When Twice as Good Isn't Enough: The Case for Cultural Competence in Computing
In this episode I unpack Washington's (2020) paper titled "When twice as good isn't enough: The case for cultural competence in computing," which explores the five elements and six stages of cultural competence in relation to undergraduate computing programs.
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Welcome back to another episode of the
CSK8 podcast my name is Jared O'Leary in
this week's episode I'm unpacking some
scholarship in particular I'm unpacking
the paper titled when twice as good
isn't enough the case for cultural
competence in computing this is written
by Nikki Washington and it's actually
one of the papers that Shuchi grover
recommended in last week's episode as
always you can find a direct link to
this paper in the show notes which can
be found in the app that you're
listening to this on simply clicking on
the link in the description or by
visiting jared O'Leary com where there's
nothing for sale just a bunch of free
content and when you do visit the show
notes just know that when you click on
Nikki Washington's name under the
citation it will send you directly to
there's Google Scholar profile and if
you click on the papers title it'll take
you directly to the publication itself
which you can download if you are an ACM
member alright so let's begin by reading
the abstract for this paper quote the
commonly documented diversity equity and
inclusion Dei issues in computing
workforce are the direct result of
corporate cultures that benefit specific
groups and marginalize others this
culture usually begins in undergraduate
computing departments where the
demographic representation meres that of
industry with no formal courses that
focus on the non-technical issues
affecting marginalized groups and how to
address and eradicate them students are
indirectly taught that the current
status quo in computing departments in
industry is not only acceptable but also
unproblematic this directly affects
students from marginalized groups as the
reasons for attrition are similar in
both higher education industry as well
as faculty as bias student evaluations
directly affect hiring promotion and
tenure decisions this position paper
presents the need for cultural
competence as a required focus for
university computing departments
nationwide by improving these issues
before students complete baccalaureate
computing degrees companies will have
talent pools that better understand the
importance and necessity of Dei and also
work to ensure they help foster a more
diverse equitable and inclusive
environment
addition more students from marginalized
groups will be retained in the major
through degree completion unquote Rada
summarizes paper into a single sentence
I would say that it unpacks the five
elements of cultural competence and the
six stages of cultural competence in
relation to undergraduate computing
programs although this paper focuses
specifically on undergraduate programs
and what university professors can do
I'm going to talk about some of the
potential implications in relation to
k-12 education alright so at the
university computing departments there
are now courses related to ethics of
computing or ethics in computing however
Washington states that quote the
overwhelming majority of these courses
focused primarily on the societal and
legal impacts of topics such as the
Internet privacy intellectual property
and cyber crime unquote and that quote
is from page 213 so instead of thinking
about the ethics in relation to equity
and social justice related issues
instead focusing on like privacy and
cybersecurity so Washington is
suggesting that we actually expand
beyond this and include course offerings
related to equity by specifically
focusing on something called cultural
competence alright so here's a quote
from page 213 that kind of explains why
this is important hope without direct
and intentional inclusion of this topic
including meaningful and impactful
discussions on race gender
intersectionality bias discrimination
and their impact on people in technology
in the majority white and Asian
male-dominated classes of new computing
graduates enter organizations where the
established corporate culture favored
their beliefs practices and identities
include so in other words if we don't
talk about this in the undergraduate
level and then graduates are going to go
into corporations and industry settings
and kind of perpetuate this some of the
biases related to white and Asian male
dominated cultures all right so let's
unpack what cultural competence is so
Washington mentions that cultural
competence came out of Social Work and
Counseling Psychology and here's a quote
an embedded quote on page 214 that kind
of summarizes what cultural calm
sentence is oat a set of congruent
behaviors attitudes and policies that
come together in a system agency or
among professionals and enable that
system agency or those professionals to
work effectively in cross-cultural
situations the word culture is used
because it implies the integrated
pattern of human behavior that includes
thoughts communications actions customs
beliefs values and institutions of a
racial ethnic religious or social group
the word competence is used because it
implies having the capacity to function
effectively in quote s from page 214 so
in this paper and in that definition
culture is used to refer to different
social constructs such as race ethnicity
gender sexual orientation religious
