Sidelined: How diversity in Canada’s sports leadership falls short

2020/07/16 Leave a comment

Good investigative reporting and data analysis:

For 14 years Clayton Pottinger had tremendous success as a basketball coach, his teams winning nearly 80 per cent of their games.

But an opportunity to coach at the next level never came.

As a Black head coach, he often wondered why.

“I don’t know a 100 per cent the reasons behind it. I don’t know that it was race related but I don’t discount that,” Pottinger told CBC Sports. “I was interviewed for three positions but overlooked — not even granted an interview dozens of times. It got to the point where I didn’t think it was going to happen.”

Pottinger’s story may sound like a tale often told south of the border, but his is a Canadian story.

Last March, he finally broke through and landed his first job at the Canadian university level when UBC-Okanagan named him head coach of its men’s basketball team.

Pottinger, 49, joined a small group of Black coaches who have reached the highest leadership positions in Canadian university sports.

For decades, North American professional sports leagues have been castigated for the dearth of Black and people of colour employed in key leadership and coaching positions.

An investigation by CBC Sports reveals that the issue is prevalent across Canadian sports.

A visual audit conducted by CBC Sports examined hundreds of key positions at all 56 Canadian universities that compete under the umbrella of national governing body U Sports, including the school’s athletic director and head coach of football, men’s and women’s basketball, hockey and soccer, and track.

Of the nearly 400 positions examined, only about 10 per cent were held by Black, Indigenous or persons of colour (BIPOC). Only one of the 56 schools has a non-white athletic director.

“You could go to any website at any university and you’d see one of the five principles or objectives is diversity and inclusion, yet you see the numbers in our studies, you see the [CBC’s] numbers,” said Dr. Richard Lapchick, founder and director of the Institute For Diversity and Ethics and Sport. The institute, based at the University of Central Florida, was the first to begin compiling racial breakdowns of hiring practices in the United States.

Lapchick said filling athletic leadership positions on North American college campuses is not always a result of overt racism, but rather a persistent old boys’ network.

“If you have a white athletic director and a white [university] president and they’re making the key hires in your athletic department, the people they know are more than likely to be white,” Lapchick said. “So they’re going to turn to them in that selection process as opposed to who [else] might be out there.”

The recent killing of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis in May has refocused the lens on racial inequality in everyday North American life. Hundreds of thousands of people have filled city streets demanding an end to systemic racism.

Many companies and organizations, including the CBC, have been forced to acknowledge both a lack of diversity among senior leadership, while addressing systemic racism in the way they conduct business both internally and externally.

The world of sports has not escaped this scrutiny.

Leagues condemn racism

In wake of Floyd’s death, professional leagues across North America issued statements condemning racism and promised to do better. Players demanded change. Leagues like the NFL, where 70 per cent of the players are Black or persons of colour, promised more would be done to reflect that in its coaching staffs and leadership. And after years discouraging outward signs of protest, like kneeling during the U.S. national anthem, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell came full circle and encouraged players to express themselves.

In Canada, the recently hired Pottinger says there is still a long way to go. UBC-Okanagan is one of only three universities in Canada to employ both a Black men’s and women’s head coach. He points to an undercurrent of bias when it comes to how leadership positions are filled.

“People of colour aren’t necessarily looked at as people with those abilities. We can shoot hoops, we can make baskets, we can make defensive plays,” Pottinger said. “But if you ask us to lead a team, then I think there’s always some question marks around whether or not you can do it.”

CBC Sports presented its findings to officials at U Sports and the four conferences that govern Canada’s university sports system.

None of the groups rejected or disputed the findings. But at the same time, it appears little has been done to formally track who is being hired and why.

The NCAA, governing body of college sports in the U.S., does maintain a database that tracks demographics for student-athletes, coaches and administrators. U Sports does not.

Most of the responses pointed to strides made in the area of gender equity but acknowledged little has been done to promote and encourage more BIPOC candidates and hirings.

Everyone involved in the upper reaches of Canadian university sport acknowledged there’s work to do when it comes to diversity in leadership positions.

At the same time, U Sports officials contend that, for the most part, they are powerless to change things.

“One of our key principles is institutional freedom and as such hiring is based on member universities’ human resource policies in compliance with provincial labour laws,” the organization said in its statement.

Balancing act

Atlantic University Sport (AUS) executive director Phil Currie called it a balancing act.

“The hiring of athletics directors or sport coaches/assistant coaches is done under the policies and practices of our member institutions and as such the AUS has no direct control of that process,” said Currie, who oversees athletics in the Atlantic provinces.

“CBC’s summary on the number of BIPOC head coaches demonstrates that, and we acknowledge that those numbers are not where they need to be,” he said.

The lack of diversity in leadership is equally stark among Canada’s key Olympic institutions. CBC Sports looked at the board of directors at the Canadian Olympic Committee and seven among the country’s largest national sport organizations: swimming, athletics, hockey, skating, basketball, volleyball and soccer.

