Updated June 27, 2022

‘Be a listening ear’: Teacher is new equity and inclusion coach, By  Suzannah Couch – March 4, 2021. 

• • On Jan. 21, the Brown County Schools Board of Trustees approved Helmsburg Elementary School teacher Malini Stiles as the equity and inclusion coach for the district.
  • As of late February, Stiles said she had not received any discrimination complaints from employees. “It could be months before someone comes to me, or it could be tomorrow,” she said.
  • Stiles is also a member of the district’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Committee of staff members that was created in 2018. The school board approved a resolution in November committing to ensuring that every student, staff and faculty member feels respected and welcomed in every school building, no matter what.

• ‘Holding our students accountable’: Student Group approaches school board about policy for hate speech, symbols, Suzannah Couch – May 19, 2021

  • The school board has been asked by a group of Brown County High School students to consider implementing a written accountability plan to address hate speech and symbols in the school district. Brown County High School Students for Equity attended the May 6 school board meeting via Zoom.
  • There is no legal definition of hate speech in United States law, but Josephine Fields, the chair and founder of Students for Equity, explained that it is generally “any form of expression through which speakers intend to vilify, humiliate, or incite hatred against a group or a class of people on the basis of race, religion, sexual identity, gender identity, ethnicity, disability or national origin.”
  • “Brown County Schools have struggled with incidents of hate speech and symbols in the past, and such speech has become common background noise in the halls. However, we are not the only school in Indiana to have these types of issues,” Shields said.
  • In 2016, the superintendent of Monroe County Community School Corporation banned the Confederate flag in and on Bloomington High School North’s property after having a meeting with students who were made uncomfortable by four students wearing the flag to school one day. … “Some students reportedly cried when they saw the flags, some students reportedly heard usage of anti-LGBT rhetoric from the group, and many students called it ‘intimidating hate speech,’” Shields said.

Regarding banning the confederate flag and free speech: “the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that a ban on a students wearing of clothing depicting the Confederate flag did not violate free speech of the student. B.W.A. v. Farmington R-7 School Dist., 554 F.3d 734 (2009). In its opinion, the court relied on the Supreme Court’s decision in Tinker vs. Des Moines Independent Community School District, 393 U.S. 503 (1969) which held that school administrators must demonstrate facts that might reasonably lead them “to forecast substantial disruption of or material interference with school activities” before prohibiting a particular expression of opinion.” (ref: Confederate flag in school and free speech, Iowa Department of Education.)

Punishment For Microaggressions at Indiana School District, with Greg Lukianoff

• • Megyn Kelly is joined by Greg Lukianoff, CEO of FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression), to talk about the absurdity of an Indiana school districts rule book on “microaggressions,” how these policies go against free speech, how the definition of a microaggression has changed in recent years, and more.

It’s time for data-first diversity, equity, and inclusion BY  ROLAND FRYER, June 20, 2022 Fortune,  

• • The average impact of corporate diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) training is zero and some evidence suggests that the impact can become negative if the training is mandated.
  • Our intuition for how to decrease race and gender disparities in the workplace has failed us for decades. It’s time to stop guessing and start using the scientific method. Remember when we thought that the Bubonic Plague was caused by a triple conjunction of Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars in the 40th degree of Aquarius?
  • Here is a three-step approach that can turn earnest intentions into good science:
    1. Understand disparities, 2. Find the root causes of bias, Evaluate

Jordan Peterson debate on the gender pay gap, campus protests and postmodernism. Jordan introduces multivariate analysis, e.g. assessments based on “data” and application of the scientific method.