Wednesday, October 24, 2018






Report: Half of All Women in Engineering Schools Experience Sexual Harassment

A report!  How gorgeous! But what is it based on? I could do a report that said the opposite.  So what would that prove?  For the "report" to be any evidence of anything, we would need to know such things as how does the study define sexual harassment and how was the sample collected? The "report" seems to be unpublished so we have no means of finding that out. 

After nearly 50 years of reading Leftist "research" I am pretty sure what I would find if I had full information:  garbage that ignored almost all scientific protocols -- like random sampling



Half of women faculty and staff in academia experience sexual harassment and almost half of all engineering students experience sexual harassment from faculty or staff, according to a report covered today at WE18 in Minneapolis, the Society of Women Engineers conference and career fair for women in engineering and technology.

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine produced the report, Sexual Harassment of Women: Climate, Culture and Consequences in Academic Sciences, Engineering and Medicine this year, reviewing research on the extent to which women in these fields experience sexual harassment and the extent to which sexual harassment in academia negatively impacts the recruitment, retention and advancement of women pursuing these fields. Alice M. Agogino, Ph.D., professor of mechanical engineering at UC Berkeley, shared the findings today among a panel of researchers at The State of Women in Engineering session during the conference.

The data reveals that 50 percent of women faculty and staff in academia experience sexual harassment. Additionally, 20-50 percent of students pursuing these fields experience sexual harassment from faculty or staff. Data analyzed included instances of reported sexist hostility, crude behavior, sexual attention and sexual coercion.

The data review also found that women of color experience more harassment (sexual, racial/ethnic, or a combination of the two) than white women, white men and men of color.

“Leaders in academic institutions and research and training sites must pay increased attention to and enact policies that cover gender and racial harassment as a means of addressing the most common form of sexual harassment and of preventing other types of sexually harassing behavior,” said Dr. Agogino.

Dr. Agogino pointed out that organizational climate is, by far, the greatest predictor of the occurrence of sexual harassment. The two characteristics most associated with higher rates of sexual harassment are male-dominated gender ratios and leadership, and an organizational climate that communicates tolerance of sexual harassment.

Aside from undermining women’s professional and educational attainment while destroying mental and physical health, sexual harassment has adverse effects on bystanders, co-workers, workgroups and entire organizations.

“The cumulative effect of sexual harassment is significant damage to research integrity and a costly loss of talent in academic sciences, engineering and medicine,” Dr. Agogino said.

Agogino provided four recommendations for institutions to prevent harassment:

1. Integrate values of diversity, inclusion and respect into the policies and procedures. 2. Change the power dynamics in advisor-trainee relationships. 3. Support targets of sexual harassment by providing alternative ways to access support services, record information about an incident, and report an incident without fear of retaliation. 4. Improve transparency and accountability to demonstrate that institutions are investigating and holding people accountable.

During the panel presentation and discussion, Roberta Rincon, Ph.D., senior manager of research at SWE, introduced SWE’s newest study which identifies the gender bias experiences of Indian women and men working for Western engineering companies in India. Findings from the study reveal that both genders experience bias, however in different forms. The study was conducted in conjunction with the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law (WLL), and dovetails a 2015 study of bias experiences of engineers across the United States.

“The findings in this study indicate that bias in the engineering workplace is a problem in India, and companies that strive for a more diverse, inclusive, and engaging environment for their employees must address these biases if they want to retain talent,” Dr. Rincon said.

Dr. Agogino and Dr. Rincon were joined at the session by Peggy Layne, P.E., Assistant Provost for Faculty Development at Virginia Tech; Peter Meiksins, Vice Provost for Academic Programs and Professor of Sociology, Cleveland State University; and Laura Ettinger, Ph.D., Associate Professor of History, Clarkson University, who each covered further reviews of women’s prevalence in engineering. Currently, just 13 percent of working engineers are women, and approximately 20 percent of engineering degrees are awarded to women.

“As a diversity organization, we have a responsibility to acknowledge and address research available that affects women and minorities in engineering,” said Karen Horting, executive director and CEO of SWE. “Gender bias on campus and in the workplace is a global issue, and we will continue to find solutions that allow women and minorities to comfortably have their deserved seat at the table.”

SOURCE 





How a Professor Who Lost His Job for Being Conservative Fought Back and Won

A longtime conservative professor on a liberal college campus didn’t expect to face harassment claims, lose his job over his political beliefs, and then win a $120,000 settlement.

Mark McIntire, 74, taught philosophy as an adjunct professor at Santa Barbara City College in California for 23 years.

An old friend of Charlton Heston, the late actor and National Rifle Association president, McIntire is no stranger to controversy.

In an email to The Daily Signal, he recalled being elected to the national Screen Actors Guild Board of Directors in 1983 and leading a “successful … coup d’etat against [then-Guild] President Ed Asner to the outrage of Hollywood liberal-progressives.”

But until the election of President Donald Trump, McIntire, a faculty member in Santa Barbara City College’s  philosophy department since 1996, says he was just the school’s “token” conservative.

“For 22 years … it was a standing joke that we had one person on campus willing to speak his mind and contradict the reigning campus orthodoxy,” McIntire told The Daily Signal in a phone interview.

“In 2016, in the run-up to the election, every single campus lecture I attended … turned into a Hillary Clinton pep rally and a Donald Trump hate-fest,” he said, noting that was the case even when the lectures had nothing to do with politics.

