Self Analysis

The first day this blog project was assigned, I had no idea what topic I wanted to do.  I started off very broad with the topic racism and sexism in America.  Dr. Frost said I had to narrow down that broad topic to a specific topic in that area.  My original focus was minorities in the workplace, and how they are increasing.  However, by doing more research I found a better argument about how affirmative action is used in colleges and the workplace.  The issue of affirmative action in the workplace is not one of the main political issues right now, and that is why I chose to do it.  I wanted to inform others about this important topic.

During my research process, I read many articles that were factual and articles that were opinionated.  The reading of these articles lead me to the two sides of this issue as people who want affirmative action to continue or people who want affirmative action to stop.  This debate can also be viewed politically as Democrats vs. Republicans.  Democrats want to continue the idea of affirmative action in the workplace, while Republicans would like affirmative action to end.  My opinion was affirmative action is needed to ensure minorities are represented fairly in the workplace.  From the beginning of the blog until now my opinion has not changed, however now I feel more educated on this topic because I presented both sides of the argument without bias, and defended my opinion.   A solution to make both sides of the issue happy is for employers to market jobs for a diverse group of people, which would lead to a diverse applicant pool the employer could choose from.  More qualified minorities would apply for a job that was marketed towards a diverse group of people.

As the country moves forward, I am curious to see if affirmative action in the workplace will continue or will it be done away with.  With the election of the country’s first African-American president, the country seems to be moving in the right direction.

I hope you enjoyed reading my blog!

Links Post

http://www.watchblog.com/republicans/archives/001819.html

The watchblog is a Republican blog that defined the stance of Republicans on the issue of affirmative action in college and workplace.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2353196/both_sides_of_affirmative_action_in.html?cat=31

This website offered a solution that made both sides of the affirmative action issue happy, which I used in my theory post.

http://www.bvblackspin.com/2008/10/14/democrat-view-affirmative-action/

This website offered the opinion of Democrats on the issue of affirmative action in America.

http://www.ur.umich.edu/0203/June16_03/01_decision.shtml

The University of Michigan’s website gave an in depth summary of the Supreme Court decision to uphold affirmative action.  I cited this site multiple times throughout my blog.

http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/aahist.html

In Motion Magazine created a timeline on the history of affirmative action in America, which help me narrow done specific aspects I wanted to research on affirmative action.

http://www.balancedpolitics.org/affirmative_action.htm

This website provided positives and negatives of affirmative action.

http://www.balancedpolitics.org/affirmative_action.htm

This website provided an in depth definition of affirmative action.

Implications Post

As stated in the theory post, Democrats and Republicans are at a disagreement with the issue of affirmative action.  One solution offered was marketing jobs to a diverse pool of applicants.  However, if the solution does not work, and the issue is not solved then both parties will still be unhappy.   Republicans feel that affirmative action is not necessary anymore in America, and Democrats want affirmative action to stay.  Since this issue cannot be resolved, the country will just stay with the status quo and handle affirmative action in the way it was handled in the past.  The last Supreme Court Case was the University of Michigan case, and the court ruled in favor of affirmative action.  Therefore, I do not think anything is going to change in the coming years with affirmative action.

Class Links

Here are some of my classmates’ blogs who I found very interesting.

http://reformingimmigrationlaws.blogspot.com/

I really enjoyed reading this blog because immigration is such a big issue.  The argument about reforming immigration laws was presented in an unbiased view.  The blog explained the different sides of the debate and what exactly needs to be done to reform immigration laws.

http://mosqueman2010.blogspot.com

I started reading this blog because I did not know much about the issue of the Mosque in Manhattan.  I knew this issue would be very controversial, but the blog did not present any bias.  The issue of the Mosque being built in Manhattan was thoroughly explained, and I gained a better understanding of the issue.

http://standup-genocide.blogspot.com

I liked reading this blog because genocide is close issue to me.  The blog did a great job in explaining the different genocides in the world and creating awareness.  The blog did not present any bias, and it presented genocide as a bigger issue that our country needs to be aware of.

The Future of Affirmative Action

With the election of an African-American President, many people feel that affirmative action is not complete.  Indeed the election of Obama showed that America is getting better about racial discrimination and starting to be fair.  Obama ran on a colorblind campaign.  He did not want be judge on his skin tone, but the content of his character.  When Obama addressed the NAACP during his election, he did not mention affirmative action, but he called for more cops to protect on the streets.  His speech was broad and not race focused like speeches given by Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson.  The different race supporters of Obama interrupted his election in different ways.  Blacks perceived his election as the “advancing the black community”, whites perceived his election as “post-racial” politics, and the multiracial supporters perceived the notion of colorblind policy as naïve.

