This is a short qualitative review of the recommendations provided in the summary of the report “Advancing Antiracism, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in STEMM Organizations“.
While an excellent breakdown and having some good recommendations, the two biggest gaps that were identified was the lack of an intersectional approach and a lack of practical suggestions to fix identified issues.
The report explicitly stated that they ignored disabled students and other marginalised groups but this does not help make things more inclusive – we should be centering the most marginalised students first as per the Intersectionality Spectrum.
While some of the recommendations were explained in a more practical way, most were abstract. One of the chief complaints or questions I hear at the end of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion talks is “What practical things can I do right now to help?”. What I tend to say in this situation is this: “Center the most marginalised people, based on a contextual Intersectionality Spectrum, and ask them what they need to succeed.”.
I think the authors have done a fantastic job of pulling this together as a reference, I hope in the future that they could provide a unifying theory, using intersectionality, and recognise that every individual is different, and we need to be person-centered.
https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.25036547.v1
