Dwindling Support (for afffirmative action at Ph.D. level)

In 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the legality of affirmative action in college admissions. But the political controversy surrounding affirmative action, and the limits placed on its use by the Supreme Court as well as by various state entities, has had a major impact on graduate education, according to a report released Wednesday.

According to the report, from the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, many of the groups that support minority Ph.D. students have broadened their programs to include other students as well. As a result, the report warns that the cohort of new Ph.D.’s — and in turn the cohort of new professors in the years to come — may lack the racial and ethnic diversity many colleges want for their faculties.

The foundation’s report has two main parts. One part summarizes data showing how few Ph.D.’s are awarded to black and Hispanic students. In 2003, the report notes, one in three Americans was black or Hispanic, but only one in nine American citizens who received Ph.D.’s that year were black or Hispanic. The data in the report largely come from the studies conducted by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago and released in December.

While the data are not new, the foundation also conducted interviews and research on programs to diversify the graduate student population. The foundation studied efforts by the government, foundations and individual universities, and found retrenchment and shifts just about everywhere — with money for minority Ph.D. students getting cut.

“Programs intended to improve diversity in doctoral education have shifted decisively away from financial support, focusing more on efforts to recruit and prepare students for graduate study,” the report said.

At the federal level, the report noted that the Education Department and the National Science Foundation have both abandoned fellowship programs for minority doctoral students, the NSF doing so under the threat of a lawsuit.

At the university level, the report said, “almost every program surveyed has modified its structure, its eligibility requirements, or even its name following recent legal challenges to university minority support programs.”

While the interviews with program managers found that most of them continued to have strong commitments to diversifying graduate student populations, it found that even where policies hadn’t been overhauled, people are reluctant to draw attention to their efforts. Program managers said that they had been urged “to maintain low public profiles,” the report said.

The foundation acknowledged that in many cases, fellowships that were once for minority students still exist, but are now open to low-income students from all racial and ethnic groups. And the report said that such fellowships serve a valuable purpose. But it added that such fellowships couldn’t replace minority-specific programs.

“A need-based model implies that low minority representation in doctoral programs results solely from economic deprivation, with no consideration of social and cultural factors that may make minority students less likely to enroll or persist in doctoral programs,” the report said. It added that not all minority students are poor, and that professors generally come from “middle-income and professional family backgrounds.” As a result, shifting graduate fellowships to emphasize low-income backgrounds “will inevitably divert recruitment energies away from precisely those groups that offer the most promising potential members of the academic community.”

In 2003, the report notes, one in three Americans was black or Hispanic, but only one in nine American citizens who received Ph.D.’s that year were black or Hispanic.

This is our first clue that the report is not serious analysis. An objective comparison might be with the percentage of blacks and Hispanics who are over the age of 25 and had graduated from high school with a college preparatory program. The total population of these groups is not meaningful. If blacks and Hispanics take themselves off the academic track more often by dropping out or taking non-college prep programs in high school, "dwindling support" for the cancer known as affirmative action is not to blame for their lower rates of doctoral degrees.

Also, it sounds like Asians aren't minorities to this group. I can't imagine why.

There are some black professors, but almost all of them have been forced by political correctness into the ghetto of Black Studies.

There's something fundamentally screwy in viewing the professoriat as a center of power and privilege, which the left has done since the 1960s. It is, certainly, a great way to seize the levers of power in order to transform the culture. But from a more personal and practical point of view, it just doesn't fly.

A PhD is the most expensive, time-consuming, difficult degree you can earn. Then when you've earned it you have a license to work for low pay. If you get an MBA, you have some chance of making a lot of money. If you get a PhD, you don't, even though it takes twice as long and is usually harder to get.

That's why so many leftist academics are so glum and gloomy, and why they unfortunately take out their disgruntlement on their students through extreme politicization. The only reason to get a PhD is because you love the work and are willing to take a cut in pay to do what you really love. Few professors these days have those motives. Instead, they are mostly spoiled and bitter leftist careerists.

Back to the point under consideration. Why are there so few black PhDs? Because most intelligent blacks who make it successfully through first-rate colleges come from relatively deprived backgrounds, and would rather follow the road of money and success as businessmen and lawyers than the PhD route of genteel poverty.

Wow, really broad brush you've got there, my FRiend.

I just defended my dissertation proposal. I am black, as are about 3 other members of my department, which is not black studies. In the minority grad student gathering I have attended on my campus, none of us is in black studies. Try chemistry, bio-chem, public health, computer science, in addition to the humanities and social sciences.

I have no intention of working for low pay, but then, I'm not getting a PhD in English, but a technology-related degree. The pay in my field is very good. Could I make more money in the private sector? Probably, but this is my 2nd career (former lawyer), and I have made my peace with the money issue. I will certainly make more than the average worker out there and 'more than enough' (whatever that is) to meet my needs and to be charitable.

I'd argue that most blacks, like most whites, don't choose the doctoral route because they don't understand it; don't understand the career choice. Not everyone wants to do research, and I would argue that few undergrads understand what it means to continue one's education in order to learn how to do research. Blacks, like whites, usually don't have a PhD mentor that they can talk to about what it means to do this degree. Few people go into fields about which they have no knowledge.

Plus, I have done recruiting for 2 big university programs and found that many blacks (and again, I bet whites as well), don't know the doctoral funding structure. Already in debt for undergrad, they hesitate to spend more money for grad school, not knowing that most PhDs are funded. When I tell people that they can get a full ride to go to school, their eyes brighten and you can see that they can now consider a career that they thought was closed to them before.

Finally, I am not depressed (ok, I was before my defense, but I feel better now). I love what I'm doing, as do my classmates. It is a grind, and it is too hard a grind to keep doing it if you don't love it.

Speaking from my experience, it is the black students who can be missionaries of a type to the leftest whites. It is the black students that are more likely to have been in the military, the black students who are practicing Christians, the black students who, tired of the affirmative action slur against their abilities, strive to show what they can do w/o special help. In short, we often are the conservative voice.

If you love what you're doing, that's the main thing. I was speaking mostly about the humanities, but in science you also tend to take a pay cut for comparable qualifications if you work in academia. A professor of biochemistry probably gets paid a lot more than a professor of English, but not as much as a researcher in a biochemical firm.

But if you like it, the life is better. I've just noticed that in recent years in the humanities an awful lot of professors seem to be unhappy with their lives.

I've just noticed that in recent years in the humanities an awful lot of professors seem to be unhappy with their lives.

People are unhappy all over, and afraid to make a change. I know a lot of unhappy lawyers. They get so wrapped up in the time and effort they spent in getting the degree, don't have an idea of what else to do, and many of the new ones are mired in debt and not making the fortune people think lawyers make.

I decided to make a change, tho I didn't think a vow of poverty was necessary, and looked for a major that would pay me a 'living wage,' to use the leftists' term. I look at several boards for faculty/doctoral students and see unhappy people who can't find work, work for low pay, are afraid they will never get tenure instead of saying 'I have this wonderful degree and am a thinking, rational person, how else can I make a way for myself in the world?' But then, these are mostly leftists, from what I can tell (statements about English lit that turn into a screed against Bush would be a sign), looking for a handout.

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