FIRST Experiences as a Person of Color

[Shrub]

Hi CD,

Almost a month ago a post was made about Legion of Black FRC Participants (link) and (link) on CD, which I think is a great idea. Since then, I have been thinking about my experiences in FRC as a person of color and how they may differentiate between my white friends, as well as my friends who are also PoC. I wanted to create a thread for POC who have or are participating in FIRST to share their experiences and how these identities (and others they hold) intersect, and any other relevant comments they may have. I apologize if this thread sounds exclusionary to any.

Some links for relevant reading (Feel free to link some more!):
Inclusion in FIRST: (link)
This article (link) from Gender Equality: A Work in Progress: (link)
Women of color in STEM and bias: (link)
Editorial from Huffington Post: (link)

[Bgreen1591]

One thing is for sure, not a lot of people look like us at competitions or events. Only people that apparently do look like us are, music producers and retired basketball players...

[RoboMom]

FIRST hired for a new position in Sept. Inclusion and Diversity Manager. PM me if you want the contact.

[Shrub]

Originally Posted by Shrub

(snip)a non-white-passing person of color and how they may differentiate between my white-passing and white friends(snip)

I got a PM about this terminology and I wanted to clarify what I mean. I didn't mean to offend in any way with this terminology and it has been brought to my attention that this has been used in a derogatory and offensive sense, and that was not my intention in using these terms. Feel free to use any other terms as you see fit and comfortable.

When I say non-white-passing, I mean someone who is not perceived by others who do not know someone's ethnicity as white. On the flip-side, a white-passing person is perceived by others as white but is a PoC. I brought this up mainly because my brother and I are both Hispanic and at one point were both in FRC, but many people thought he was white until he clarified that we were both Hispanic (or he spoke in Spanish). I do not bring this up to address any type of privileges held by any other group, simply experiences, and have amended my original post.

Again, I used this term because it is a common one for me and did not know of its derogatory past until it was brought up to me, which I am very glad it was.

[Monochron]

Originally Posted by Bgreen1591

One thing is for sure, not a lot of people look like us at competitions or events. Only people that apparently do look like us are, music producers and retired basketball players...

This was brought up by our RD last year. Having non-white judges and other officials as an example to non-white students is a priority and, I agree, could still use some work. I know there is effort being made in NC.

[Sperkowsky]

I think the diversity is much better in naturally diverse places. In lower NY we are naturally very diverse and the teams are by result.

[mrnoble]

Originally Posted by Sperkowsky

I think the diversity is much better in naturally diverse places. In lower NY we are naturally very diverse and the teams are by result.

This is true to an extent. FIRST has an up-and-down history with issues surrounding race, gender, ethnicity, and similar. Our team's first year (2004) was almost our last due to the way FRC organizers in our state attempted to "highlight" persons of color on our team, essentially treating our school and it's kids as a zoo with exhibits. It was insulting at best. We re-entered FRC two years later, when our concerns were addressed. The state leadership for the last five years (at least) is part of our community and are very much engaged in making FRC accessible and welcoming, and I have nothing but respect for them and their work.

I'm glad this thread is up, this is an important topic.

[jeser#1772]

This is a very interesting discussion

In Brazil we do not differentiate people, we just have Brazilians in Brazil

I remember answering the FIRST questionnaire about the percentage each ethnicity within the team and not actually knowing what to do...

I ended up spending a long time thinking what to answer and at the end I just ticked "other” and put "people" in the box, I also requested that FIRST did not ask me that again.

[Monochron]

Originally Posted by jeser#1772

This is a very interesting discussion

In Brazil we do not differentiate people, we just have Brazilians in Brazil.

A possible analog for you could be foreign students vs. local students. I think you would agree that it would feel very different to go to a competition in Brazil and have every judge, MC, and volunteer be a white American. Or if you came to America for a competition and those same people only spoke Portuguese and came from South America.
Diversity is important everywhere, though it is certainly more of an issue in some places than others. The reason I care about it is that I don't want minorities (whether that's females or other racial minorities) to see the STEM world as only inclusive of majorities or men.

[FrankJ]

Originally Posted by Bgreen1591

One thing is for sure, not a lot of people look like us at competitions or events. Only people that apparently do look like us are, music producers and retired basketball players...

Not that many people make a big deal of his ethnicity, but Lonnie Johnson (inventor of the super soaker) is a supporter of First. I not sure if he is a judge, but he gave substantial speeches at the Peachtree & Georgia Southern Classic regionals. (past tense because we are going to districts next year.) He also hosts one of Georgia's DE fields at his research facility.

[tab1a]

I'm not sure if my experiences as an Asian in FIRST are relevant here, but I have noticed that at least in the Pacific Northwest East and South Asian are fairly well represented. However, our robotics team has barely any Hispanic and African American team members, which comes as no surprise as our state, Oregon, is one of the whitest. However, despite the fact that Asians are so well represented, micro-aggressions still absolutely take place on the part of white FRC team members which is something I hope will soon change.

[Katie_UPS]

I always wanted someone to start a thread about this but never felt it was my place to start one, so kudos to you for starting this. I too have noticed a lack of representation of PoC in first, both as participants and as guests/judges. It gets more bleak when you look for people who tick off multiple "diversity" boxes such as females of color.

