Week 7: Equality

There has been a lot of talk about equality lately. Racial equality. Gender equality. Income equality. These are the big three. I am not here to pretend that there are not more inequalities or that the big three are not weaved together like a nice Irish sweater. Of course they are. However, I do think that there is a part of the equality discussion that we don't talk about. That will be my topic for the week.

First lady Melania Trump spoke about equality, freedom and the responsibility women have to help each other achieve success at an invitation-only luncheon honoring International Women's Day Wednesday at the White House. CNN Article

Before we start, let’s agree on a couple things:

1. We want equality.
2. There are limited resources.

If my classroom has 30 students in it and I want to reward the students for their work in the class with a percentage of a delicious chocolate pie. How can I do that? Some students are going to fail and some are going to do great. Some students are inevitably going to get a large percentage of the pie and others will get very little if any. Since, I want equality, I want everyone to get an equal amount but there is a limited amount of pie. If I just give everyone an equal amount regardless of the work they do in class there is no incentive to work hard. So I can’t do that. However, some students don’t really have to try and they are going to get a large percentage of the pie and others are going to bust their butt and get a small percentage or none. That’s not fair, is it?

Delicious Chocolate Pie

The reality is some students have advantages. Sure there are a few students that defeat all odds and achieve regardless of their disadvantages (The American Dream) but for the most part the students with the inherited advantages get more of the pie then the students with less of the advantages.

Let’s review what we agreed upon:    

1. We want equality.
2. There are limited resources.

If we want equality and we recognize that there are limited resources then we have to take a good look at the students with the advantages. If we allow those students to continue to have those advantages there is no way that we are going to achieve equality. It just can’t happen.

Here in America we want equality but we fail to accept the reality that there are limited resources. We are under the impression that if everyone just works hard enough that there are an unlimited amount of delicious chocolate pies. Sure, we could use are resources more efficiently and there could be more delicious chocolate pies then there are now but there will never be an unlimited amount. The answer to equality is not for disadvantaged groups to work harder. Sorry, I wish it was.   

The answer to equality is that the advantaged groups need to be willing to share the extra portion of the pie. This makes perfect sense to the disadvantaged groups but it makes absolutely no sense to the advantaged groups. For example, I talked to my classes this week about gender inequality to coincide with International Women’s Day and they all agreed that it existed. On average they said that men get about 70% of the pie and women get about 30%. My next question was, what advantages should men give up to ensure gender equality? As you can imagine the girls had a lot of ideas but the boys were flabbergasted. They want gender equality but they don’t want to give up their portion of the pie. They want gender equality but they want to keep their advantages.    

One male student said:

“I don’t think men should have to sacrifice anything.

If the women who want equality should just fight really hard for it…”  

This is a very American view on equality. If there were unlimited resources it would work. But there isn’t. Here’s my argument. If you are part of an advantaged group but you are not willing to give up your advantages then I am sorry but you do not want equality.

If we go back to the big three: race, gender and income; I have all three of these advantages. I get a lot of delicious chocolate pie. I grew up in the city of Chicago. I have driven in a car from here to there, fast and slow, swervy and straight, through stop signs here and red lights there and through whatever neighborhoods I wanted. I’m a safe driver but I’m not perfect, no one is, yet I have never once was pulled over by CPD. Am I willing to give up that advantage? I was a slow learner. I didn’t learn to read until I was in 3rd grade but no one ever questioned my ability to be successful. “Boys will be boys.” “He’ll figure it out.” “Just give him time.” “He can be whatever he wants when he grows up.” Am I willing to take that advantage away from my rambunctious son Nate? My Dad was a doctor. I went to Catholic Schools. Sure there were families with more money, there always will be, but I never worried about food on the table or medical insurance. My kids don’t either. Am I willing to take a piece of that delicious chocolate pie and share it?

Nate Getting Low

           

If it was that easy people would probably just share their pie. I know my students would. If I gave out pieces of pie based on achievement but I told them they could share if they wanted to. They would. I have confidence that we would too. But that only solves the problem for the day. After the pie is shared certain students still have advantages. If we want real equality then we have to help disadvantaged groups earn more of our pie. Not the pie or someone else’s pie. OUR PIE.

How? Well… first of all, we need to do more then just let them “fight for it.” Members of the advantaged groups have to build scaffolds. Sorry, this is teacher talk. It means we need to provide structures for disadvantaged groups so that they can access the same stuff as the advantaged groups until they are no longer disadvantaged. It sounds crazy. Why would I build scaffolds to let other people access my portion of delicious chocolate pie? Because I believe in equality that’s why. Remember. We agreed.

Many of us have shown support for disadvantaged groups and that is great. We have demonstrated that we want equality but now it’s time to take the next step. Now we need to provide access to our extra portion of delicious chocolate pie. If we are members of advantaged groups what scaffolds are we building for equality? If we’re not building scaffolds and we don't think it’s our responsibility to then I would argue that we don’t really want equality. That hurts doesn't it? It cuts us to our American souls. But it's true. So long as there is a limited amount of delicious chocolate pie and some groups have more the only way to get to equality is those groups need to have less. But we can't give it away. We have to build scaffolds. Got a hammer?