Across them, around 100 board members are tasked with representing thousands of athletes. Only seven of these key positions are held by BIPOC. For example, the COC’s 17-member board is composed of 16 white directors and only one BIPOC.

“Our reflection following the events of the past month has reinforced that while we have made important strides in diversity and inclusion, we need to do more,” the COC said in a statement to CBC Sports.

“Though our board of directors reflects diversity in a number of important measures, including gender, LGBTQ+, language, etc., there’s no denying that we have considerable work to do in addressing BIPOC diversity on our board.”

The COC vowed to change the makeup of its board by instituting a number of measures, including no longer simply relying on a public call for board nominations.

Across the board, national sports organizations contacted by CBC Sports acknowledge major shortcomings in the racial makeup of their key leadership positions.

Athletics Canada said it’s “probably the most inclusive sport in Canada in terms of racialized participation,” but said its board must “better represent what the sport looks like on the field of play.”

Basketball Canada also acknowledged a large gap between players and decision makers.

“Our Canadian national basketball teams are some of the most ethnically diverse in our country. However, we acknowledge that, off the court, our organization still has some work to do at a leadership level,” it said in a statement.

For some, change has been elusive. Hockey Canada said it’s been “working at various stages over the past few years to address areas of diversity,” but its 11-member board was comprised of 11 white males as of July 1.

CBC Sports also looked into 500 leadership positions across professional ranks and found that for the most part, they mirror the above findings.

CBC Sports compiled data that included team ownership, team president, general manager and head coach across seven major leagues: NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, CFL, WNBA and the NWSL.

Only the NBA, where more than 80 per cent of players are BIPOC, according to research by the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sports, approached close to 25 per cent of leadership positions filled by people who look like the majority of its athletes.

In MLB, where 41 per cent of players are BIPOC, only seven of 100 leadership positions looked at are filled by people of colour.

In the CFL, only about 10 per cent of the league’s key leadership positions are filled by people who aren’t white, a sharp departure from the league’s on-field racial makeup.

One of the league’s two Black head coaches is former quarterback Khari Jones, who has been head coach in Montreal since June 2019.

After a stellar career in the CFL, he worked as assistant coach for a decade in Hamilton, B.C and Saskatchewan.

Jones said he doubted whether he would ever be a head coach.

“You see so many African-American people play the game but not having the chance to coach and have lead roles,” he told CBC Sports. “It’s never deterred me. It’s just a sad thing, even when I knew I wanted to get into coaching and I knew my goal was to be a head coach.”

Jones says until more BIPOC people own teams or fill leadership roles with authority to hire, change will be difficult.

“All the owners are white, so you tend to go that route when hiring,” Jones said.

“It becomes really disheartening when you don’t think you have a real chance, or you don’t have an opportunity to get a job that other people seem to be getting.”

Source: Sidelined: How diversity in Canada’s sports leadership falls short

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Buckingham Palace feared increasing ‘non-British’ immigrants would doom the monarchy in Australia

2020/07/16 Leave a comment

Wonder whether they had similar fears for Canada (but Canada never had referendums on the monarchy):

Buckingham Palace feared the monarchy would collapse in Australia because of an influx of postwar ‘non-British’ immigrants, newly released correspondence reveals.

Letters exchanged between Governor-General Sir John Kerr and the Queen’s private secretary Sir Martin Charteris were finally released today after four decades.

Along with providing bombshell revelations on Sir John’s decision to dismiss Gough Whitlam’s government in 1975, they reveal how the Palace saw Australia.

Sir Martin believed that without more frequent visits from The Queen and other royals, a more multicultural country would ditch the monarchy.

A year after the dismissal, Sir John wrote to Sir Martin – by then his frequent pen pal – to voice his concerns about the monarchy’s future in Australia.

‘I have been musing about the monarchy as an institution in our part of the world’, he wrote on December 19, 1976.

‘In 1947, 98 per cent [of Australians] were of British stock. By the 1971 census only 88 per cent were so derived.’

Sir John noted that most of these non-British immigrants were Italians, Greeks, Yugoslavs and Germans – but there were many other nationalities.

‘Our immigrants come from over one hundred countries including, for example, Egypt and Turkey, Lebanon and other Arab countries.

‘Increasingly, but not yet significantly, we have Asians. Most of these, and most who have come from Europe are from republics and are not directly acquainted with monarchy.’

A year after the dismissal, Sir John wrote to Sir Martin - by now his frequent penpal - with concerns about the monarchy's future in Australia

A year after the dismissal, Sir John wrote to Sir Martin – by now his frequent penpal – with concerns about the monarchy’s future in Australia

Sir Martin replied that the 'increasing non-British element in Australia’s ethnic make up' had 'significant ramifications for the monarchy

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Sir Martin replied that the ‘increasing non-British element in Australia’s ethnic make up’ had ‘significant ramifications for the monarchy

Sir Martin replied that the ‘increasing non-British element in Australia’s ethnic make up’ had ‘significant’ ramifications for the monarchy.

