So the Urban League has jumped on the "where are the black IT workers" train. Specifically they are doing what I call the "Demographics Dance". This is where you point out that so and so makes up x amount of the general population and therefore should make up x amount of your employees, or prisoners, or whatever else. What these people don't like having discussed are the actual relevant statistics on why so and so population is overwhelmingly white, black, male or female. In the case of IT, even though there are relatively few black people with advanced computer science degrees, the rent seekers continue to blather on about the lack of "representation" at IT firms, as if these firms exist to do "representation".
In total disregard to the fact that these IT firms are doing quite well with the numbers of male and non-black employees, particularly the programmers, the rent seekers continue to make the unfounded assertion that somehow these companies could be doing better if they just put more black/female faces in the programming room. But this is not a post about that. What this post is about is
the continued lack of achievement on the part of black students as
the explainer of the lack of numbers. From the LA Times:
Under the previous test, last given to public school students two years ago, the gap separating Asian and black students was 35 percentage points in English. The gap increased to 44 percentage points under the new test. Asian students' results dropped the least on the new tests, which widened the gap between them and those who are white, black or Latino, the analysis showed.
English. I'll go out on a limb and suggest that Trap music is not helping.
A similar pattern occurred with students from low-income families. Their scores in math, for example, declined at a steeper rate (51%) than those of students from more affluent backgrounds (16%). In the last decade, all ethnic groups made significant academic gains compared to where their scores started. But the gap separating the scores of blacks and Latinos from whites and Asians changed little.
So a "similar pattern" occurs for upper and lower income families. Black students, regardless of family income do worse than their Asian and white counterparts. What are we to do about this Asian Supremacy?
And now the relevant kicker:
. "There is something going on here when you talk about the difference in the size of the gap, particularly in math."
In that subject, 69% of Asian students achieved the state targets compared to 49% of whites, 21% of Latinos and 16% of blacks.
69% of Asian students achieved state targets in math vs. 16% of black students. There's your IT gap right there. Lets be clear. If you suck at logical thinking (which is what math develops and depends upon) you will not be doing any high level programming. Not happening. Swift doesn't care who you are. If you code incorrectly, the program will fail and no amount of cries of racism will change that.
In math, the percentage of Asians who met state targets declined 12%. White students went down 21%, Latinos 50%, black students 54%.
54% decline?
And now the excuses:
Schools that did worse may have "relied on narrow forms of test preparation, so they spent less time on critical thinking activities" which are emphasized on the test, said Maria Brenes, executive director of InnerCity Struggle, a nonprofit that works with schools east of downtown, which have mostly Latino students.
So they are saying that the black students are not performing well on critical thinking tasks. You cannot program well unless you have very good critical thinking skills. So if a majority of black students lack the math proficiency and critical thinking skills, how do you expect to see them in any large numbers in fields that demand these things?
To narrow the achievement gap, she said L.A. Unified should invest more in technology, teacher training and parent education about the new learning goals.
Technology is not the solution. Seriously. People have been developing math skills long before the advent of the computer. Critical thinking skills were developed long before the iPhone. Technology in teaching is NOT the issue at all.
"Students in lower-wealth schools that did not have extensive technology access and who do not have technology at home had another challenge in taking these tests,"
Amazingly I did well in both math and English without the use of a computer (other than a Casio calculator). Technology is not the problem.
There is a lot of fascination with technology and the internet for teaching. But the fact of the matter is that these things are not necessary in the least bit to develop math skills or critical thinking. We need to get off the tech bandwagon and get back to basics. And so long as black students fail at such high rates, we will continue to see low numbers in Tech businesses.