The election of the first African-American president has shown affirmative action has worked.  However, I do not think the country is fully ready to discard all affirmative action, especially from the workplace.  There are becoming more African-American CEOs, but the majority of all companies are under the control of the white majority.  If affirmative action had been eliminated, would African-American have the opportunity to be CEOs?  I don’t think they would.  Affirmative action allows for all minorities to receive a fair chance in the workplace and college admission.  Had this policy not been in place, there would be more racial discrimination now.  One day in the future, affirmative action will not be necessary because this country will truly be colorblind.  However, that day will not be very soon so affirmative action needs to stay.

Source: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/11/what-s-next-for-affirmative-action/7122/

Fall Break Post- Political Cartoon 2

http://filipspagnoli.wordpress.com/2008/04/04/human-rights-cartoon-46/

Political Cartoon #1- Affirmative Action

This cartoon describes how Ivy League schools give preferences to the rich and wealthy, and normally do not accept students coming from poor backgrounds.

Source: http://bradbrown.com

Theory Post

This issue is polarized because Democrats want affirmative action to continue, while Republicans want to end affirmative action.  Republicans believe that affirmative action has already done its job since there are minorities in leadership positions, and it causes reverse discrimination because the best candidate for the job may not have been hired because the company had to hire a minority to fill a quota.  Democrats believe affirmative action is still necessary because not everybody in this country is born with the same opportunities.  Affirmative action allows for all people, especially minorities, to get equal treatment when applying to colleges and the workplace.  I discussed in my analysis post how students growing up in a majority minority inner city school are at a disadvantage when applying for college.  If these minorities do not get into college, then they will not be in the workplace.  One solution  to solve the problem and make both sides happy is to advertise the job to a diverse group of applicants to apply for the job.  The company would be able to hire the most qualified applicant and also meet its requirement of minority employees.  Having company’s advertise jobs to a diverse group gives everybody, including minorities, to get a fair chance in receiving the job.  In the future, I do not really see both sides coming together and saying that affirmative action is not needed, or it is needed, but I it will become less and less of an issue debated.

Reflection on Anaylsis Post

After researching affirmative action, I learned some new interesting facts.  As big of issue as affirmative action is, many people do not know about it.  I find that odd considering it involves college admissions and employment.  Even the two many political parties do not discuss the topic of affirmative action, even though the strongly oppose each other.  Minorities are the ones who should be well informed about affirmative action, yet they are the ones who mostly do not know about affirmative action.  I maybe wrong, but I think that is a problem.  How can minorities fight for the issue of affirmative action, if they do not even know what it is?  If the government decided to take affirmative action away, most minorities could not come up with the first reason why affirmative action is necessary.  Minorities need to be educated on the issue of affirmative action so they will know what they are fighting for. 

On to a lighter note, affirmative action allows for an increase in minority workers in the workplace.  Think about it, if there are more minorities in colleges that means more minorities will be graduating and entering the workplace.  In my analysis post, I found research that shows minorities in inner-city schools are at a disadvantage when applying to colleges than students who go to school in the suburbs.   Everybody deserves an equal chance to be accepted by colleges, and affirmative action provides that opportunity.  This same justification can be applied to the workplace.  Everyone deserves an equal chance at employment, especially high level management jobs.  Without affirmative action, minorities would not be represented in college or the workplace.

Analysis Post

Affirmative action has been a part of America’s history for 48 years.  Affirmative action was introduced in 1961 by President Kennedy.  The term “affirmative action” means measures taken to increase opportunities for women and minorities in areas of employment, education, and business from which they have been historically excluded.  President Lyndon Johnson issued the Executive Order 11246, which allowed affirmative action to hire without consideration to race, religion, and national origin.  Different forms of affirmative action range from rigid quotas to target outreach that encourage minorities to apply.  The different programs decide how much weight they give race in determining an application for the college admission.   The same forms can also be used in the workplace.   Affirmative action is needed to allow for minorities to have fair job opportunities in the workplace.