‘It is one of the reasons why the monarchy in Australia could not, I believe, long remain a reality without more frequent visits by the Sovereign than was customary in the first half of this century,’ he wrote.

‘The days when The Sovereign of Australia could remain in London, and still remain acceptable are, I think, long past; new immigrants, changing values… would all make this impossible, as well, of course as being wholly undesirable.’

In other letters, the pair discussed movements campaigning for an Australian republic but believed they were formed by a small number of ‘left-wing’ rabble rousers.

Australia held a referendum in November 1999 on whether the country should become a republic, but it was comfortably defeated.

The 211 letters, thousands of pages in all, contain many revelations about the lead-up to and aftermath of the dismissal as Sir John wrestled with what to do.

Also revealed is Mr Whitlam’s ‘rage’ at being ousted and the extent of the backlash against Sir John.

The letters finally showed that the Queen did not order Sir John to dismiss Mr Whitlam.

It has long been speculated that Her Majesty may have undermined Australia’s independence by trying to influence Sir John’s decision.

The letters appear to indicate that the Queen and Sir John did not communicate, at least not directly, and Kerr’s correspondence was only with Sir Martin.

Palace allies battled for decades to keep the documents – which also include correspondence from Her Majesty’s then-private secretary, Martin Charteris – secret, with the National Archives of Australia refusing to release them to the public.

The letters had been deemed personal communication by both the National Archives of Australia and the Federal Court, which meant the earliest they could be released was 2027, and only then with the Queen’s permission.

But the High Court bench earlier this year ruled the letters were property of the Commonwealth and part of the public record, and so must be released.

Source: Buckingham Palace feared increasing ‘non-British’ immigrants would doom the monarchy in Australia

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Trump administration rescinds rule barring foreign students from taking all classes online

2020/07/16 Leave a comment

A rare but welcome reversal of the Trump administration’s anti-immigration policies:

Facing eight federal lawsuits and opposition from hundreds of universities, the Trump administration on Tuesday rescinded a rule that would have required international students to transfer or leave the country if their schools held classes entirely online because of the pandemic.

The decision was announced at the start of a hearing in a federal lawsuit in Boston brought by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs said federal immigration authorities agreed to pull the July 6 directive and “return to the status quo.”

A lawyer representing the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said only that the judge’s characterization was correct.

The announcement brings relief to thousands of foreign students who had been at risk of being deported from the country, along with hundreds of universities that were scrambling to reassess their plans for the fall in light of the policy.

Under the policy, international students in the U.S. would have been forbidden from taking all their courses online this fall. New visas would not have been issued to students at schools planning to provide all classes online, which includes Harvard. Students already in the U.S. would have faced deportation if they didn’t transfer schools or leave the country voluntarily.

Immigration officials issued the policy last week, reversing earlier guidance from March 13 telling colleges that limits around online education would be suspended during the pandemic. University leaders believed the rule was part of President Donald Trump’s effort to pressure the nation’s schools and colleges to reopen this fall even as new virus cases rise.

The policy drew sharp backlash from higher education institutions, with more than 200 signing court briefs supporting the challenge by Harvard and MIT. Colleges said the policy would put students’ safety at risk and hurt schools financially. Many schools rely on tuition from international students, and some stood to lose millions of dollars in revenue if the rule had taken hold.

Harvard and MIT were the first to contest the policy, but at least seven other federal suits had been filed by universities and states opposing the rule.

Harvard and MIT argued that immigration officials violated procedural rules by issuing the guidance without justification and without allowing the public to respond. They also argued that the policy contradicted ICE’s March 13 directive telling schools that existing limits on online education would be suspended “for the duration of the emergency.”

The suit noted that Trump’s national emergency declaration has not been rescinded and that virus cases are spiking in some regions.

Immigration officials, however, argued that they told colleges all along that any guidance prompted by the pandemic was subject to change. They said the rule was consistent with existing law barring international students from taking classes entirely online. Federal officials said they were providing leniency by allowing students to keep their visas even if they study online from abroad.

Source: Trump administration rescinds rule barring foreign students from taking all classes online

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#COVID-19: Comparing provinces with other countries 15 July Update

2020/07/16 Leave a comment

The latest weekly stats showing no major changes from last week in terms of relative ranking, although the USA can be expected to surpass the harder hit European countries in deaths per million over the next few weeks given current trends:

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Kingwell: The science of denial

2020/07/15 Leave a comment

Good commentary on ignorance and denial, the importance of expertise over ignorance, and that free speech should not give license or credibility to “Hate speech, plagiarism, pseudoscience, cynical falsehood, and self-serving nonsense:”

Peter denied his association with Jesus three times before the cock crowed, at least as Luke tells it, but nowadays denials are a lot easier. Just one will do, and you can make it at any time of day on Twitter or Facebook, or some other dependency-creating interface. Deny science, deny experts, deny social and legal norms, and above all deny responsibility for any ethics scandals, cronyism or accusations of bad governance.

