Rather than mandate “diversity training” via workshops and/or coursework, a better way to increase racial harmony on campus is to live with a roommate of a different race.
So argues New York University’s Jonathan Zimmerman in the Washington Post.
Despite “[h]undreds of schools offer[ing] diversity training and other programming, aimed at changing the overall racial climate on campus,” research has shown they have little or no effect, he says. (Indeed, the authors of one recent study, published in the Harvard Business Review, point out that efforts to increase racial harmony “can backfire,” leading to “increased hostility rather than less.”)
Zimmerman points to research done by psychologist Jim Sidanius which demonstrated that if individuals had a roommate of a different race, they showed “significant gains in the comfort levels they exhibited” around those of a different race/ethnicity.
Unfortunately, the author goes from one mandate to another: Students would have to have a roommate — and a randomly assigned one at that.
Likewise, recent research by Dartmouth College economist Bruce Sacerdote showed that interracial freshmen roommate pairs were more likely to interact with members of different races than were freshmen who roomed with someone of the same race.
Unfortunately, more colleges are allowing freshmen to choose their own roommates. And, unsurprisingly, almost everyone who does that selects someone of the same race. Many schools are also offering single rooms to freshmen, who happily seize the opportunity — if they can afford it — to avoid the “hassle” of living with someone else.
MORE: Diversity requirement over math requirement?
So I’ve got a simple proposal: Instead of expending yet more resources on multicultural programming, let’s generate multicultural roommate pairings. All freshmen roommates should be randomly assigned, as in the past. And we should bar or discourage freshmen from taking single rooms, so that they’re forced to live with another person.
A study of Ohio State University freshmen found that African American students who came to college with high standardized test scores earned better grades if they had a white roommate than if they had a black one. As one black student suggested, blacks who lived with whites might be motivated to work harder to avoid confirming negative stereotypes about minority academic performance.
Zimmerman adds that “[l]iving with someone forces you to engage in the messy, unpredictable work of interactions that students call FTF (face to face) or IRL (in real life.)”
If it came down to it, I’d certainly prefer a random roomie (of whatever race/ethnicity) than having to endure required, cockamamie, and inanely scripted diversity “training sessions” any day of the week.
MORE: Despite drop in donations, enrollment, Mizzou has $1 million for ‘diversity audit’
MORE: Profs: Campus diversity efforts do more harm than good
Like The College Fix on Facebook / Follow us on Twitter
IMAGE: Ron Mader/Flickr
Please join the conversation about our stories on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit, MeWe, Rumble, Gab, Minds and Gettr.