the problem is that even without overt "I don't want to see any damn n****rs in the office!" kind of racism, you can still end up with disparities in employment created by institutional factors.
Personally, I think of this as the "country club networking" problem, which is a classic example of how racism can be propagated even unintentionally. Golf in the U.S. is traditionally a very "white" sport, and for years many clubs even barred non-whites. But even if they don't anymore, it's still a very white sport. In some professions, a lot of business and networking traditionally happened on the golf course; if you don't do it, it's harder to get promoted, etc. You might even get hired on the basis of somebody your dad or uncle or family friend of whatever played golf with.
A lot of this may not be intentionally "racist" in any meaningful sense. People are just hiring based on recommendations from friends they trust or whatever. But just because of the cultural association of golf and its informal connection to certain professions, more white people get hired or promoted, etc.
Now golf may not be as important for networking in tech, but there may be other cultural assumptions, which some demographic groups may be less likely to be interested in or participate in. And even if you get hired, maybe you don't "bond" with your coworkers as effectively as a minority, because you lack similar interests after work or whatever. Maybe that lack of relationships leads to less opportunities for heading major projects, which leads to less opportunities for promotion, etc. And sometimes it's even just due to assumptions about lack of a shared culture or whatever which just leads people to be less likely to involve a minority coworker in social events or whatever... which can sometimes have career ramifications in the long-term.
Nobody has to be actively racist in any of this to create a disparity. But there still may be factors that basically result in a disadvantage. And that's even without factoring in known unintentional biases that have been measured in studies where resumes are rated differently when the name is stereotypically black or latino or whatever vs. white.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 27 2017, @04:56PM
A lot of this may not be intentionally "racist" in any meaningful sense. People are just hiring based on recommendations from friends they trust or whatever. But just because of the cultural association of golf and its informal connection to certain professions, more white people get hired or promoted, etc.
Racial inertia.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 27 2017, @05:14PM (2 children)
They fucking love golf.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 27 2017, @07:20PM (1 child)
China, Japan, and South Korea are the 1st/2nd, 3rd, and 11th largest world economies. You will invite them from overseas to do business with them. You will play golf with them and let them win. You might even suck their dicks to close the deal.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 28 2017, @02:34AM
It would be interesting to know where you got your numbers.
USA is still in the Top 2 by most counts.
These guys used IMF's October 2016 numbers.
These guys call the EU an economy and bump USA to #3.
World's Largest Economy: 2016 [thebalance.com]
I don't see anybody putting Japan at #2.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 27 2017, @05:17PM (3 children)
I mean, come on. White people worship high quality people. Get the hint?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 27 2017, @06:32PM (2 children)
Yay for tokenism.
By that logic, Pakistan has more gender equality than the US since they had a female head of state decades before the US.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 27 2017, @07:59PM
At least I'm actually using logic.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 28 2017, @03:01AM
Not such a big deal. Pretty much EVERYBODY has. [google.com]
...and
Shirley Chisholm - Democrat - 1968
Cynthia McKinney - Green - 2008
We could have had not only the 1st female president, but the 1st non-white president at the same time.
...and
Jill Stein - Green - 2012, 2016
(not a Reactionary nor a Neoliberal).
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 27 2017, @06:48PM
This is correct. It can work the opposite way too-- notice how there are so many PoC/minorities in sports like basketball or baseball? It's because those sports are played in areas where they cannot afford golf courses, because economically they are not feasible, which is the long product of years and years of systematic and systemic oppression of minorities by whites, namely after whites moved manufacturing jobs overseas in their "capitalist colonization" of places like Indonesia and other places with even cheaper labor.
Had PoC moved out to the plains instead of into the cities for farming jobs, I can guarantee you golf would be a predominantly minority-powered sport in the US simply because it is hard to fit golf courses in, well, dense urban areas. They would also be richer, but again, leave it to the racist institutions of America to completely run over minorities at every turn, just like in the OP article.