Denial does feel life-affirming. It places me against the man, or the mob, or the whoever. But it is also the first of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s five stages for dealing with grief. You have some work to do. Denial ain’t just a river, as Mark Twain probably did not say.

Sure, you can always adopt some Trump-era version of “never apologize, never explain,” and thus secure your membership in the current version of the 19th century know nothing party. Insincere performative apology is another attractive option.

Lots of people know nothing. Some of them know that they know nothing, and make that a guiding principle in life. This is the good kind of ignorance.

The record indicates that Socrates, directed to the Oracle at Delphi, was told that his fate was to be the wisest of Athenians. Since he, a simple soldier and cobbler, knew that he was ignorant, it seemed clear that wisdom might reside in knowing that he knew nothing. Michel de Montaigne struck a medal with the sceptical slogan: Que sais-je?—what do I know?  In philosophy class, we sometimes call this de doctrina ignorantia. We start from a lack of knowledge, but with lots of questions, especially for those who claim to know.

Things get tricky when knowledge becomes increasingly complex, however, demanding individuals who devote their lives to one special subfield in order to advance it. Non-experts in turn resent and fear these individuals, who sometimes tell them what to do or correct their errors. So people refuse to wear masks even months now into a global pandemic; they won’t take a state-sponsored vaccine even when it becomes available, because it may be infected with government software; and they are led by a president who says he “disagrees” with Anthony Fauci, a doctor who actually knows what he’s talking about. Trump disagrees, from his vast knowledge of medicine?

Sure, why not. I disagree when my doctor tells me I should stop smoking cigars and ordering Manhattans, but I also believe he is correct. That’s on me.

Denial is a deeply human act, hardwired into our feeble brains, and actually not a function of ignorance. Fauci was recently chided by one writer for neglecting, as a scientist, the science that illustrates how prevalent denial is in the species. This seems, at the least, extremely unfair. Fauci’s specialty is epidemiology. He’s not a social psychologist. And even if denial is common in us, does that make it okay? Hate is rampant in human affairs, and violence, and torture, and irrational prejudice of all kinds, and host of other behaviours that are “natural” yet abhorrent. We don’t, at least in our better moments, simply give them a free pass.

But the criticism does highlight two salient features of current COVID-dominated political culture. The first is that expertise, always a fragile property, has become suspect. The old saying has it that an expert is a person who has read one book; these days, you don’t even have to do that much work. A few hours on websites and you are surely the smartest person in the room—even if the room is just your basement office.

The second is that calling people stupid is not the best way to make them act smart. You don’t rehabilitate an addict by calling him or her names. You need structure and therapy and support; also nudges, incentive schemes and social scaffolding. And more information will mostly not help.

Trust in experts has been eroded for good reasons and bad. There good include fake science journals, institutional arrogance and aggressive scientism wielded as moron-bashing ideology (yes, I mean Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett and their fellow “Brights”). But reflexive and comprehensive suspicion of elites, East Coast elites, Laurentian elites, or whatever is the going version right now, is just doubling down on dumb. That denial tactic may work—it may even get you elected to high office—but it is harmful, immoral, and sells short the stocks on the human-potential market.

In the best case, expertise represents a preponderance of evidence and accumulated scholarship, rather than simply flashing credentials or invoking institutional heft. That’s good scientific method: this is the universal truth, the best explanation so far. Sane people can work with that. But other people will still deny because of confirmation bias, motivated reasoning, fear of cognitive dissonance, the pleasures of solidarity, sheer contrarianism, and maybe a misplaced, harmful belief in “individual freedom” over community safety.

So then what? Well, how about large doses humility, more education and a great deal of open discourse? John Stuart Mill was right—in the marketplace of ideas, good ones can eventually drive out bad, but this is painful, costly and bloody. It’s not me or you or some other person with an M.D. or a Ph.D. who matters, it’s good arguments that should prevail. This is creative destruction. If science teaches us anything, it’s that previous thinking never lasts. Philosopher of science Karl Popper influentially argued that every scientific proposition must be falsifiable—not wrong, rather open to being shown wrong on its own terms. Otherwise it is faith, ideology or madness.

Falsifiability is a baseline standard of all good discourse, yet it’s often misunderstood or distorted by media positioning and political posturing. For example, take note, in this political moment, that determining the meaning of “free speech” has become its own species of luxury good. A lot of hefty, credentialed, big-platform people (most of them experts in nothing except sounding off) are squawking about cancel culture and ideological targeting, not really on principle but because their special privileges feel threatened. But using “freedom of speech” as a conceptual cudgel in your ideological battles against “mobs” is not classical liberal thinking. It’s just a dog whistle in the culture wars. Denial is as denial does.

