Lani Guinier – The Tyranny of the Meritocracy: April 9

You don’t be afraid. I said it was intended that you should perish, in the ghetto, perish by never being allowed to go beyond and behind the white man’s definition, by never being allowed to spell your proper name. You have, and many of us have, defeated this intention and by a terrible law, a terrible paradox, those innocents who believed that your imprisonment made them safe are losing their grasp of reality. But these men are your brothers, your lost younger brothers, and if the word “integration” means anything, this is what it means, that we with love shall force our brothers to see themselves as they are, to cease fleeing from reality and begin to change it, for this is your home, my friend. Do not be driven from it. Great men have done great things here and will again and we can make America what America must become.

It will be hard, James, but you come from sturdy peasant stock, men who picked cotton, dammed rivers, built railroads, and in the teeth of the most terrifying odds, achieved an unassailable and monumental dignity. You come from a long line of great poets, some of the greatest poets since Homer. One of them said, ‘The very time I thought I was lost, my dungeon shook and my chains fell off.’

You know and I know that the country is celebrating one hundred years of freedom one hundred years too early. We cannot be free until they are free.

From James Baldwin’s My Dungeon Shook — Letter to my Nephew on the One Hundredth Anniversary of Emancipation

That passage made me know I had to go to college.  Years later, my, my, my, how I struggle with my professional competence and my trust in institutions.

It took me a while, but I figured it out. I have had the classic “there-but-for-the-Grace-of-God” education. Lucky enough to be born in proximity to loving advocates – my parents, urban activists, and teachers – and smart enough to know that I had to play to that which prevails. I found my way into poverty help, special programs, enrichment times, SAT exams, staunch liberal goodwill, and the need for diversity. I know dozens – maybe even a hundred – of folks from around my way who were and are smarter and more deserving of living in the merit syndrome than I. That’s why I struggle so much – even now.

How was I chosen? Or, was I a good-enough hustler that got into the game at the right time – taking advantage of severe social unrest that hailed diversity as a remedy? (I choke on the word “diversity” – it’s so late last century. I prefer to talk about the multiple reflections and perspectives throughout society. I even prefer that old-world word “pluralism” to – okay, I’ll say it – diversity.)

Finally, someone has given diversity a vision. I just put down Lani Guinier’s The Tyranny of the Meritocracy: Democratizing Higher Education in America. It’s a letter of love to us and our power to pause, and remix the world again. A reminder that democracy is about a way of life that is as deliberate about who sits in our classrooms as who leads our institutions and nation. She is bold enough to suggest that if democracy is to progress – maybe even survive, we consider brushing aside SATs and ACTs as key entry points to the leadership and power networks in society. It’s a broad challenge to longstanding notions that individuals always take priority over the common good – especially when it comes to elite, higher education.

I’ve invited Professor Guinier in for discussion and a re-examination of the old wisdom – the old truths – about higher education and the successful democracy. Join us on Thursday, April 9, at 5 p.m. in The Florence & Chafetz Hillel House at Boston University (213 Bay State Road, Boston).

Sometimes I wonder if we’re loosing sight of the real problem – not the specific numbers – but who is in the rooms and the reasons why we want them there. Let’s check the answer on Thursday.

Peace.