affiliation etc that's from page 214 so
following this introduction of what
cultural competence is Washington
outlines five of the key elements that
make up cultural competence so the first
one is valuing diversity which quote
means people understand appreciate and
respect it's worth unquote now an
important thing to note about valuing
diversity is that Washington points out
that quote a diverse environment can
still lack inclusion especially when
individuals in key positions refuse to
address systemic issues such as micro
and macro aggressions bias and
discrimination which are common in
computing and tech environments in quote
best from page 214 now this is important
to note you will have heard some people
in previous interviews and interviews
that have not been released yet kind of
talking about some of these things in
terms of like the micro macro
aggressions or systems of oppression in
education that either are designed to or
unintentionally and cause harm or forms
of violence so we as educators shouldn't
just value diversity in terms of like
understanding and appreciating it we
also need to be inclusive in our
settings and so some of the previous
podcast guests that have been on the
show I've mentioned they like to have
students go out and recruit other
students so that way there's a variety
of voices who are sharing the message of
what computer science can offer to them
in the classes that are available in
your school and hopefully reach
populations that you as a single
individual would not be able to do on
your own okay so the second element of
cultural competence is cultural
self-assessment so this process is quote
accurately and exhaustively assessing
one's current beliefs against current
practices one my valued diversity and
still display bias and discriminatory
behavior encode so one of the interviews
that has not been released yet and will
come out later a guest mentions that
while they are actively working on
incorporating anti-racist practices in
their classroom they are still
unintentionally displaying biases and
discriminatory behaviors that can be
described as racism if that sounds
alarming it should be for one but two it
is a result of biases that are
unconscious that are simply being
acknowledged and this guest is
personally working through them as we
all hopefully are and if further clarify
this episode that will release a few
weeks from now the guest considers
themselves to be a co-conspirator not
just an outline but someone who is
willing to put their body in harm's way
to help somebody else however they are
still acknowledging that they have
biases because they are engaging in
these self assessments and realize that
sometimes biases and discriminatory
behaviors emerge even when they are
actively trying their best to not do
that so something that I encourage for
everybody else and I am also
participating in it is that constant
cultural self-assessment okay so the
third element of cultural competence is
management of dynamics of difference so
here's an embedded quote from page 214
quote when a system of one culture
interacts with a population from another
both may misjudge the other's actions
based on learn expectations unquote so
not only do we need to reflect upon and
assess our own cultural biases and
understandings we also need to think
about how our understandings and our
ways of being in cultures intersect and
interact with other cultures in ways
that might be unintended or be perceived
as problematic now obviously this is
very hard to do so some of the guests
that I have spoken with about similar
topics have recommended going into these
confer
sessions with humility and willingness
to learn and just know that you are
going to make mistakes and instead of
hiding from those mistakes or denying
them - instead stick with it and
continue the conversation even when it
gets uncomfortable and simply
acknowledge how you have unintentionally
made somebody feel and actively find
ways to work through that and grow from
that experience and I say that as
somebody who has unintentionally
insulted other people because of
cultural differences it has been
uncomfortable and I have learned from
those experiences
okay so element for institutionalization
of cultural knowledge so Washington
points out that you can't simply go to
like a webinar or a PD session and then
suddenly become woke and Wow all of a
sudden I know everything that I need to
know about a particular culture it's not
gonna happen this needs to be an ongoing
process and it needs to happen over an
extended period of time so this is not
even something that you can do in a
semester by taking a single course on
this if you are taking a course related
to cultural competence and similar
topics yeah you might learn a lot
through that experience but this is an
ongoing thing and one of the reasons why
is because culture is constantly
changing and evolving so we need to stay
on top of those changes so as an example
think of a place that you visited that
you've only visited one time and maybe
you went there maybe 10 20 years ago and
if you were to go back today and kind of
compare how the place differs in terms
of this culture and the ways that people
are interacting and the way that the
environment is set up etc it's likely
going to be very different in ways that
you might not have predicted
so because culture is constantly
changing we as individuals need to
constantly try and continue to learn and
grow and adapt by constantly seeking to
understand these changes in different
