Tuesday, November 16, 2021

Maryland, My Maryland

A couple of articles of interest to Marylanders. First, from Star News, University of Maryland Adds New Ethnic Category for ‘Students of Color Minus Asian’

On Thursday, a photo went viral of a student admissions chart from the University of Maryland, which depicts a bizarre new racial category for non-White students titled “Students of Color, minus Asian,” the Daily Caller reports.

The photo, shared by investigative journalist and leading opponent of Critical Race Theory Chris Rufo, depicts freshmen admission rates over the course of four years, from 2017 to 2021. At the bottom of the chart, newly-admitted freshmen are separated into two categories: “Students of Color, minus Asian,” and “White or Asian students.” Across all four years, the latter category notably made up roughly 80 percent of all admissions in every Fall semester.

“We’re at the point in the discourse when colleges have created the highly scientific and totally legitimate racial category of ‘Students of Color, minus Asian,’” Rufo sarcastically remarked on Twitter.

In response to the controversy, the University of Maryland issued a statement in which it defended maintaining these two categories, saying that the chart was meant to depict the data of students that the university considers “underrepresented.”

“During his annual State of the Campus address,” said a university spokesperson, “President Pines shared information about the demographics of the freshman class, including information about the diversity of the class. The data in this specific section of the slide refers to student populations that are considered underrepresented on our campus.”

This approach is echoed by the university’s Diversity and Inclusion Dashboard, which specifically lists its “underrepresented minority” category as consisting of “African-American/Black, Hispanic, American Indian, and Native Hawaiian.”

Asians are instead described as “other minority,” and are included with either White students or students who select the option of “multiple races.”

Of course, it's true that many student of Asian origin (predominantly Chinese and Japanese) are from high performing households, and have no need (or desire) for a hand up, but others, including Filipino, and other countries are in much the same condition as a majority of Black and Hispanics. For that matter, many White students come from poor household, with disadvantages as well. Would it be too much to just judge the students by their circumstances and abilities, and not their color?

CBS 13 Balmer, Cambridge Mayor Andrew Bradshaw Charged With Distributing Revenge Porn On Reddit

Cambridge Mayor Andrew Bradshaw is charged with violating Maryland’s revenge porn statute, the Office of the State Prosecutor said Monday.

Bradshaw, who is charged with 50 counts of distributing revenge porn, made his first appearance in court Monday and was released on his own recognizance.

Charging documents allege Bradshaw made multiple accounts on Reddit, a community forum website, with usernames that had the name and birthday of the victim, a woman previously in a relationship with him. From those accounts, he posted nude photos of her without her consent on forums related to sex, humiliation, degradation and race, officials said.

If convicted, Bradshaw would face a maximum penalty of two years’ incarceration and a $5,000 fine for each count.

1 comment:

  1. "Would it be too much to just judge the students by their circumstances and abilities, and not their color? "

    Depends on what your real goal is. Apparently that doesn't meet the necessary criteria of certain racists in the UM Administration.

    ReplyDelete