Hate speech, plagiarism, pseudoscience, cynical falsehood, and self-serving nonsense are not free speech. They are toxins to be eliminated by the clean air and sunshine of reason. At the same time, a lot of what is called censorship these days is actually vigorous disagreement, calling out bulls–t, and speaking truth to power. (We have to leave room for self-serving nonsense, since without it there would be mostly silence.)

There will always be deniers, of anything and everything, just like there are conspiracists, demagogues and witch-hunters in every historical moment. They can’t be eliminated, they can only be made outliers. Maybe at some point, like all responsible people, they will admit that they were wrong. The willingness to acknowledge error is, rather than our top-of-the-food-chain smarts, what makes us homo sapiens.

I might be wrong about that, or dishing up some self-serving nonsense. What do I know? I’m sure lots of smart people will now tell me.

Source: The science of denial

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Coren: The Hagia Sophia is now a mosque – and a victim of Turkey’s profane politics

2020/07/15 Leave a comment

Good column by Coren:

In 537 AD – as the story goes – Byzantine Roman Emperor Justinian first laid eyes on Hagia Sophia, The Church of the Holy Wisdom and the largest building in the world at the time, and declared edificial triumph over a biblical king: “Solomon, I have surpassed thee.” It was fair comment: The fourth church to be built on the spot in this city that was once called Byzantium and then Constantinople, the building he saw then was magnificent. Using stone from as far away as Egypt, more than 10,000 craftsmen spent six years constructing it.

We’re not entirely sure what Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is saying right now, but it’s likely he doesn’t particularly care what Justinian, King Solomon or anybody else might think. In a decision that has attracted international disapproval, the hardline nationalist announced last week that Istanbul’s 1,500-year-old Hagia Sophia, which has since become a museum, would become a mosque.

History is central to understanding the conflict. As the cathedral of the Patriarch of Constantinople before and after the Great Schism that divided Western and Eastern Christianity into Catholic and Orthodox, the Hagia Sophia became one of the most important Christian sites in the world. But in 1453, the Ottoman Turks took the city, and Sultan Mehmet II announced that the church would be known as the Great Mosque of Aya Sofya. The mihrab, indicating the direction of Mecca, replaced the altar; Mehmet’s successors made further alterations. Still, the Hagia Sophia remained sacred for Orthodox Christians the world over.

The Ottoman Empire declined in prestige over the centuries, and when the “sick man of Europe” finally passed on, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk – the founder of modern Turkey – initiated a relentless campaign of modernization and secularization. Part of his battle with the country’s conservative faithful was resolved in 1934, when the mosque became a museum; the Hagia Sophia has since become Turkey’s most popular tourist destination, with almost four million visitors a year. It seemed a glorious compromise.

On Friday, however, Turkey’s top administrative court annulled the Hagia Sophia’s museum status. Within hours, the Islamic call to prayer was recited, and the museum’s social-media pages were shuttered. Lina Mendoni, Greece’s culture minister and a world-renowned archeologist, responded to the announcement angrily: “The nationalism displayed by President Erdogan takes his country back six centuries,” she said, adding that the ruling “absolutely confirms that there is no independent justice” in Turkey.

The Russian Orthodox Church claims that its concerns were never given proper hearing when the transition was being considered, while other Eastern Orthodox leaders have condemned the decision. UNESCO, under which the building was protected as a World Heritage Site, urged Turkey to delay any change until further discussion had taken place.

None of that seems to concern Mr. Erdogan, since the Islamic traditionalists who have long called for this will guarantee him power in once-secular Turkey. That tension – between the temporal and the spiritual – is at the heart of this provocative and potentially dangerous move.

Turkey is home to a modern, non-religious, educated class that looks to Europe and liberal democracies. But for those outside that class – and they are now perhaps the majority – Mr. Erdogan and his systematic and sometimes brutal policy of Islamization represents the fulfillment of a long-awaited ambition. The President sees himself as leading the Muslim world, just as did the Sultans before him – even if it sows profound division – and this irresponsible if unsurprising action is central to that.

Turkey also does not have an impressive record of tolerance for Christians. Only about 300,000 now live there, comprising a meagre 0.3 per cent of the population. The Armenian Genocide between 1914 and 1923 in Turkey saw the murder and expulsion of 1.5 million ethnic Armenians, almost all of them Christian; despite the overwhelming evidence, the Turkish government refuses to acknowledge or take responsibility for that mass atrocity.

As a museum, the Hagia Sophia did not satisfy everybody, and there were Christians as well as Muslims who imagined a once and future religiosity. But for most, it had become a vibrant symbol of moderation and understanding, and a meeting place for all people from all faiths and backgrounds. That vision has evaporated.

It remains to be seen if this will further isolate Turkey, and exactly how Vladimir Putin – the leader of Eastern Orthodoxy’s super power – will choose to react. What we do know is that the world is a slightly darker and less gentle place than it was a week ago – one in which there is less of the spirit of Solomon’s famed sagacity, and more regression because of craven political nationalism.

Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-the-hagia-sophia-is-now-a-mosque-and-a-victim-of-turkeys-profane/

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Ontario issues directive to end birth alerts in the province

2020/07/15 Leave a comment

Yet one more historical practice with unfortunate results falls:

The Ontario government has issued a policy directive that orders children’s aid societies in the province to cease the controversial practice of issuing birth alerts.

Birth alerts are notifications issued by hospitals in the province regarding an expectant parent when the societies believe the child may be in need of protection after delivery.

The alert prompts the hospital to contact the society when the baby is born regardless if hospital staff have independently developed concerns regarding a parent’s ability to care for their infant.

Children Minister Jill Dunlop told The Globe and Mail that the Ontario government is issuing the directive as part of efforts to address systemic racism including in the province’s child-welfare system.

Child protection services in the province are delivered by children’s aid societies, Ms. Dunlop said, adding that birth alerts are not required under any provincial legislation or policy.

The ministry does not track their use specifically, she added, but she said in the past 12 months 442 children were removed from their mother within seven days of birth and their first birthday, and that 50 per cent of referral sources were from medical staff at a hospital.

The government heard through consultations with First Nations organizations that birth alerts have regularly affected members of communities particularly near Thunder Bay, Hamilton and Brantford, she said.

“We know it is unacceptable,” Ms. Dunlop said. “This is why we are ending the practice across the province.”

She said the government has also heard from families that birth alerts cause trauma, including to children, adding that she hopes other provinces will end the practice.

Provinces such as British Columbia and Manitoba have also put an end to the practice of birth alerts that have been the subject of concern from advocates and the national inquiry on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls.

Last June, the inquiry, among other things, called upon provincial and territorial governments and child-welfare services to put an immediate end to the practice of “targeting and apprehending infants (hospital alerts or birth alerts) from Indigenous mothers right after they give birth.”

In January, Manitoba announced the end of birth alerts, and B.C. said in September, 2019, that it would end the practice immediately, citing the call from the inquiry.

In a statement, B.C. conceded at the time that birth alerts were primarily used for marginalized women and disproportionately for Indigenous women.

The directive from Ontario’s assistant deputy minister David Remington says the intent of the new policy order is to provide guidance on ceasing the practice in the province and to ensure there is collaboration with local hospitals, prenatal and postnatal services and other health care professionals.

Among the new requirements, societies must halt the practice by Oct. 15 and prepare to do so in the interim. Societies also must confirm in writing to the ministry that it has implemented requirements by that month.

The Ontario Native Women’s Association has told the government that 450 Indigenous families a year will benefit from the ending of birth alerts based on the programs they administer and sites they have, Ms. Dunlop’s office said.

The province’s child-welfare system has also been the subject of consultations since last August, including with youth who have been in care, family members and organizations, the minister added.

She said that “fundamental change” will be announced in the coming weeks, adding that the review of the child-welfare system includes the overrepresentation of Indigenous, Black and other racialized children and youth.

The government is focused on prevention and early intervention and working with families about services they receive, she added.

“We know that birth alerts do the exact opposite [with families],” Ms. Dunlop said. “This is a key starting point for us.”

Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-ontario-issues-directive-to-end-birth-alerts-in-the-province/

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Canadian business leaders launch national initiative to fight anti-Black systemic racism

2020/07/15 Leave a comment

Worthy initiative.

For the banks and financial sector, as larger federally regulated organizations subject to the Employment Equity Act, we have at least data for the four groups along with hiring and salary data.  Close to one-third are visible minorities, with reasonable representation at more senior levels on a labour market availability basis (2017), but not desegregated by individual group:

A coalition of Canadian business leaders has announced a strategic partnership for a program to support Black professionals in Toronto’s financial district, Bay Street and elsewhere.

The Canadian Council of Business Leaders Against Anti-Black Systemic Racism and the Canadian Association of Urban Financial Professionals announced the plan, dubbed the BlackNorth Initiative, on Monday.

The plan advocates for companies to work with the coalition to hire more Black students for their internship/co-op programs and to ensure business succession planning strategies include a Black talent strategy to help build a pipeline of employees for future leadership positions.

It is also asking that businesses disaggregate their employee race data and publish it annually, including data on executive representation and/or employee mobility statistics for each Black, Indigenous and person of colour group.

The push to deal with systemic racism has gained strength in recent months in the wake of demonstrations held across Canada and the United States.

A summit is planned for July 20 where business leaders will be asked to sign a CEO pledge and say what they are doing to fight anti-Black systemic racism.

The Canadian Association of Urban Financial Professionals has more than 600 Black professionals as members who work across Bay Street.

“The BlackNorth Initiative and CAUFP are fully aligned regarding the critical need to begin dismantling systemic racism in corporate Canada,” said Wes Hall, founder and chairman of the Canadian Council of Business Leaders Against Anti-Black Systemic Racism.