cultures now one thing that Washington
points out is that we can't become the
cultural bears for cultures that we are
not a part of so we need to seek out
individuals from different cultures and
have them be the main contributors of
those conversations when it comes to
different questions and concerns about a
particular call
so the final element of cultural
competence is adaption to diversity now
an example that's given by Washington is
that quote just as individuals from
different cultures have different
beliefs and experiences organizations
and individuals should ensure that their
cultural competence values respects and
addresses the needs of all individuals
in quote that's from page 215 so even
though that's the last element I think
it is a very important one we need to
ensure that the things that we are doing
as individuals and in organizations that
we work with that we all reflect a
diverse set of needs okay so in the next
section Washington outlines some stages
of cultural competence and there are six
stages the first one is cultural
destructiveness the second one is
cultural incapacity the third one is
cultural blindness the fourth one is
cultural pre competence the fifth one is
cultural competence and the sixth one is
cultural proficiency so let's unpack
what each of those are okay so the first
one cultural destructiveness so cultural
destructiveness is when your ways of
paying your ways of acting and engaging
with other cultures are destructive to
that culture or to the individuals
within a particular culture so some
examples that were given by Washington
are homophobia misogyny and white
supremacy those examples are given on
page 215 in stage two in cultural
incapacity this stage has people in it
who are not necessarily trying to be
destructive but are unable to actually
provide help to marginalized groups now
some examples of cultural incapacity
includes some of the fears that some
people have around other cultures and
how those can extend into different
hiring practices or microaggressions or
expectations of other cultures and
groups of people all right so the third
stage is cultural blindness so this is
characterized primarily by assimilation
and ignoring different strengths of
different cultures so for example
instead of
highlighting encouraging differences
being shared across different cultures
we instead trying to homogenized
everything by getting marginalized
groups to all conform to the dominant
culture so this is equivalent to people
who are saying I don't see color
everyone's the same to me
and the denial that you have bias which
by the way I'll include a link in the
show notes to an unconscious bias test
that you can take in a variety of
different categories to actually learn
more about some of the biases that you
do have so for example I took a couple
of them and found out that I had some
biases that I was aware of as well as
some others that are surprised about now
one of the interesting things that's
related to this particular stage is
there can be a lot of victim blaming in
terms of not understanding why some
people from different cultures are
unable to assimilate or align with the
dominant cultures and success is viewed
within this stage as quote how closely
marginalized groups can approximate
middle class non-minority existence in
quote s from page 215 okay now we're
going to move on to the more positive
side of this continuum or stages so the
fourth stage is cultural pre competence
so this is the stage where I think a lot
of people are in right now in terms of
what's going on with learning more and
trying to do something in particular
related to racism in education
and in society so cultural pre
competence involves people who are
making intentional efforts from an
organizational level they might be
hiring intentionally for diverse
perspectives and experiences however in
this stage it can stop here with this
false sense of accomplishment that
Washington describes or even a tokenism
of different cultures or marginalized
groups because the table doesn't
actually respect in value cultures it's
just learning more and understanding
about them but not necessarily playing
to those strengths in stage five however
which is called cultural competence
here's a quote from page 215 quote
organizations actively hire unbiased
employees constantly work to improve
practices and seek the expertise of
marginalized groups to better assess how
to meet their needs many components of
the stage include an understanding of
the effects of policy on practice and
actively working to ensure that enacted
policies support a diverse and inclusive
environment in quote so it's not enough
to just learn about different cultures
and to be an ally for different cultures
you need to actively reflect upon the
different practices and policies that
can impact having a diverse and
inclusive environment one of the things
that I would argue against though is
actively trying to hire unbiased
employees again I think is impossible
because we all have these unconscious
biases that being said I think hiring
people who are actively exploring their
unconscious biases is something that can
definitely be done all right so the last
stage is called cultural proficiency so
this involves organizations who are just
constantly trying to find diverse
perspectives and experiences and people
and are constantly re-evaluating what
they're doing ok so what does this have
to do with computer science education so
the remainder of this paper Washington
