Our Compelling Interests

Earl Lewis is president of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. His books include Love on Trial and Defending Diversity. Lewis was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2008. Nancy Cantor is chancellor of Rutgers University–Newark. Her books include Personality and Social Intelligence and Personality, Cognition, and Social Interaction. She was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and to the National Academy of Medicine in 2000. How diversity and difference strengthen democracy and increase prosperity It is clear that in our society today, issues of diversity and social connectedness remain deeply unresolved and can lead to crisis and instability. The major demographic changes taking place in America make discussions about such issues all the more imperative. Our Compelling Interests engages this conversation and demonstrates that diversity is an essential strength that gives nations a competitive edge. This inaugural volume of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation's Our Compelling Interests series illustrates that a diverse population offers our communities a prescription for thriving now and in the future. This landmark essay collection begins with a powerful introduction situating the demographic transitions reshaping American life, and the contributors present a broad-ranging look at the value of diversity to democracy and civil society. They explore the paradoxes of diversity and inequality in the fifty years following the civil rights legislation of the 1960s, and they review the ideals that have governed our thinking about social cohesion-such as assimilation, integration, and multiculturalism-before delving into the new ideal of social connectedness. The book also examines the demographics of the American labor force and its implications for college enrollment, graduation, the ability to secure a job, business outcomes, and the economy. Contributors include Danielle Allen, Nancy Cantor, Anthony Carnevale, William Frey, Earl Lewis, Nicole Smith, Thomas Sugrue, and Marta Tienda. Commentary is provided by Kwame Anthony Appiah, Patricia Gurin, Ira Katznelson, and Marta Tienda. At a time when American society is swiftly being transformed, Our Compelling Interests sheds light on how our differences will only become more critical to our collective success. "For a collection of essays, the book is well organized and unusually coherent. Each of the essays makes important contributions to what is likely among the most important challenges the US will face in the twenty-first century. Though balanced, the overall tone is optimistic." "Lewis and Cantor have assembled a remarkable slate of top-tier talents to offer insights on a topic of utmost significance-the fact and value of diversity in a twenty-first-century world. Making it clear that a demographic revolution is upon us, this illuminating and riveting book offers new ways of seeing and thriving in a world hurtling toward the future."-Henry Louis Gates Jr., Harvard University "The United States is irrevocably becoming more diverse from racial, ethnic, religious, language, intermarriage, and country-of-origin perspectives. In what ways is this growing diversity a strategic advantage for the country? Our Compelling Interests contains essays prepared by leading scholars who have done fundamental research on the value of diversity for a more democratic and prosperous society. Whether optimistic or pessimistic, the contributions in this book are a must-read and raise issues that we all need to confront honestly and aggressively."-Paul L. Joskow, president of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation "Our nation's unofficial motto is e pluribus unum-out of many, one. America's diversity has enriched our economy, culture, and well-being, making the United States strong and dynamic. However, as America grows even more diverse, tensions have grown too. In light of this troubling trend, we are in dire need of thoughtful commentary and objective resear

Scott E. Page is the Leonid Hurwicz Collegiate Professor of Complex Systems, Political Science, and Economics at the University of Michigan. His books include The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools, and Societies (Princeton). How businesses and other organizations can improve their performance by tapping the power of differences in how people think What if workforce diversity is more than simply the right thing to do? What if it can also improve the bottom line? It can. The Diversity Bonus shows how and why. Scott Page, a leading thinker, writer, and speaker whose ideas and advice are sought after by corporations, nonprofits, universities, and governments, makes a clear and compelling practical case for diversity and inclusion. He presents overwhelming evidence that teams that include different kinds of thinkers outperform homogenous groups on complex tasks, producing what he calls "diversity bonuses." These bonuses include improved problem solving, increased innovation, and more accurate predictions-all of which lead to better results. Drawing on research in economics, psychology, computer science, and many other fields, The Diversity Bonus also tells the stories of businesses and organizations that have tapped the power of diversity to solve complex problems. The result changes the way we think about diversity at work-and far beyond. "If you want your business or team to perform better, read this book. With compelling evidence, examples, and writing, Scott Page makes the business case for drawing out diverse perspectives, and shows you exactly how to do it. A clear road map for every team and leader."-Laszlo Bock, former SVP of People Operations at Google and author of Work Rules! "Leaders often say that the greatest obstacle to diversifying their organizations is their commitment to 'excellence' and 'meritocracy.' Scott Page's important book blows that myth out of the water, powerfully demonstrating that diverse teams are better: more creative, productive, and profitable. After this, there is no excuse for making excuses."-Naomi Oreskes, coauthor of Merchants of Doubt "A powerful way to appreciate the problem with homogeneity."-Tim Harford, Financial Times

