DEI and other leftist initiatives at Christian colleges?

Merrill · Jul 20, 2023

I am looking at colleges for my son to go to next year, and I have run into some alarming things.

The Christian colleges I have looked at have some of the following initiatives and requirements in place:

1. Every first-year student must take a course in DEI/CRT. The syllabus for this course is filled with the most left-wing stuff imaginable. Loras College, a Catholic School in Dubuque requires this, and it is astonishing to me. That school also has a LGBT center in it

2. Bias-Response Teams are on campus, and students can anonymously complain about other students "bias incidents" and "micro-aggressions". Students that have been accused are dragged in front of the administration, the diversity board, and in some cases the police. Clarke University in Dubuque, and University of Dubuque have this --both of them are Christian schools.

I don't think I should have to pay for courses in indoctrination, or struggle sessions.

Is this just the reality now? Does anyone know of Christian (or even secular) schools that DON'T have this stuff?

PloverWing · Jul 20, 2023

I think that the days when churches and Christian schools explicitly endorsed racism are fading into the past. Even Bob Jones, which held onto its segregationist policies for a long time, now has a statement that it does not discriminate based on race, and has a procedure for reporting discrimination and harassment: Discrimination and Harassment

I haven't surveyed all Christian colleges -- there are lots of them -- but I'm seeing efforts to do better on racial issues. Here, for example, is a statement from my alma mater, Wheaton College:

We acknowledge that our priorities have not always demonstrated our individual and collective dedication to affirm diversity, practice inclusion, seek justice, and pursue unity. Wheaton College was founded in part on its abolitionist vision. However, our institutional opposition to discrimination against people of color and women has not been consistently sustained in policy and practice.

Because of Christ’s reconciling death on the cross, we repent of racism, sexism, and other divisive sins and rededicate our energy and resources to creating an environment where all people know we are Christ-followers by the way we love one another [Mark 3:24-26; John 13-34-35; Ephesians 2:12-16; 1 John 1:7-8].

(Source: Diversity Commitment) So, as far as race goes, yes, this is the reality now.

If your focus is more on gender, then you can probably find schools that favor complementarian gender roles. They may not permit actual sexual harassment, though.

If your focus is on sexuality issues, then there will be lots of Christian colleges that teach that marriage is between one man and one woman, and there will be lots of Christian colleges that require their single students (gay or straight) to abstain from sexual relations before marriage.

Actual course work will vary from one school to another. Having a full course in DEI issues sounds unusual to me; if you object to that, you can probably find a college where discussion of DEI is not in the formal curriculum. The students themselves, of course, may decide that they want to support some social justice causes, regardless of what the school officially teaches.

Merrill · Jul 20, 2023

PloverWing said:
I think that the days when churches and Christian schools explicitly endorsed racism are fading into the past. Even Bob Jones, which held onto its segregationist policies for a long time, now has a statement that it does not discriminate based on race, and has a procedure for reporting discrimination and harassment: Discrimination and Harassment

I haven't surveyed all Christian colleges -- there are lots of them -- but I'm seeing efforts to do better on racial issues. Here, for example, is a statement from my alma mater, Wheaton College:

(Source: Diversity Commitment) So, as far as race goes, yes, this is the reality now.

If your focus is more on gender, then you can probably find schools that favor complementarian gender roles. They may not permit actual sexual harassment, though.

If your focus is on sexuality issues, then there will be lots of Christian colleges that teach that marriage is between one man and one woman, and there will be lots of Christian colleges that require their single students (gay or straight) to abstain from sexual relations before marriage.

Actual course work will vary from one school to another. Having a full course in DEI issues sounds unusual to me; if you object to that, you can probably find a college where discussion of DEI is not in the formal curriculum. The students themselves, of course, may decide that they want to support some social justice causes, regardless of what the school officially teaches.

The certainly isn't anything wrong with colleges issuing statements regarding past racism, and to assert their commitment to equal opportunity, etc.

And there isn't anything wrong with scholarships being offered up to POC, etc.

But full-on DEI programs are something completely different. They are divisive, antagonistic, and Neo-Marxist. We should have to pay schools to indoctrinate our kids. Likewise, the anonymous snitching on classmates for "micro-aggressions" is just awful.