The issue of affirmative action and its interpretation often leads to the question should affirmative action policies be eliminated because the policy is based on race.  There are both positive and negatives to this question, which represent the various arguments.  The main negative argument is affirmative action encourages reverse discrimination.  Reverse discrimination is discrimination in hiring, college admissions, employment, etc are directed toward the majority population such as white males.  Allan Bakke was a white male, who had been rejected from a medical two years in a row, but the same school had selected less qualified minorities, and the school reserved 16 out of 100 spots for minorities.  Bakke sued the University of California, and the court ruled that Bakke was discriminated against, but refused him entrance into the medical school.   The case was taken to the Supreme Court where it confirmed with the trial court’s decision that the admissions process was unconstitutional, but the Supreme Court ordered Bakke be admitted into the school.  This case was significant because it was the first time the Supreme Court said there could be reverse discrimination.  Other negative arguments are students who are admitted based on affirmative action are not prepared to handle the university they have been accepted to, employment is based on race or gender rather than merit, and creates an attitude of “us versus them”.   Supporters of affirmative action say it is needed to make sure minorities and women have a fair opportunity in education and employment.  Statistics have shown that schools that serve majority of minority inner-city children receive about half of the money per student than schools that are located in the suburbs.  White men hold 97% of the top executive positions, and the black male worker makes sufficiently lower wages than a white male worker.  Affirmative action allows for minorities to the same opportunities as the qualified majority party.

The two areas that affirmative action affects the most people and causes the most controversy are college admissions and the workplace.   In college admissions affirmative action  helps individuals from diverse backgrounds have an opportunity to have an education at a university that has historically accepted students with certain backgrounds and income bracket.   Many students with high socio-economic classes generally have an advantage when applying to college, especially Ivy League schools.  Affirmative action is a policy that compensates for the inequalities between socio-economic classes.  It also allows for more diversity in schools.  Affirmative action  has allowed for many minorities and women to move up and have high positions in the workplace.  The positive effect of diversity in the workplace is the understanding of cultures of your peers.  Businesses (9) also use diversity management, which is a plan that develops affirmative action programs that provide support for minority members in the workplace.

The affirmative action debate is the difference between color-blind versus race-conscious.  The color-blind approach is the more supported approach.  Color-blind is how employers and college admissions advertise in media mostly seen by minorities to recruit them for colleges and employment.  Many supporters of this approach are interested in creating fair education and employment for minorities, and they accept the inequalities in achievement.  The race-conscious approach encourages minorities to be considered in admissions and hiring to reach a numerical goal or quota.  Race-conscious is also called preferential treatment or affirmative discrimination.  These two approaches have answers to the basic questions about social justice and human rights, and an employer or college admissions must have a full understanding of these questions so he or she can facilitate affirmative action.

Republicans and Democrats normally an opposite on every issue and affirmative action is no different.  Republicans view affirmative action as unnecessary and unfair.  They argue that two students with equal academic success will not have the same admissions opportunity, and the minority race of the student could be the factor that gives that person the spot in the class.   Because affirmative action uses race as factor to be considered in college admissions and employment, Republicans feel it insults all the hardworking students and employees, despite race or economic background.  The University of Michigan’s admission process was challenged by Republicans as being unfair because more points were given to race, than a perfect SAT score.  President Bush called the admission process “fundamentally flawed and it is a quota system that rejects or accepts students based solely on race.”    An example Republicans use is a son of a  black millionaire would get preference over a son of a white unemployed high school dropout under the admissions process.  However, Democrats view affirmative action as very necessary and fair.  Because minorities have historically been discriminated against, affirmative action guarantees to restrict discrimination in the future against minorities, which Democrats view as very important.  In 2003, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 the University of Michigan’s  admissions policies to consider race to achieve a diverse student body was constitutional.  This ruling was significant because it was the first approved method to pursue diversity in colleges and it provided a map for other colleges to diverse their school.  Even though affirmative action is a large issue Democrats and Republicans disagree upon, it normally is flown below the radar.  When the Supreme Court decided in the University of Michigan, many people knew nothing about the case.   The issue of affirmative action had much greater attention from Democrats than from Republicans and other minority political parties.