“Corporations must do more to create and nurture Black talent pipelines to ensure proper representation at the highest levels. This is a natural partnership in a shared mission that will lead to measurable results.”

Source: Canadian business leaders launch national initiative to fight anti-Black systemic racism

Filed under Multiculturalism

Prevent doesn’t stop students being radicalised. It just reinforces Islamophobia

2020/07/15 Leave a comment

Interesting survey. Whether the issues are with Prevent itself or more generalized attitudes towards Muslims and media coverage is unclear:

The UK government has long maintained that radicalisation is a problem in universities and that Prevent, the national counter-terror programme, is an essential means of tackling it. Yet recently the Office for Students reported very little such activity: in 2017-18, only 15 referrals were made by universities to Channel in England (the Prevent rehabilitation programme), and it is unlikely that all 15 were found to be terrorism-related.

Despite a clear lack of evidence of radicalisation in universities, Prevent training continues for staff. Indeed, a major new report of a three-year study of Islam on campus shows that almost 10% of all students believe there may be some risk on their campus. Our research reveals that Prevent reinforces negative stereotypes of Islam and Muslims: 20% of students believe that Islam is not compatible with British values; among those supportive of Prevent, the figure rises to 35%.

This project, led at Soas University of London by myself and Dr Aisha Phoenix, with Professor Mathew Guest (Durham), Dr Shuruq Naguib (Lancaster) and Assistant Professor Dr. Sariya Cheruvallil-Contractor (Coventry), is the largest data set yet collected about Islam on campus. In total, 2,022 students attending 132 universities answered a detailed online survey. We also collected and analysed 140 hours of interviews from six campuses.

Our research finds that Prevent discourages discussion about culture, identity and religion – especially, but not exclusively, about Islam. Students and staff are discouraged from raising concerns about Prevent. They self-censor their discussions in order to avoid becoming the object of suspicion and are sometimes discouraged from exploring, researching or teaching about Islam. They see this as a counterproductive policy in the light of the perceived need for securitisation to fight terrorism, which trumps all other human rights.

On the other hand, 59% of students said they’d never heard of Prevent, yet many of those then expressed opinions about it, from an apparently non-existent knowledge base. When students are kept ignorant, this creates a democratic deficit: the student population should be fully informed about Prevent, about perceived and actual risk, about the facts and figures, and encouraged to debate these issues. Honesty and clarity are urgently required.

There’s so much more that the campus offers. The university population is religiously and culturally diverse, and despite the secular tone of the modern campus, most of our student sample believe that religion is an important source of moral values. Almost 70% of Muslim students and 56% of Christian students believe that university provides a valuable opportunity to develop their faith in new ways. And 79% of Muslim students believe that the university experience should encourage critical thinking about matters of faith.

Source: Prevent doesn’t stop students being radicalised. It just reinforces Islamophobia

Filed under Multiculturalism, Religion Tagged with , , ,

Too soon to say if StatsCan will bring in more racialized researchers, says official; ‘we’re just building those relationships’

2020/07/14 Leave a comment

To watch and see whether the model used for Indigenous peoples is needed or applicable to some or all visible minority groups:

Canada’s statistics agency is working with an expert advisory committee to better collect race-based data, but it is too early to say whether it will hire more racialized on-the-ground statisticians and researchers to help, says one official.

Marc Lachance, acting director of health, justice, diversity, and populations with Statistics Canada, acknowledged in an interview last week that while the country has made some strides in collecting Indigenous data, figures for some ethno-cultural groups are lagging.

“We have put in place a committee of experts that could specifically provide us guidance on—you know, we never really did a lot of work on the Black populations before, how do we do this?” said Mr. Lachance in a phone interview July 9.

In July 2019, the agency established the Centre for Indigenous Statistics and Partnerships, which consolidated “long-standing working relationships” with communities and organizations across the country into one centre. All research at the agency involving Indigenous people is “channeled through” this centre, which helps “provide relevant expertise and co-ordinate outreach to partners,” a July 6 statement from the agency read.

Included in the centre are 11 Indigenous liaison advisors, some of whom, according to Mr. Lachance, might work on reserves, and most of whom identify as Indigenous. The agency did not provide an exact breakdown, nor a dollar figure of cost, for these positions. The program began in the 1980s and positions are currently funded through the centre, said StatsCan spokesperson Peter Frayne in a July 10 email. The officers’ salaries and non-salary needs like travel are covered. “Funding  may vary from year to year based on the level of activities and engagement, but typically peaks during the conduct of the census,” Mr. Frayne added.

They are stationed across the country and look after a particular region, said Mr. Lachance. A StatsCan webpage lists advisors as covering Atlantic provinces, Manitoba, Inuit Nunangat, and others. “That program is probably one of our most established programs to engage communities such as the Indigenous [one] on Indigenous data,” he said.

