Affirmative Action Produces Equal Employment Opportunity for All

Abstract

probably the most difficult of those faced in affirmative action. Questioning our accepted standards of quality strikes at tradition and destroys some of the most important groups of our individual self-definitions. The less secure the institution, occupational group, or individual concerned, the more threatening such examination becomes. Degrees and other labels provide a much more comforting definition of quality than does a continuing evaluation of job performance. The more the occupational group is involved in processes of professionalizing itself or is striving for higher status, the greater the tension between those processes and inclusionary requirements. All of these changes increase exclusivity. Attempts at implementation of affirmative action in police departments, for example, are running head on into the federally financed drive to professionalize according to traditional measures-particularly degree attainment.2 The case of several state colleges in California which are undergoing a change of status from colleges to universities provides us with another example. In this instance one of the main criteria for change of status is the number of PhD degree holders on the faculty. Teachers with master's degrees who had been receiving excellent evaluations from deans, peers, and students are suddenly being reevaluated according to a more professional standard, i.e., the PhD. Job performance is the same, but some are now being dismissed or not advanced because external criteria have changed. Any attempt to implement affirmative action programs in this atmosphere of degree consciousness is difficult. Suggestions that alternative standards of faculty quality be considered (for example a bachelor's or master's degree plus experience, cultural knowledge, ability to relate to students, ability to serve as a minority role model, and warmth,