kind of outlines some different ways
that using cultural competence can
impact si s education
so the first outline that Washington
gives is on page 216 and it is quote
appropriately respond to current and
projected demographic changes and quote
so in particular in this section
Washington
describes how the United
is going to be changing demographically
over the next few decades in terms of
percentage of people by race percentage
of people by ability to speak more than
one language percentage of immigrants
etc and Washington particularly outlines
some of the demographics of race in
relation to faculty members and students
in computing degrees and in particular
when speaking of nationwide demographics
of students and faculties in computing
courses and degree programs we need to
have them aligned to the demographics of
the United States so the second reason
for encouraging cultural competence in
computing courses and undergraduate
programs is to quote eliminate
long-standing income disparities from
diverse backgrounds in quote so in
particular Washington points out that
computer science majors earn more money
than other majors or people with high
school degrees which if we read between
the lines we can look at this and go
okay this could be a way of helping
elevate people out of poverty or low
socioeconomic status the next rationale
that Washington mentions also on the
same page 216 is quote improved
Technology Development to account for
differences in quote so in particular
Washington mentions that there's a lot
of research that talks about bias in
related to algorithms and such as fake
facial recognition programs or even
infrared sensors for hand-washing etc
some of the things that we've talked
about in previous episodes and even some
of the upcoming episodes and how having
a diverse set of computer scientists in
an organization or a company or in a
school can help prevent some of those
algorithmic biases so the next rationale
is specifically around how there are
more jobs available right now than there
are qualified people to actually fill
them in relation to stem and computer
science in particular so by broadening
our scope of the typical students who
kind of go into these programs we might
be able to help fill this gap and the
fifth rationale is quote improved
retention of students and employees from
marginalized groups unquote so there
have been studies that have demonstrated
that students in schools and even
students in some organizations have
left because they felt like they did not
belong in the particular culture so for
example I've had multiple colleagues and
friends who have come to Arizona from
other states and they felt like the
culture that they are used to and that
they love and embody are not represented
within the Southwest in particular in
the Phoenix area so they have felt a
little out of place and some of them
have actually left the valley because of
this so having a more diverse set of
cultures within the organization or the
school or the company might help out
with retention and the final rationale
is that that might result in a decrease
in lawsuits related to discrimination
complaints okay so Washington concludes
this section by basically saying look if
we don't talk about this stuff in our
undergraduate classes then when they go
into industry setting and start working
as si as professionals then they're
likely not going to question some of the
expectations and norms set by some of
the more dominant cultures that exist
within industry settings so Washington
mentions a course called
race gender and computing and it's
broken down into three parts in
particular and again this is an
undergraduate course and I'm gonna
unpack here in a moment what could this
look like in elementary setting so the
first part was just kind of getting some
of the basics of terminology related to
quote race ethnicity bias
microaggressions marginalization and
historically disenfranchised groups
through various articles publications
and current events related to the topics
in quote that's from page 217 the next
part of this course was to then have
students focus on biases as they present
themselves in technology as I mentioned
like some of a facial recognition bias
and infrared biases with hand-washing
stations things like that and then the
final portion of this course involves a
presentation of a reflection of things
that were learned over the course of the
semester
all right so Washington in the
conclusion points out that quote
regardless of institution type the three
C program should be required for all
computing undergraduates nationwide
enclose that's from page 218
all right so I think this is very
important to note because just because
we might be working in locations where
the majority of the students who are
there are from marginalized groups it
doesn't mean that we shouldn't talk
about this though regardless of what
school you're in we need to be engaging
with this so this leads to some of my
lingering questions so in each one of
these unpacking scholarship episodes I
like to kind of share some of the
questions or thoughts that I had after
reading their particular paper which I
really enjoyed this paper and I hope you
go and read it but here's one of my
first questions so how my k-12 CS
educators adapt the structure of the
race gender and computing course so in
particular what kind of actionable
project could apply understandings at
the culmination of the course so I like
the idea of like exploring some of the