“Their role is very key, specifically in ensuring there is trust with the data and a good rapport and relationship with StatsCan.” When the agency starts work for its census, for example, these officers act as ambassadors who promote it and in some cases seek permission to be able to go into communities, or at least notify Indigenous leadership about the agency’s intentions.

Mr. Lachance said it is too soon to say whether the agency will bring in Black community researchers to help it gather better race-based data.

“We’re working with experts right now. The plan is in the fall, we do more consultations with racialized communities, specifically to get their input on new approaches on how we can disseminate information” to those communities, he said.

Statistics Canada received $4.2-million over three years through the government’s anti-racism strategy last year. A portion of that funding was to allow the agency to set up an advisory committee on ethno-cultural and immigration statistics. That advisory committee will guide the body in setting up a “conceptual framework on ethnocultural diversity and inclusion as well as families of indicators to be able to track relevant ‘inclusion’ indicators over time,” according to a July 6 statement from the agency, which also said the committee had been formed and already met once, with another meeting slated for last week.

Mr. Lachance said it’s possible that the agency will create other “ambassador”-like roles for other racial groups, but he said “we haven’t made that decision yet, we’re just building those relationships.”

His comments come in the wake of an influx of public calls for better race-based data collection. The COVID-19 pandemic has harmed Black people in the United States at a greater rate than it has white people. Canada has not tracked pandemic outcomes by race or ethnic background.

To better understand the pandemic’s disproportionate impact on some communities, the agency has already made a push to collect more disaggregated data. It has been releasing a series of voluntary questionnaires, which change about every two weeks, and tap into a range of topics like parenting during the pandemic and the impact faced by those living with disabilities.

“How we continue this relationship depends on what the community needs and how we want to work closer with them,” said Mr. Lachance.

“We are accountable to Canadians about the data. The data is about what individuals are telling us about themselves, and they’re taking the time to answer the questionnaire and surveys.”

Some experts who spoke to The Hill Times this month noted that authorities and government institutions might face an uphill battle as they go about collecting race-based data, thanks in part to “longstanding disparities” in areas like housing, healthcare, and food insecurity in these communities.

Anna Banerji, a director of global and Indigenous health at the University of Toronto’s faculty of medicine, noted in an earlier interview that “there’s a lot of information that’s out there that’s partially used or distorted in the usage, and there’s no underlying [questioning of] what are the contributors to this.” She noted that in some cases, data has been used to justify racism and discrimination, a fact that Public Safety Minister Bill Blair (Scarborough Southwest, Ont.) also acknowledged this month.

Mr. Lachance said Statistics Canada’s researchers are well aware of this history.

“When we come to the analysis [stage], we need to ensure that the analysis that we do and analytical products [we put out] are sensitive to the perspectives of the communities,” he said, adding StatsCan consults national Indigenous organizations in creating or testing the Aboriginal Peoples Survey, which gathers figures to track the “social and economic conditions” of those living off reserve. Groups consulted include the Assembly of First Nations, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, and the Metis National Council, he said.

The agency said that in 2017, Indigenous people were hired as interviewers and guides during the collection period, and organizations promoted and reviewed the analytical findings of the Aboriginal Peoples Survey.

“This ensures that findings are presented in an appropriate manner and ultimately results in stories that are balanced and include essential contextual information,” said a statement from the agency, which also noted that those interviewers and guides help to improve the reliance and quality of the analysis.

A lack of consultation has created barriers for Indigenous communities in the past, according to a January 2019 report prepared for Indigenous Services Canada and the AFN. In 2006, for example, the AFN withdrew its support for the Aboriginal Peoples Survey over concerns that it infringed on their right to control and govern that information.

In 2019, Statistics Canada shared data on suicide among Indigenous populations, a sensitive topic, as part of an effort to engage communities about the data it is collecting, said Mr. Lachance.

“Usually, we can go ahead and just print the suicide rates, but without the proper context and proper process…that report can also have some unintended consequences, because it does provide sometimes a negative picture,” he said.

That report, shared in June 2019, comes with an introduction that references intergenerational trauma and the effects of colonization and ongoing marginalization, specifically “the loss of land, traditional subsistence activities and control over living conditions” and a “suppression of belief systems.”

“We always feel that we’re accountable to our respondents, so the trust comes in different levels,” said Mr. Lachance. “It comes from the fact that the data that people provide us is confidential … and [in the assurance] of the quality and statistical rigour that we are bringing to the data,” he said.

Jeff Latimer, director general and strategic adviser for health data with Statistics Canada, told  the House Health Committee last week that a lack of standards between provinces and territories, for instance, makes it difficult to get other data like figures around deaths in the country. Part of that is because some jurisdictions still rely on paper-based processes for death registrations, making it difficult for the agency to paint a complete national picture, as it relies on these authorities to filter up data to the federal government through the Public Health Agency of Canada.

Source: Too soon to say if StatsCan will bring in more racialized researchers, says official; ‘we’re just building those relationships’

Filed under Aboriginal, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

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