My friend Ray Mazurek mentioned last week that during his ten-year tenure as an undergraduate and then graduate college student, he only had three female professors and four professors of color. This was in the 70s.
I also spent exactly ten years in college, from 1992 until 2002. So I decided to do a count of my own. Nearly half of my professors were women. Okay, interesting, especially given how different my numbers are compared to Ray's. Then, I broke it down by race. During my ten years as a full-time college student, I had TWO professors of color. And this was mostly in the 90s. And I did my undergraduate work in Detroit, and got my doctorate thirty miles north of the Mexican border. And both classes were in multiculturalism (an African-American woman taught my Af-Am Lit class and a Latino man taught my multi-cultural education seminar)--non-required electives that I sought out.
3 comments:
My experiences are similar. Between 1999 and 2007, I've only had 2 professors of color. Probably over half my classes were taught by women (if not closer to 2/3). And one of my professors of color taught Multicultural Education at my undergrad, and the other taught a few Philosophy classes in my graduate program.
Remarkable, Michael, isn't it?
Bill given recent events that you and I could discuss privately, I am NOT surprised. I had one female woman of color at the same place where you studied for your doctorate and if Victor Villanueva hadn't come down from Flagstaff, that one would have been the only person of color teaching me. So I had 2 peoplee of color, 2 females, 5 male professor from that program.
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