The High-Five: 5 Questions with Charlton McIlwain, Vice Provost for Faculty and Engagement at NYU
Q. Now that you have moved beyond the classroom as Vice Provost for Faculty Engagement with NYU, what are some of the ways in which you are supporting and engaging your faculty team[s], across the various offices and networks, in this current environment?
A. Much of what I have been doing lately is very simple – listening. The folks I work with, like many others, have been thrust into circumstances that complicate not just their work but their lives – especially given that two worlds have largely merged. Regardless, people want to do great work. They want to engage their students. Provide an environment conducive to learning and development. They want to continue to do their research and write and engage with other scholars and ideas. Doing what was normal has become complicated in many ways and much of what I’ve been doing is listening to what concerns people. See if there are things that are within my power to do to help them do what they need and want to do to be successful as teachers, scholars, people engaged with their communities.
Q. What does the future of education look like at the university level?
A. That’s the million-dollar question. I don’t know that any one knows, but I think most would agree that the landscape of higher education will look pretty different, at least for the near future. I think “remote” forms of teaching and learning and the role that technology plays in the educational environment will look different, particularly as many find that remote and environments and technology pose challenges, but also some opportunities that we may never have experienced if we’d not been thrust into this situation of not having much choice. Affordability will be an even greater challenge for many higher education institutions, given the financial impact that the current crisis will likely have – something we also don’t fully know yet, generally speaking. These and many other challenges mean that I think higher education institutions in the near future will look differently as we ask faculty, students and administrators to have to think creatively about how we do what we do under constraints that we haven’t quite experienced before.
Q. I m discovering that, living through this pandemic, the digital chasm appears to be growing. Remote learning for kids of color, primarily in elementary school, has been challenging because the access to the requisite technology either has been non-existent, or it’s being shared by siblings. Despite the best intentions from schools issuing temporary laptops, we need to understand how the lasting and severe impact this new ‘abnormal’ can have on educating future generations of underserved and disenfranchised populations. What are your thoughts there?
A. We’ve always known – whether we as a society choose to acknowledge it or not – that education is one of the greatest sites of rampant inequality, where one’s educational opportunities are largely a function of one’s accident of birth and geography. That is, who your parents are, where they live, and what kind of money they make. Geography is frequently destiny given the way that we fund our school systems across the country and vast amounts of money and resources separate students and what they have access to and what they don’t, all depending on where they happen to live.
This is all becoming so much more difficult to ignore in our current situation, especially when it reveals itself in the gap between those who have access to digital tools and those who do not, and those who have access to family situations that make it easier to take advantage of computers and internet service, and remote learning or asynchronous teaching and learning. The fact that public schools across the country are giving up on even trying to finish some semblance of the academic year speaks to this. It’s during crises like these that these inequalities are laid bare and show us that something must be done if we are not going to continue to let birth and geography pick winners and losers in terms of access to quality education.
Q. Building on the last question, your recent book Black Software speaks about the advances that African-Americans have made in computer technology and their pioneering leadership in that space to make their voices heard, appreciated and respected in meting out racial equality and justice. The book also, however, addresses racial biases inherent in how digital technology is positioned and deployed up through today, to where the seemingly meritocratic state of the Internet is in fact gamed and tilted to those who are in power. With that backdrop, will today’s health crisis have an adverse effect on African-Americans’ ability, or capability, to make their voices heard through our digital platforms and outlets? If so, how? If not, why not?
“It’s during crises like these that these inequalities are laid bare and show us that something must be done if we are not going to continue to let birth and geography pick winners and losers in terms of access to quality education.”
A. Well, I think this goes back to what we promised this Internet thing would be way back in the early 90s and beyond. It was supposed to be a great, unifying, democratic space. It was supposed to provide everyone – regardless of race or gender or sexuality or any other difference – a voice, a way to express ourselves and most important a way to make our voices heard among those who often need to hear it. People in power. People creating the rules that we will have to live by. People making decisions that will affect our life chances and course. Today, we clearly see that not only does access to the Internet and digital connectivity in general exist for some more than others. But also I think the lesson of the last twenty plus years is that the Internet has been great at giving us the Illusion of having a voice.
What we know from research though is that in the same way that technology has always worked, it seems to help the rich and powerful more than those who are not – folks who are also disproportionately people of color, immigrants, people without means or access to means. Sure Black folks and other people of color have many platforms from which we can speak. But is anyone listening? Are the right people listening? Do they care what we say? Can we cut through all the noise to be heard even if folks want to? Frequently the answer to those questions are an emphatic – no!
Q. Life in perpetual BETA is essentially the notion that you are constantly and continually in the state of becoming. You’re never quite there and always are striving to improve. This concept is one I introduce when I speak about rapid organizational change and individual development and growth. I have introduced BETA as a mnemonic to explore ways in which one could bring about positive change in one’s life or organization. The mnemonic is below. Would you indulge me and share how you would apply these words as it relates to your personal or professional life?
Belief – Principles that guide how I make decisions.
Empathy – It’s what makes us, “us.”
Trust – Can’t lead without it.
Advocacy – Sharing my influence to benefit others