After researching affirmative action and how it affects the opportunities for minorities in college admissions and the workplace, it is necessary to provide the same job opportunities for minorities in the workplace.  Affirmative action gives minorities who would not normally have a chance to go to college of their choice, including Ivy League schools.  As stated earlier, minority students who attends a majority minority inner-city school is at a disadvantage than a students who attends a schools in the suburbs.  Affirmative action allows for those the students who go to the inner-city schools to compete with the students who attend the schools in the suburbs.  With more minorities in college, there will be more minorities in the workplace.  Colin Powel said, “ I believe race should be a factor among many other factor in determining the makeup of a student body of a university”, which shows that minority leaders are in favor of affirmative action.  When it comes to the workplace, affirmative action allows for minorities the same job opportunity as the majority race.  Without affirmative action, some of our important minority leaders such as President Obama may not have happened.

Unemployment Rates of Miniority Workers

As I stated in my earlier blog, minority groups have been projected to increase in numbers by the year 2014.  However, I do not think these projections accounted for this current economic recession.  Minority workers have the highest unemployment rates in America.  African Americans and Latinos have the highest unemployment rate among the minority groups.  As of March of this year, 13.2 million Americans were unemployed.  While Caucasians unemployment rate was 7.9%, African Americans had an unemployment rate of 13.3% and Latinos had an unemployment rate of 11.4%.  As the numbers show, this economic situation has been devastating for minority workers, and there seems to be no hope in sight.  Because of the high unemployment rate of minority groups, they are said to be in a depression and not a recession.  Clearly, a depression is worse than a recession.

I am a college freshman and these current statistics scare me to death.  In three to four years, I will be out of college looking for a job, but if these unemployment rates keep climbing, there may not be a job for me.  I can only imagine how other minorities feel who just graduated college.  Minorities are already at a disadvantage when competing for jobs (that is why we need affirmative action), and this weak economy does not help minorities either.  Minorities want to be successful, but they always seem to be getting the short end of the stick.  I have read articles stating that affirmative action should end.  Now if this were to happen, these unemployment rates are going to increase drastically.

Affirmative Action and the Workplace, Dr. KSanford and LWalker3

New Introduction and Admissions in College

As I was reading other introduction blog, I realized my introduction blog was more like a blog post, so I will introduce my position here.  There is a growing number of minorities in America through birth and immigration.  America established to affirmative action to make amends for blacks and females for past discrimination.  Republicans feel affirmative action is not necessary anymore, while Democrats feel it is very necessary.  Affirmative action is needed to allow for minorities to have fair job opportunities in the workplace.

Affirmative action is a measure that allows consideration to guarantee that minorities are allowed the same opportunities to be included in pools with qualified candidates.  One of the pools is college.  Race can be a factor in state funded colleges in admissions.  College admissions look at race to diverse its campus.  Some students would not be able to get into their college of choice had it not been for affirmative action.  Affirmative action allows for all students to be looked at on the same playing field.  There are many minorities who come from low performing schools, so even though the student has high grades, he might not be as strong as a student who went to a private school.  One strong believer of affirmative action in college admissions is Colin Powell.  Powell wants to have everything in the country to be race neutral, however he does not believe are there yet.  He thinks race should be a factor along with many other factors for college admissions.  If more minorities are in college, then more minorities will enter into the workplace.

The Issue of Minorities in the Workplace

In 2004, there were more Hispanics (13.1%) than African Americans (11.3%) in the workforce.  Projections for the 2014 workplace have shocked many people.  African-Americans in the workforce are expected to increase 16.8%, while Hispanics increase by 33.7%.  Hispanics are expected to make up 15% of the labor force, which is up from 13.1% in 2004.  Asian-Americans are also expected to increase making up 5.1% of the labor force.   The white labor force is projected to decrease more than the overall labor force.  They are decreasing from 70% (in 2004) to 65.6% in 2014.  My source of information is from libraryindex.com.  What do these projections mean for America?  Minorities are becoming more popular in the workplace due to higher birth rates and immigration.

Having higher percentages of minorities in the workplace would not have happened if it were not for affirmative action.  Affirmative action was created to make amends to blacks and females for past discrimination.  Affirmative action was used in job applications and college applications.  Republicans and Democrats have different views on affirmative action.  Republicans say that affirmative action is no longer needed because it is not fair for goals and quotas to be based on race.  The Republican & Conservatives Archives wrote an article in 2004 and provided this example about how a son of a black millionaire would get preference over a son of a white unemployed high school dropout.  However, Democrats say affirmative action is completely necessary.  The BV Black Spin wrote an article about the Democrat view on affirmative action.   They view affirmative action as measure that allows special consideration to guarantee that minorities are allowed the same opportunities to be included in pools of qualified job candidates.  Without affirmative action, many of our dominant minority leaders would not be around.