topics in terms of unpacking what does a
microaggression mean what does a
marginalization mean etc and learning
more about that then I really like the
part two we're kind of situates those
into industry related stuff or in the
k-12 setting it could just simply be
situating it into concepts and practices
that are part of the computer science
standards that you are using in your
school and then part three I like that
it's a reflection on understandings and
kind of sharing how your understandings
have maybe changed over time after
learning more about the different
terminology and learning about how such
forms of oppression or violence exist in
technology in the design of Technology
but I think a part four in particular
for k-12 settings could be okay now that
you were reflected on this what can you
actively do to help improve people's
lives either in your own life or the
lives of other people in your community
or beyond them so while I think it is
definitely important to include a course
like this at the undergraduate level for
anyone who is intending on getting a
degree in computer science I honestly
think that we could integrate these
practices and ways of unpacking systems
of oppression and just learning how to
better understand and elevate different
cultures and perspectives and ways of
being all this can be done within a k-12
setting and in any kind of classroom
doesn't have to just be computer science
so my challenge to all the other k12 CS
educators and even the undergraduate and
graduate research is out there is try
and find some ways that you can
incorporate cultural competence and the
classrooms that you're working with or
even what I talked about two weeks ago
culturally relevant pedagogy which if
you haven't listened to that episode I
highly recommend it or even some of the
other concepts that are going to come up
in future interviews such as critical
race theory and better understanding
double consciousness etc which if you
don't know those terms don't worry
future interview is going to talk about
that now the last question relate to
this article that I have is how do the
enrollment demographics for 2020 CS
programs differ from a few years ago and
the reason why I asked is because there
has been a huge push or k12 C s
initiatives in the last several years
and this has pushed this ban on related
to CS for all trying to get everybody
into computing but I'm wondering have
the percentages of incoming freshmen in
computer science programs changed as a
result of this so we've had several
years now where kids have had the
opportunity or at least the increased
opportunity to learn computer science
and across the board are we seeing any
changes in enrollment and if so why and
if not why all right so those are just
kind of main questions and ours having
after reading through this paper which
again I highly recommend you check out
so if you are a member of ACM go into
the show notes and click right on the
title of this paper and it will take you
directly to it and you can download the
PDF to read it I hope you enjoyed
listening to this episode stay tuned
next week for another interview and then
two weeks from now we're going to have
another unpacking scholarship episode I
hope you're all staying safe and healthy
in our hope you are having a wonderful
week
Article
Washington, A. N. (2020). When Twice as Good Isn’t Enough: The Case for Cultural Competence in Computing. Proceedings of the 51st ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE ’20), 213–219.
Abstract
“The commonly documented diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) issues in the computing workforce are the direct result of corporate cultures that benefit specific groups and marginalize others. This culture usually begins in undergraduate computing departments, where the demographic representation mirrors that of industry. With no formal courses that focus on the non-technical issues affecting marginalized groups and how to address and eradicate them, students are indirectly taught that the current status quo in computing departments and industry is not only acceptable, but also unproblematic. This directly affects students from marginalized groups (as the reasons for attrition are similar in both higher education and industry), as well as faculty (as biased student evaluations directly affect hiring, promotion, and tenure decisions). This position paper presents the need for cultural competence as a required focus for university computing departments nationwide. By improving these issues before students complete baccalaureate computing degrees, companies will have talent pools that better understand the importance and necessity of DEI and also work to ensure they help foster a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive environment. In addition, more students from marginalized groups will be retained in the major through degree completion.”
Author Keywords
Cultural competence, computing, diversity, inclusion, race, gender
My One Sentence Summary
This paper unpacks the five elements of cultural competence and the six stages of cultural competence in relation to undergraduate computing programs.
Some Of My Lingering Questions/Thoughts
How might K-12 CS educators adapt the structure of the “Race, Gender, and Computing” course?
What kind of actionable project could apply understandings at the culmination of the course?
How do the enrollment demographics for 2020 CS programs differ from a few years ago?
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