JimR-OCDS · Jul 21, 2023

According to Dr Jordan Peterson, DEI is a disaster waiting to happen.

He said that universities like MIT, Harvard, CalTech and others traditionally have rejected 80%
of it's applicants. With DEI, they now reject highly qualified candidates because they're the wrong
race or gender. This means the brightest that we have will be rejected from the STEM fields, which
they should be accelerating in.

We probably won't see the bad results for the next decade or so, but you can bet that the Russians
and Chinese governments will take advantage of our foolishness.

Arcangl86 · Jul 21, 2023

JimR-OCDS said:
According to Dr Jordan Peterson, DEI is a disaster waiting to happen.

He said that universities like MIT, Harvard, CalTech and others traditionally have rejected 80%
of it's applicants. With DEI, they now reject highly qualified candidates because they're the wrong
race or gender. This means the brightest that we have will be rejected from the STEM fields, which
they should be accelerating in.

We probably won't see the bad results for the next decade or so, but you can bet that the Russians
and Chinese governments will take advantage of our foolishness.

This seems to be assuming that white men are inherently more qualified than women or people of color.

Merrill · Jul 21, 2023

Arcangl86 said:
This seems to be assuming that white men are inherently more qualified than women or people of color.

No it isn't

if you are using criteria that has nothing to do with competency and skill to evaluate candidates, you will get distorted results, and less-qualified people

Arcangl86 · Jul 21, 2023

Merrill said:
No it isn't

if you are using criteria that has nothing to do with competency and skill to evaluate candidates, you will get distorted results, and less-qualified people

But that's only if those are the only criteria that are being used, which is not the case. Diversity criteria generally come into play when distinguishing between two otherwise similarly qualified candidates.

JimR-OCDS · Jul 21, 2023

Arcangl86 said:
This seems to be assuming that white men are inherently more qualified than women or people of color.

No, it has nothing to do with race or gender.

When an institution tries to create justice for one group, they end up being unjust to another. This is what]
DEI does. The consequences are never thought about by leftist making these decisions.

If you discriminate against the brightest people because they happen to be white males or Asians, you
eliminate the development of a better future for society. We didn't get here by discriminating against
the smartest people, but by helping them to develop.

Arcangl86 · Jul 21, 2023

JimR-OCDS said:
No, it has nothing to do with race or gender.

When an institution tries to create justice for one group, they end up being unjust to another. This is what]
DEI does. The consequences are never thought about by leftist making these decisions.

If you discriminate against the brightest people because they happen to be white males or Asians, you
eliminate the development of a better future for society. We didn't get here by discriminating against
the smartest people, but by helping them to develop.

Again, this comes with an assumption that the smartest people are within a particular demographic.

JimR-OCDS · Jul 21, 2023

Arcangl86 said:
Again, this comes with an assumption that the smartest people are within a particular demographic.

Again, it has nothing to do with it. It has to do with the brightest being rejected because of their race and gender.
If they're nonwhite, of course they'll be automatically accepted, but so will the brightest Asians and Whites be rejected
in order to make room for the less intelligent who happen to be the preferred race and gender for DEI standards.

FireDragon76 · Jul 24, 2023

JimR-OCDS said:
Again, it has nothing to do with it. It has to do with the brightest being rejected because of their race and gender.
If they're nonwhite, of course they'll be automatically accepted, but so will the brightest Asians and Whites be rejected
in order to make room for the less intelligent who happen to be the preferred race and gender for DEI standards.

Seriously? Have you actually read about the history of Ivy League schools? Getting into one wasn't about being particularly bright, it was mostly down to having family connections (your dad went to the school) and money. Scholastic aptitude wasn't even part of it. George W. Bush was a bad student but still got into Yale.

friend of · Jul 24, 2023

JimR-OCDS said:
We probably won't see the bad results for the next decade or so, but you can bet that the Russians
and Chinese governments will take advantage of our foolishness

Yep. Expect to lose when we jettison meritocracy

friend of · Jul 24, 2023

FireDragon76 said:
Seriously? Have you actually read about the history of Ivy League schools? Getting into one wasn't about being particularly bright, it was mostly down to having family connections (your dad went to the school) and money. Scholastic aptitude wasn't even part of it. George W. Bush was a bad student but still got into Yale.