Then, earlier this year, he suddenly found himself embroiled in the college’s free speech and #MeToo movements.

‘Oversharing’ Political Beliefs

When McIntire invited prominent atheist Michael Shermer to campus in March to speak about debunking beliefs in the afterlife and utopian societies, one female educator at the college sent out a mass email to faculty.

In the email, the chairwoman of the chemistry department, Raeanne Napoleon, cited a Buzzfeed article reporting on past allegations of sexual misconduct leveled against Shermer, including attempted groping and lewd behavior at scientific conferences, along with one public accusation of rape.

Even though Napoleon wrote that Shermer “still has the right to free speech,” she recommended that female faculty members and students avoid being alone with him.

Napoleon told Inside Higher Ed that she was inspired by the #MeToo movement to warn fellow faculty members about Shermer. She also wasn’t a fan of McIntire’s politics.

Napoleon said McIntire was well-known for “oversharing” his political beliefs through campus email, admitting to automatically marking his emails as trash in the past.

In response, McIntire came to Shermer’s defense in a series of private emails he sent to fellow educators, as well as in an article he wrote for the student newspaper.

Of Napoleon’s all-campus email, McIntire wrote in the student newspaper’s online comments section: “She succeeded only in fingering herself as a calumniator of the very worst stamp.”

McIntire also referred to a conciliatory e-mail sent to him by Napoleon as a “morning-after regret” of an email to another faculty member.

Complaints, Evaluations

 Those comments—among others—got McIntire into trouble. Napoleon told Inside Higher Ed that his language was suspect in the context of the sexual assault allegations against Shermer.

Soon thereafter, four of McIntire’s female colleagues, including Napoleon, brought  harassment complaints against McIntire under Title IX, the federal law protecting individuals from discrimination based on sex at institutions that receive federal funds.

In May, the college sent McIntire a termination notice, owing to three negative teaching evaluations from philosophy department Chairman Marc Bobro.

In the teaching evaluations, Bobro wrote that the topics McIntire chose for term papers and exams were too “highly charged and politicized,” that his Facebook posts were inappropriate, and that he failed to grasp “basic philosophical concepts.”

“I never assigned topics,” McIntire wrote in an email to The Daily Signal. “I let the students assign the topics.”

Often, McIntire’s students would pick politically charged topics such as abortion, homosexual marriage, Black Lives Matter, extraterrestrial life, and transgenderism.

“In all my 23 years teaching at SBCC, I never had a student paper defending conservatism,” he said.

McIntire said it took several meetings with administrators for Bobro to acknowledge he was incorrect on that point.

‘Tribal Feminism’

In his second evaluation, Bobro wrote that he recommended that McIntire delete Facebook posts critical of other faculty members and transgender individuals, and “go to a diversity workshop on campus this school year.”

“My political ideas and expressions should never have been included in the teaching evaluations,” McIntire said.  “I teach philosophy, which is all about the examination of opposing views, dispassionate, in a civil environment.”

McIntire said he believes the negative teaching evaluations and harassment claims were rooted in a bias against his political beliefs:

I was fired because of a disease. The clinical name for this disease is ‘Acute Social Justice Warrior Campusitis.’

The particular pathogen on the SBCC campus is the #MeToo tribal feminism that fired me because I was the only faculty member with the grit to [publicly] defend opposing views of conservatives, Trump voters, religious, libertarian, and home-schooled individuals.

Bobro did not return calls or emails from The Daily Signal seeking comment.

After months of legal wrangling, McIntire and the college agreed to a $120,000 settlement. According to the student newspaper, The Channels, the decision was unanimous on the part of the college’s board of trustees, with  internal deliberations ending in a 6-0 vote Aug. 9.

McIntire said college documents will list him as having resigned Aug. 3, rather than not rehired or terminated.

He told the student newspaper that the college expunged the three negative evaluations.

‘A Good Judge’

In an email to The Daily Signal, he said he has been “fully exonerated” in the four Title IX complaints.

Judge Elinor Reiner, hired by the college to investigate the complaints against McIntire, determined in her final report that the statements McIntire made to the female instructors did not rise to the level of violating Title IX law.

But Reiner wrote that she did “find that a small number of the comments made by McIntire in his e-mails were gender-based in a purposefully disparaging fashion,” adding:

While those comments reasonably could give rise to a belief among some female faculty that at times he was ‘anti-feminist,’ especially since they believed (erroneously) he never directed negative comments toward male faculty members, patently they were not ‘severe’ or ‘pervasive’ enough to demonstrate actionable harassment or bullying took place.

McIntire said he is satisfied.

“I’m grateful that my name was cleared,” he said, adding that Reiner “clearly didn’t like the language I used … but she’s a good judge, and she came down on the side of the law, Constitution and Bill of Rights.”

SOURCE 







Australia: Vic students tested on literacy, numeracy

Every high school student in Victoria will be tested against new literacy and numeracy standards, in the biggest shake up of VCE in decades.

The new standards will be reported as part of VCE or VCAL results from 2021, the Labor state government announced on Monday in a bid to ensure school leavers meet minimum literacy and numeracy standards.

"This is a change that has been called for by employers for some time, and with this additional support we will give every student the opportunity to be job ready," Education Minister James Merlino said.

The Liberal-Nationals opposition doesn't support the new testing system.

"It's a bit late. If kids have got a problem with numeracy and literacy they need to be identified very early," Opposition Leader Matthew Guy said, instead pointing to the need for phonics checks earlier in school years.

SOURCE 



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