Hiring a "chief diversity officer" doesn't close achievement gaps, concludes an analysis by Jay P. Greene and Madison Marino of the Heritage Foundation's Center on Education Policy.
Black and Hispanic students had "significantly greater learning loss during the pandemic in school districts that had hired chief diversity officers than in districts without one."
Even controlling for pre-pandemic achievement gaps, minority students lost more than their white classmates, especially in math, they found. "Racial achievement gaps went from bad to worse in these districts."
Why?
Hiring a senior district official who insists that Black and Hispanic students not be held to the same standards of behavior or academic achievement as other students because of structural racism obviously undermined minority student success.
Nearly half of districts with at least 15,000 students employ a chief diversity or equity officer, and that rises to 89 percent for districts with more than 100,000 students, the study found. "Federal COVID-19 money has facilitated the spread of this idea from universities into school districts."
If students are told that turning in work on time, respecting teachers and taking responsibility for their actions are "white supremacist" expectations, that success in school won't pay off due to "systematic racism" . . . Why bother with the math homework?
What helps close achievement gaps are the same things that help close them in all students - excellent teaching that follows research. In elementary reading that means following the science of reading. Teaching the way we know the brain learns to read. This has changed the way students believe in themselves; I have seen the confidence in students go through the roof! "I didn't know I could read!"
Diversity: Synonym for Racism.
Thomas Sowell said it succinctly 4 years ago
But then that is the true goal of the social justice/DEI industry. If minorities succeed, what it to become of the white liberals who depend on "helping" for the robust incomes.
JK Brown
Zig Englemann showed how to do it almost 60 years ago. Few noticed or followed his lead.
https://vimeo.com/97345007
Admitting lower qualified blacks or Hispanic while not admitting the most marginal white or Asian students cannot do anything but make the racial achievement gaps bigger.