It's both family/money connections but it's also given to those of high academic aptitude. If it wasn't then Ivy league wouldn't be a reknown collection of schools at all.

FireDragon76 · Jul 24, 2023

friend of said:
It's both family/money connections but it's also given to those of high academic aptitude. If it wasn't then Ivy league wouldn't be a reknown collection of schools at all.

You can find good colleges with academic excellence all across the country. The Ivy League isn't unique in that regard, and never has been. This is about the legacy of classism and racism in America's elite institutions.

RDKirk · Jul 24, 2023

Arcangl86 said:
But that's only if those are the only criteria that are being used, which is not the case. Diversity criteria generally come into play when distinguishing between two otherwise similarly qualified candidates.

If the goal was equality, it would necessarily allow for inequalities in diversity. But that's not what "equity" means. Equity, it is used in DEI ideology, means that the outcomes must be equal.

A business must hire equal numbers of women and men engineers, for instance, despite the fact that 80 percent of the women graduates are sociology majors. That means they can hire the top, say, 5% of male engineering graduates who apply...but they must hire 60% or 70% of the female graduates who apply. No, they are not "otherwise similarly qualified."

friend of · Jul 24, 2023

FireDragon76 said:
You can find good colleges with academic excellence all across the country. The Ivy League isn't unique in that regard, and never has been. This is about the legacy of classism and racism in America's elite institutions.

Ivy League schools are world renown and the most reputable academic institutions in the world. They have taught the best of the best. There is more going on with these schools than legacy wealth and classism, which is a simplistic way of viewing things.

FireDragon76 · Jul 24, 2023

RDKirk said:
If the goal was equality, it would necessarily allow for inequalities in diversity. But that's not what "equity" means. Equity, it is used in DEI ideology, means that the outcomes must be equal.

A business must hire equal numbers of women and men engineers, for instance, despite the fact that 80 percent of the women graduates are sociology majors. That means they can hire the top, say, 5% of male engineering graduates who apply...but they must hire 60% or 70% of the female graduates who apply. No, they are not "otherwise similarly qualified."

Equity specifically refers to justice, that is the meaning of the word (equitas in Latin means something like "fairness"). Distributive justice is part of that.

RDKirk · Jul 24, 2023

FireDragon76 said:
Equity specifically refers to justice, that is the meaning of the word (equitas in Latin means something like "fairness"). Distributive justice is part of that.

I'm referring to the meaning as it is being applied by DEI ideology and practice.

JimR-OCDS · Jul 24, 2023

FireDragon76 said:
Seriously? Have you actually read about the history of Ivy League schools? Getting into one wasn't about being particularly bright, it was mostly down to having family connections (your dad went to the school) and money. Scholastic aptitude wasn't even part of it. George W. Bush was a bad student but still got into Yale.

You're referring to mostly legacy students who go to these ivy league schools.

However, Cal Tech, MIT and even Harvard where the focus is on STEM academics, legacy
students must still have the grades to make it. As the stats show according to Dr Jordan
Peterson, 80% of the students who apply to these schools are not accepted. This was before
the DEI policy was put in place. Now, some of the brightest will be rejected because they're
wrong race or gender. Those accepted will be of lower intelligence because of their race and
gender.

JimR-OCDS · Jul 24, 2023

FireDragon76 said:
You can find good colleges with academic excellence all across the country. The Ivy League isn't unique in that regard, and never has been. This is about the legacy of classism and racism in America's elite institutions.

Interesting that the engineers from China that I worked and helped when they came here, wanted to be accepted into
a few schools to get their master's degree. They are the schools that they heard about back in China.
MIT was the first choice, Cal Tech was their Second, then Virginia Tech, if they
couldn't get into the other schools. Other than those, they would just return to China and get their master's there.
The mangers of the company attended WPI for their undergrad degree, then back to WPI or MIT for
their Masters. The Chinese engineers never even heard of WPI, but academically it's up there with MIT, but doesn't have
the worldwide recognition.

DEI and other leftist initiatives at Christian colleges?

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