Eboo Patel is founder and president of Interfaith Youth Core, a nonprofit organization that promotes interfaith leadership on college campuses. He is the author of Interfaith Leadership, Sacred Ground, and Acts of Faith. Twitter @EbooPatel A timely defense of religious diversity and its centrality to American identity America is the most religiously diverse nation on the planet. In today's volatile climate of religious conflict and distrust, how do we affirm that the American promise is deeply intertwined with how each of us engages with people of different beliefs? Eboo Patel, former faith adviser to Barack Obama, provides answers to this timely question. In this thought-provoking book, Patel draws on his personal experience as a Muslim in America to examine the importance of religious diversity in the nation's cultural, political, and economic life. He explores how religious language has given the United States some of its most enduring symbols and inspired its most vital civic institutions-and demonstrates how the genius of the American experiment lies in its empowerment of all people. "One of America's deepest thinkers on religion and the human condition."-U.S. News & World Report "Readers will be rewarded with Patel's rich perspective on religious diversity in America."-Publishers Weekly "Patel makes a gloriously unapologetic case for such old-fashioned American values as empathetic citizenship and religious pluralism."-Stephen Prothero, author of God Is Not One "With this book, we experience the sweep of Patel's intellect and perspective."-Krista Tippett, founder and CEO of the On Being Project "Patel is the best of what this country makes: a person of faith with a heart as big as his mind."-Ayad Akhtar, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Disgraced

Gary Orfield is professor of education, law, political science, and urban planning at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he codirects the Civil Rights Project, one of the nation's leading centers for civil rights research. His many books include Educational Delusions? and Dismantling Desegregation. The case for race-conscious education policy In our unequal society, families of color fully share the dream of college but their children often attend schools that do not prepare them, and the higher education system gives the best opportunities to the most privileged. Students of color hope for college but often face a dead end. For many young people, racial inequality puts them at a disadvantage from early childhood. The Walls around Opportunity argues that colorblind policies have made college inaccessible to a large share of students of color, and reveals how policies that acknowledge racial inequalities and set racial equality goals can succeed where colorblindness has failed. Gary Orfield paints a troubling portrait of American higher education, explaining how profound racial gaps imbedded in virtually every stage of our children's lives pose a major threat to communities of color and the nation. He describes how the 1960s and early 1970s was the only period in history to witness sustained efforts at racial equity in higher education, and how the Reagan era ushered in today's colorblind policies, which ignore the realities of color inequality. Orfield shows how this misguided policy has resegregated public schools, exacerbated inequalities in college preparation, denied needed financial aid to families, and led to huge price increases over decades that have seen little real gain in income for most Americans. Drawing on a wealth of new data and featuring commentaries by Stella Flores and James Anderson, this timely and urgent book shows how colorblind policies serve only to raise the walls of segregation higher, and proposes real solutions that can make higher education available to all. "A thorough, unflinching look at what it would take to eradicate racial barriers in American higher education. . . . [The book] finds clear directions within a complex issue and makes a robust case for centering race in higher education policy." "Anyone who seeks to understand policies and structures that have generated and continue to reinforce racial stratification in the US, and who believes that the past can inform the present and guide the future, will find the book to be a worthy read."---Pamela R. Bennett, Ethnic and Race Studies "[The Walls Around Opportunity] provides compelling evidence that the educational policy implementation practices begun by former President Lyndon B. Johnson's administration . . . were effectively undercut by the color-blind methodologies introduced by President Ronald Reagan and perpetuated by subsequent presidents. . . . Orfield argues that the current bleak conditions can be overcome through bold action and offers a toolkit of strategies . . . to reform education in the US and restore meaningful opportunities." "At a time when children of color are the fastest growing sector of our preadult population, systemic inequalities represent a serious threat to democratic citizenship in our country. In this masterfully argued and brilliantly written book, Orfield offers a detailed blueprint for undoing the walls around opportunity for millions of our children. This is a book every citizen should read and pass on to others."-Marcelo M. Suárez-Orozco, chancellor of the University of Massachusetts, Boston "Orfield's book is well timed. It is written with a sense of urgency, and the call to action is clear."-Bridget Long, dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education "Gary Orfield's brilliant and powerful book shows that pursuing colorblindedness in education only increases inequalities, and offers detailed suggestions for reform. The Walls around Opportunity needs t

