Merit and Diversity

“I’m all for diversity as long as all hiring is done on merit.”

“A diverse student body is a good thing, but all admission should be by merit.”

These are among hundreds of similar comments I’ve encountered by New York Times readers who describe themselves as “liberal” or “a Democrat.”

Every opinion piece or news article about DEI or diversity elicits this resentment or philosophical concern about practices that seem to favor race, gender or other qualities over merit.

I can only conclude that the comments are offered by people who have done little or no hiring or admitting. During my work years I did plenty of hiring and admitting. Merit, whatever it’s construed to mean, was usually a consideration, but often a minor one.

My hiring experience was mostly during my 19 year tenure as head of a school. For example, how might merit be assessed in selecting an English teacher? Usually, not always, minimal levels of experience and education were expected. I will not elaborate, but invite you to imagine the pretentious advanced degree holders who exhibited little interest in or affection for children. And in our colorfully progressive school, a candidate with several decades of experience in an “elite” prep school would have some convincing to do.

Our candidates met with students, whose feedback was a primary consideration. They were unlikely to be persuaded by typical measures of “merit.” In this not-so-hypothetical example, the existing composition of the English faculty would be a major factor. Having gender, racial and ethnic representation provided invaluable perspectives and models for our diverse student body. A sense of humor, preferably self-deprecating, mattered more than the candidate’s college GPA. Evidence of broad curiosity and breadth of life experience mattered more than Summa Cum Laude.

How a candidate might complement and enliven the faculty as a whole was considered. Evidence of passion and compassion outweighed the candidate’s undergraduate or graduate institutions.

In my 19 years we crafted a more diverse faculty and never hired a person of color “because” she was Black or a woman. We hired people based on the rich mix of considerations mentioned above, as well as others not mentioned. I am glad to acknowledge that some candidates might have thought themselves more qualified based on “merit,” yet were sometimes viewed as uninteresting, insufferable or lacking in understanding of our mission and institutional values.

Such considerations are part of a hiring process anywhere, from entry-level corporate positions to associate positions at prestigious law firms. How does a candidate fit in our organizational culture? How will they complement the current team? Even in these much more traditional settings, “merit,” however defined, may be a threshold to meet, but is not likely to be the determining criterion.

I will crudely add the obvious: Some humans are lovely and some are assholes. The former should always benefit from affirmative action!

Admission, at any level from pre-K through graduate school, is analogous to hiring. Here, particularly at the college level, the markers of “merit” are ubiquitous and seem quite precise. Those 1,600 SATs and 4.4 GPAs are inarguable measures of ability and potential, aren’t they? Well, no.

Standardized test scores are more reliable indicators of wealth than any important ability. Neither they nor GPAs say much about character, curiosity, humor or many other qualities that comprise a vibrant, creative, diverse student body.

One bit of anecdotal delight: Years ago a study (don’t ask me to recall with a specific reference) looked at class rank in law school and subsequent conspicuous success, defined as judicial appointment, partnership in major firms, leadership in legal organizations and such things. The counterintuitive, yet perhaps unsurprising, finding was that the most “success” was achieved by those clustered near the middle, not the top, of class rankings. The theory offered was that mid-level achievers were more likely to have played rugby, rock-climbed, socialized, joined clubs, gone to the movies or, in other words, broadened their experiences beyond the library.

Once the over-inflated notion of “merit” is punctured, the idea of diversity can be released from the political trap of condescension or unfairness.

Make no mistake. Affirmative efforts are essential to remediating centuries of racism, sexism and the resulting deficit of social capital.

But these efforts don’t compromise anything at all. Merit, as defined by those who think they have it, perpetuates stratification by historical discrimination.

In hiring and admissions, affirmative efforts to diversify have had negligible impact on the overwhelming advantages we white men enjoy.

Quit bitching.