Diversity in Appearance But Not in Thought

Tabia Lee (Chron photo)

The director of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) at De Anza College in Cupertino has been fired. Tabia Lee, a Black woman, had served less than two years on the job. [bold added]

Tabia Lee received a letter in March saying her contract would not be renewed in June because she was uncooperative with colleagues, unwilling to accept constructive criticism and unlikely to change. Lee is a vocal critic of many of today’s diversity and inclusion practices, and many colleagues at the school said she belittled their racial justice initiatives...

Lee said she will fight to keep her job as faculty director of De Anza’s Office of Equity, Social Justice and Multicultural Education, which she has carried out remotely since the fall of 2021. Her job description at the public community college of 16,000 students is to promote a “commitment to equity, social justice and multicultural education” and create an “inclusive campus environment” within an “institution-wide transformation.”

Critics said Lee sought to transform the college in the wrong direction. Groups representing Latino and Asian Pacific American employees urged the district’s Board of Trustees to remove her, contending that she subverted anti-racism initiatives by opposing everything from their efforts to gain more say in campus governance to their use of the gender-neutral term “Latinx.” In a letter to the college, Lee cited research suggesting the word has little support among Latinos themselves.

Debates on its merits can fill volumes, but my own take is that the vast majority of community college students have little use for DEI. They come to De Anza, Foothill, and the College of San Mateo to learn practical skills that they can use on the job today.

Racism and social justice may be important to some people, but those are distractions for students who are trying to learn computer programming or accounting or chemistry. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, both of whom went to De Anza College, seem to have done just fine without DEI.