The case for race-conscious education policy In our unequal society, families of color fully share the dream of college but their children often attend schools that do not prepare them, and the higher education system gives the best opportunities to the most privileged. Students of color hope for college but often face a dead end. For many young people, racial inequality puts them at a disadvantage from early childhood. The Walls around Opportunity argues that colorblind policies have made college inaccessible to a large share of students of color, and reveals how policies that acknowledge racial inequalities and set racial equality goals can succeed where colorblindness has failed. Gary Orfield paints a troubling portrait of American higher education, explaining how profound racial gaps imbedded in virtually every stage of our children's lives pose a major threat to communities of color and the nation. He describes how the 1960s and early 1970s was the only period in history to witness sustained efforts at racial equity in higher education, and how the Reagan era ushered in today's colorblind policies, which ignore the realities of color inequality. Orfield shows how this misguided policy has resegregated public schools, exacerbated inequalities in college preparation, denied needed financial aid to families, and led to huge price increases over decades that have seen little real gain in income for most Americans. Now with a new afterword that discusses the 2023 Supreme Court decision to outlaw affirmative action in college admissions, this timely and urgent book shows that the court's colorblind ruling is unworkable in a society where every aspect of opportunity and preparation is linked to race, and reveals the gaps in the opportunity pipeline while exploring the best ways to address them in light of this decision. Gary Orfield is professor of education, law, political science, and urban planning at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he codirects the Civil Rights Project, one of the nation's leading centers for civil rights research. His many books include Educational Delusions? and Dismantling Desegregation. "At a time when children of color are the fastest growing sector of our preadult population, systemic inequalities represent a serious threat to democratic citizenship in our country. In this masterfully argued and brilliantly written book, Orfield offers a detailed blueprint for undoing the walls around opportunity for millions of our children. This is a book every citizen should read and pass on to others."-Marcelo M. Suárez-Orozco, chancellor of the University of Massachusetts, Boston "Orfield's book is well timed. It is written with a sense of urgency, and the call to action is clear."-Bridget Long, dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education "Gary Orfield's brilliant and powerful book shows that pursuing colorblindedness in education only increases inequalities, and offers detailed suggestions for reform. The Walls around Opportunity needs to be read by everyone who is involved in designing policy for schools, from preschool through college."-Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of Berkeley Law "Orfield's book encapsulates the work of a scholar who has committed his life to the eradication of educational inequality. Written in Orfield's frank, astute style, The Walls around Opportunity provides a strong multidisciplinary mix of social science evidence of why public education has yet to become the great equalizer in society, yet also offers hope for educational redemption."-Prudence L. Carter, coeditor of Closing the Opportunity Gap "A thorough, unflinching look at what it would take to eradicate racial barriers in American higher education. . . . [The book] finds clear directions within a complex issue and makes a robust case for centering race in higher education policy." "Anyone who seeks to understand policies and structures that have gene

How to make American higher education fairer In the 1930s, American colleges and universities began to screen applications using the SAT, a mass-administered, IQ-descended standardized test. The widespread adoption of the test accompanied the development of the world's first mass higher education system-and served to promote the idea that the United States was becoming a "meritocracy" in which admission to selective higher education institutions would be granted to those who most deserved it. In Higher Admissions, Nicholas Lemann reflects on the state of America's aspirational meritocracy and the enduring value and meaning of standardized testing. Lemann writes that the anticipation of the Supreme Court's 2023 decision banning affirmative action, plus the Covid pandemic, led hundreds of universities to stop requiring standardized admissions tests; now many colleges and universities are reinstituting test requirements. The country is preoccupied with the admissions policies of the most selective universities, but Lemann redirects our attention to an alternate path that American higher education could have taken, and can still take-one that emphasizes selective admission less and a significant upgrade of the entire higher education system more. Lemann argues that to improve the state of higher education overall, we should focus not on the narrow chokepoint of admission to highly selective colleges, but on efforts to create as much meaningful opportunity for flourishing in our vast higher education system for as many people as possible. The book includes thoughtful and challenging responses from Marvin Krislov, Patricia Gándara, and Prudence Carter. Nicholas Lemann is a staff writer at the New Yorker and dean emeritus of the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University, where he is the Joseph Pulitzer II and Edith Pulitzer Moore Professor of Journalism. He is the author of Transaction Man: The Rise of the Deal and the Decline of the American Dream, The Big Test: The Secret History of the American Meritocracy, and other books. "For anyone interested in the status of testing in American higher education, Nicholas Lemann has provided a masterful synthesis of the relevant-- and sometimes surprising-historical, political, economic, institutional, and personal factors."-Howard Gardner, Harvard Graduate School of Education "Questions about the SAT abound: Can we constructively use it in college admissions without unfairly discriminating against swaths of our diverse population? Did our retreat from it during the pandemic prove we don't need it? Is it critical to finding 'diamonds in the rough' for college admissions? No one has a deeper, more comprehensive grasp of this test-its history, uses, and capacities-than Nicholas Lemann. His new book, in taking up these questions and more, is a welcome and truly exciting arrival-a must-read for all educators and, I hope, many Americans."-Claude Steele, Stanford University "With this slim but powerful volume, Nicholas Lemann and his interlocutors contextualize current debates about the value of the SAT/ACT in selective college admissions as well as their influence on American ideas of merit. This searing account encourages readers to ask what alternative futures, with or without standardized testing involved, we might envision for a more just and democratic higher education system."-Rachel Gable, author of The Hidden Curriculum: First Generation Students at Legacy Universities "With some selective colleges and universities reinstating the standardized SAT as an admissions criterion (after dropping the requirement during the Covid-19 pandemic) and with the Supreme Court ruling against affirmative action, [Lemann's] examination [of the SAT] is timely. . . . A well-informed critique."

