Inclusion in FIRST

[CLandrum3081]

Originally Posted by Kimmeh

She's female, in STEM, and LGBTQ!? 3x Bonus! New high score!

ULTRA KILLER COMBO!

2/3 for my whole life, 3/3 since coming out. Do I get bonus points for being 2E?

In all seriousness, I'd like to write a pages-long rant about this, but it'd get a little too personal, and since I'm female the internet will assume my wish to rant has something to do with the nonexistent relative rationality of my (perceived) gender. ("But women ARE irrational! A sitcom told me so!")

Anyway, I'll truncate the ranty part of my personal experience and list some things that did and didn't work for me as a student in FIRST. I absolutely love my old team and the mentors, and would love to give back someday, and my pointing these things out is in no way meant to herald 3081 as the best team in the universe or make it out to be the worst thing that's happened in the 21st century.


Things that work:
-Inclusion of each individual: Ask the student what they're interested in, or if they'd be interested in exploring XYZ if they're unsure.
-Identifying when it's other students doing the excluding. If one kid out of the twenty present is sitting off in the corner sulking and not participating in activities, it usually means something's wrong. It's not always that the other kids are being jerks, or, if they are, it's not necessarily because the student is "different", but it's a possibility worth ruling out.

Things that don't work:
-ANY COMMENT EVER relating quality of work to (insert minority status here). "Oh, you did a great job on that, especially considering you're a girl." Replace "girl" with (insert race here) or (insert perceived or actual LGBT status here) and you've left yourself open to criticism. It should be this way with "girl", but we'll leave that rant for another day.
-Delegating students to particular tasks because of their gender/minority status/you get the drill. Getting girls that are interested in the robot to work on it or sparking that interest in students is one thing. Telling girls they need to work on the robot even if they're not interested because "we need representation from this minority in this role" is not going to be effective. It makes students feel like their only worth is whatever minority status they have, which can be confusing if that has been a subject of ridicule for years (as being a girl with non-girly interests, perceived or identifying as LGBTQ, and not being the majority ethnicity can bring).

I was going to say more, but I started getting even MORE babbly so I just deleted it. The point is, we need to make less of a mission about "WE NEED MORE GIRLS BECAUSE STATISTICS" or "WHY ARE ALL MY TEAMMATES WHITE" and more about including each individual student - "minority" or not.