‘Targeted minority’ status hurting UW

April 6, 2010
The Badger Herald

“Why do you keep stigmatizing our ‘targeted minority’ students? What you write and say makes them feel bad and interferes with their academic achievement.”

That is what campus administrators often tell me after something I write appears in print (e.g., “UW and dead-end diversity, Badger Herald Nov. 13, 2009; “Diversity initiative more words than actions, Badger Herald Feb. 2, 2010). Why do they say this? I suspect it is because of their annoyance with my long-standing criticisms of UW-Madison’s misguided diversity policy. What remains unclear to me is whether “targeted minority” students actually make such comments or whether administrators are describing what they imagine these students are saying.

So, what is stigmatization? It reflects, as sociologist Erving Goffman in his classic 1963 book “Stigma” tells us, the labeling by the majority of a group it regards as lacking some attribute that would make its members similar and equal to the majority group.

Here at UW-Madison, the process of stigmatization begins by designating certain groups of students — African Americans, American Indians, Hispanics and South East Asians — as “targeted minorities.”

Targeted for what, you ask? For special consideration as determined by the enlightened, well-meaning leaders from the majority group. This means giving “targeted minority” students preferences in admission, offering them extra tutoring and academic help, and providing them with their own space where they can associate together, e.g., the Multicultural Student Center, and so on.

Who is doing this stigmatizing? It is campus administrators who apply the “targeted minority” label to them. It is campus administrators who treat “targeted minority” students as if all of them need special academic help to become more like majority students.

What these administrators fail to realize is that this process of stigmatization tarnishes all “targeted minority” students. It is most damaging to those minority students who do not require any special assistance. They can already compete academically with non-minority students.

This latter group suffers in still another way. Its members know they don’t need special help. Yet, because it is offered they are reluctant to refuse it. This act could accentuate the stigmatization they already feel and also undermine the academic performance of these students who in the absence of stigma could perform academically at a higher level.

This stigmatization hardens as non-minority students observe the special treatment afforded “targeted minority” students. Non-minority students come to realize that some of them also need an extra push and could benefit from the special treatment accorded “targeted minority” students.

This evolving process creates awkwardness in interactions between non-minority and “targeted minority” students. Non-minority students are not certain how to interact with these “targeted minority” students who are so “different” from themselves and thus viewed as less than equal to themselves. Likewise, “targeted minority” students feel uncomfortable in their interactions with non-minority students not knowing whether they will be received as “normal” persons or treated with condescension if not disdain. In short, to use the words of Goffman, “targeted minority” students are seen by other students as “incomplete persons.” Unfortunately, many “targeted minority” students come to regard themselves in the same way.

What is the solution to this long-standing mistreatment of minority students and the identity politics that flows from it? What will not help is the inventive new banner of “inclusive excellence.” This term is the latest effort to camouflage what goes on at this university. It will do nothing to eliminate the stigmatization of minority students.

The solution is obvious. Eliminate the labeling of African American, American Indian, Hispanic/Latino, and South East Asian students as “targeted minorities.” Admit all applicants on a competitive basis, paying attention to their academic preparation and potential rather than their race/ethnicity, or other characteristics that give an excuse to “privilege” a “targeted minority.” Do away with unevaluated academic support and related programs that operated earlier under the name of “diversity” and now under the name of “inclusive excellence.”

In short, treat all students as equal human beings; which is what the 1964 civil rights movement sought to achieve.

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