How to turn the paradoxes built into anti-racism work into drivers of learning and change Even as anti-racism practices seemed to be gaining momentum, the nation shows signs of falling back into long-standing patterns of racial injustice and inequality. Leaders who introduce anti-racist approaches to their organizations often face backlash from white colleagues and skepticism from colleagues of color, leading to paralysis. In What Might Be, Susan Sturm explores how to navigate the contradictions built into our racialized history, relationships, and institutions. She offers strategies and stories for confronting racism within predominantly white institutions, describing how change agents can move beyond talk to build the architecture of full participation. Sturm argues that although we cannot avoid the contradictions built into efforts to confront racism, we can make them into engines of cross-racial reflection, bridge building, and institutional reimagination, rather than falling into a Groundhog Day–like trap of repeated failures. Drawing on her decades of experience researching and working with institutions to help them become more equitable and inclusive, Sturm identifies three persistent paradoxes inherent in anti-racism work. These are the paradox of racialized power, whereby anti-racism requires white people to lean into and yet step back from exercising power; the paradox of racial salience, which means that effective efforts must explicitly name and address race while also framing their goals in universal terms other than race; and the paradox of racialized institutions, which must drive anti-racism work while simultaneously being the target of it. Sturm shows how people and institutions can cultivate the capacity to straddle these contradictions, enabling those in different racial positions to discover their linked fate and become the catalysts for long-term change. The book includes thoughtful and critical responses from Goodwin Liu, Freeman Hrabowski, and Anurima Bhargava. Susan Sturm is the George M. Jaffin Professor of Law and Social Responsibility and the Founding Director of the Center for Institutional and Social Change at Columbia Law School. She is the coauthor (with Lani Guinier) of Who's Qualified? A New Democracy Forum on the Future of Affirmative Action. "Susan Sturm's unflinching and poignant narrative urges white leaders and collaborators to think more critically about anti-racist praxis without coopting it. Crucial for our times, What Might Be is an orienting and intimate guide."-Swethaa S. Ballakrishnen, University of California, Irvine, author of Accidental Feminism "Susan Sturm works hard to convince folks to be their best, to use their power and privilege for good, to collaborate across racial lines, and to do the work to confront racism in the academy and elsewhere. The beauty of this book is how Sturm uses her own experiences, presenting an authentic perspective."-Marybeth Gasman, Rutgers University, author of Doing the Right Thing "As a white man leading an institution whose origins epitomize white male privilege, I wish I had had this book years ago when embarking on an intentional and ongoing participatory process of institutional transformation towards anti-racism and antisexism. Susan Sturm has provided an inspiring and practical guide to the deep work of multiracial collaboration that fuses theory, reflection, and practice to powerfully advance equity and justice."-Stephen Heintz, President and CEO, Rockefeller Brothers Fund "During a time of division and conflict, Susan Sturm offers powerful stories linked to instructive analysis of bridge-building in pursuit of equality, excellence, and effective collaborations against racism. What makes this work so essential is its honesty and clarity about the dilemmas that arise when people use their power and privilege to try to alter the patterns affording them authority."-Martha Minow, author of Whe