It's definitely not any PoC's responsibility to educate white folk, but if anyone is willing, what are some ways we (non PoC) can be allies? What type of things would you like to see at events? Should volunteer coordinators try to focus on making a more diverse judging pane/volunteer crewl? Should we (the collective FIRST community) try to get more distinguished guests/speakers that are PoC at events?

I think the Legion of Black FRC Participants is a good thing. I hope it becomes a strong community much like FIRST Ladies has.

[jman4747]

Originally Posted by Katie_UPS

It's definitely not any PoC's responsibility to educate white folk, but if anyone is willing, what are some ways we (non PoC) can be allies? What type of things would you like to see at events? Should volunteer coordinators try to focus on making a more diverse judging pane/volunteer crewl? Should we (the collective FIRST community) try to get more distinguished guests/speakers that are PoC at events?

The number one thing anyone can do in regards to race is to not worry about it. Most Problems occur when some assumption about someone is made based on race. Think of skin color like pit scouting robots. What good elim pick list is based solely off pit scouting data?

As far as the current level of diversity in FIRST? More external factors seem to be at play than internal. From my perspective (African American) FIRST and the general community aren't doing anything particularly wrong and my experience has been generally positive. #1 reason you will or won't see someone of color on a FIRST team is where it is located. Who goes to the school. #2 is media. How many African American engineers or female engineers have you heard of? More importantly how often are they mentioned? If you never see it you won't think of it as an option. Then you're flooded with examples of every profession but engineering to seal the deal (mostly sports & entertainment).

[GeeTwo]

We are always striving to more aggressively recruit minorities who are less likely to show up for the team based on "generic" recruiting. Looking at our Facebook photo, which is our Bayou Blue Banner team photo, I see that no fewer than 5 of the 36 students and receent alumni in the photo would self-describe as non-white, and several others for whom I really don't know. Slidell is listed as 73% white, 16% black, 8% hispanic, and 3% others categories, and northern Slidell (SHS' district) is more predominately white than southern Slidell, so we're pretty close to representative. Only eleven were female, but they included a team co-captain, the drive coach, the human player, and a candidate for the most impressive freshman ever on the team. I believe that our smaller 2016 team has a higher percentage of minorities, both in gender and race. It has even become a bit of a team joke that whenever someone expresses that he or she is a member of a gender, racial, or other minority that the response is one of surprise (oh, you're black? and even on a few occasions oh, you're a girl?) but not concern. Honestly, most of our students don't care what race someone is, and several of the mentors are hustling to keeping up.

This year, we have started having "build" and "business" functions at different time, to make it clear that every team member should have a function on both sides. This was an intentional move to limit the "natural" migration of girls to "business only" functions, and inhibition of boys in serving in business functions. One of the truths that many of the mentors did not learn until after we were out of college is that a scientist, engineer, or mathematician needs to also be a bit of a salesman to prosper. The good news is that you can succeed without having to sell garbage - but it is essential that you can sell the ideas you believe in. OBTW, this same salesmanship in something you believe in helps our students become STEM ambassadors in the world, and you can't cut it much finer than this: being STEM ambassadors is what FIRST is really all about.

[Shrub]

Originally Posted by Katie_UPS

It's definitely not any PoC's responsibility to educate white folk, but if anyone is willing, what are some ways we (non PoC) can be allies? What type of things would you like to see at events? Should volunteer coordinators try to focus on making a more diverse judging pane/volunteer crewl? Should we (the collective FIRST community) try to get more distinguished guests/speakers that are PoC at events?

Hey! I just wanted to chime in. I think a great way to begin allyship is becoming aware of, and developing language to combat microagressions, which were previously mentioned. In my experience, microagressions add another layer of stress to FIRST functions and events as I happen to check so many "diversity boxes". They're also hard to deal with when one is a token student with no idea how to explain why something makes them upset. Having an environment that challenges stereotypes and microagressions also becomes more inviting to students who may have been wary of the environment beforehand.

A second thing is to learn about "nerd culture," which can be elitist and exclusionary to those who are not constantly surrounded by it. It's also extremely common in FIRST due to the overlap of students into general nerdery - especially video games - and also robots. I'm not saying one has to dismantle nerd culture signlehandeldly, but becoming aware of how one may be exclusionary to others (and then learning how they can personally change that) is always good. NPR Latino recently posted a podcast about nerd culture that may be worth a listen (link, scroll down to Diversity in Geekdom). I don't have many links on the issue sadly.

Forcing or deliberately highlighting student diversity is often harmful to students, as is shown in mrnoble 's post. It's kind of like when college brochures try to include every minority in a photograph. This can backfire on team dynamics and the students who are being highlighted due to the "diversity boxes" they check.

[I'd also love to see more diverse judging and volunteer crews, but that's heavily based on the demographics of the area. Seeing speakers and guests that are also PoC is also really awesome whenever it happens. Even little things like the naming of Championship fields can go a long way-this isn't to say that only little things can work. These are all things that can only happen (or usually only happen) as collective communities, and I really wanted to focus on what individuals can do for allyship. I do not speak for all PoC, obviously.]

Thank you all for the positive messages so far as well!