Diversity Or Ability?

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/12035655/Fast-track-transgender-teachers-for-a-30000-grant-school-heads-told.html

/// Schools are being offered £30,000 extra funding to hire and promote gay and transgender teachers, it can be revealed. ///

/// Critics have described the policy as "profoundly misguided" and warned it will oblige head teachers to favour some staff over others, regardless of their
ability. ///

[Mosaic]

What's the question you want to ask AOG?

[Mamyalynne]

Interesting article thank you - of course on reading it the scheme is far wider than gay and transgender isn't it?

[mikey4444]

I'm not sure what your question is either AOG ?

[jim360]

Critics often makes that point, about how actively trying to broaden a workforce's diversity can undermine talent. I'm not so sure it's necessarily true, because the reason it's important to work to encourage diversity in the first place is that a workforce drawn from only a subsection of society is less likely to be the most talented available -- either because people not represented are being turned away despite their talent, or because talented people from the rest of society are worried about the risks of discrimination and so are put off from applying for the job in the first place.

It does pay, in general, to encourage diversity in the workplace. As a short-term measure, at least -- in the longer term, you'd hope it would no longer be necessary. But we aren't at that stage yet.

[vulcan42]

Why have Mosaic & mikey4444 both queried AOG regarding his question when both have previously posted statements and not questions?

[mikey4444]

Jin...good reply ! BA perhaps ?

[Mosaic]

Whyever not? Vulcan, can you work out what AOG's question is?

[Old_Geezer]

One is trying to produce discrimination against the hiring of those who are not in the favoured category. This is wrong regardless of what the final aim is as it disadvantages unfairly, and is thus hypocritical by its nature. Aims do not always justify means. But it is no different to the same practice applied for other groups in the past.

[Mosaic]

If you read the actual diversity information from the NCSL its seems reasonable and straightforward. It basically says, school heads are best placed to judge what their school might need to focus on, so they can apply for funding. It also says as many kids at or around puberty realise they are not conventionally gendered, the best placed people to counsel them might be drawn from similar communities.
But I still don't know what the question is.

[mikey4444]

Neither do I Mosaic !

[Mamyalynne]

I don't think there is a question as such, simply making us aware of this fund.



//The fund encourages applications on the basis of so-called protected characteristics, defined by the Equality Act in 2010.
These include age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation.//

[mikey4444]

Well, I think its sounds OK to me Mamy !

[sp1814]

Thank you AOG for posting this. Seems reasonable, as others have pointed out.

Others have failed to see your question, but I think I know what concerns you. I don't think that diversity and ability are necessarily mutually exclusive.

It doesn't have to be either/or, as many of us who have experience of working with talented and inspirational teachers from all walks of life can attest.

[anotheoldgit]

vulcan42

Thank you vulcan, yes it seems it does confuse some, they would rather me make a direct statement, then they can go ahead and play their little childish games.

But if I am wrong and it is more about them being a little slow on the up-take, I will go to the trouble and try and explain it all to them.

The question was:

Diversity Or Ability?

Well here we have two different words with an 'OR' between them, followed by a question mark (?), this symbol suggests that it is a question.

So therefore the reader is asked a question, "Diversity or Ability" which give the reader an opportunity to answer if they so wish, bearing in mind that they are not forced to of course.

So lets now give a few choices that they can make:

Is it more important to choose Diversity over Ability?

Is it more important to choose Ability over Diversity?

Is it best to incorporate the two providing of course one doesn't have an adverse effect on the other?

Well you can't say I didn't try, next question?

[sp1814]

AOG

You introduced the 'or'.

It can be both.

It usually is.

Also, with the volume of testing and structured training and performance protocols that schools have in place, the ability question is answered time and time again.

So I think you may have little to worry about.

[jim360]

Put it this way, AOG -- do you think, when (good) jobs went almost exclusively to middle-class white men, that the selection criteria were based solely, and without discriminating based on background, on ability?

Like I said in my earlier post, ability and diversity should, and do, go hand-in-hand. The more people you are drawing from when choosing your workforce, the better chance you will have of finding the most able people.

[mikey4444]

Well said Jim !

[Peter Pedant]

Jim360 hi sunny Jim ? is it pssoing down in Edinburgh ?

I thought you were gonna say: do you want your child/grandchild to be taught math by some man in a dress or by someone who can add ? That last one would be you Jim,

or as my dear late mum used to say ( of her surgeon Lancelot Spratt )
I dont care how rude he is, can he do the operation ?

[jim360]

Who do you think is in my avatar though, PP?

[Togo]

Bradford , Luton, Birmingham, and many more education authorities must immediately recruit transgender and openly gay or lesbian teachers to comply. Good luck with that one. But the more rural schools will of course be forced to.