[Dcouncil] Fwd: [Jlab_chn] Fwd: About the JLab Diversity Policy

Thu Aug 18 12:30:54 EDT 2016

Hello all and thank you Shirley for sharing. Please take a look at the expressed concern with the upcoming diversity policy (and diversity in general) shared between colleagues. 
Thank you, 
Brandye 

Brandye, 

I got the email below from Zhihong Ye about two months ago. I don't know Zhihong but per his email, he has been working at JLab for over 11 years. He is a postdoc in Argonne National Lab now. 

I'm forwarding his email to you because I think this might be a good topic for us to discuss in our committee. I'm very sorry that I didn't forward it to you earlier. 

Best Regards. 

Shirley 

----- Forwarded Message ----- 
From: "Zhihong Ye" <yez at jlab.org> 
To: "jlab chn" <jlab_chn at jlab.org> 
Sent: Friday, June 24, 2016 10:55:43 AM 
Subject: [Jlab_chn] Fwd: About the JLab Diversity Policy 

Dear friends, 

I am forwarding the emails between me and Larry Weinstein regarding the bad situation of Chinese scientists in the diversity policy (The email I sent was not perfect since I sent it out late last night after long traveling). Larry just replaced Haiyan to be the chair of the JLab user group board, and he is representing users to raise any concerns to the lab managements and try to influence the policy making. Larry suggest us to raise our voice and tell him what you think about the situation of us, the Chinese communicate in JLab , in our research and career developments. One of the biggest issues is that the diversity policy is not in favor of us but on contrary, hurt us in a different way. 

If you have any concerns, please DO send an email to him and he can forward your messages to the upper managements in JLab. In particularly for young scientists, e.g. graduate students and postdocs, it is very important to do so for your future job searching. We don't usually jump out to fight for our rights, but just know to work harder and always try to stay out of causing inconvenience to others. However, it is not enough and we are in a very bad situation. So, please don't keep silence any more and tell JLab and the science community what are your concerns. 

JP has done so and I followed up. Now I urge you to send emails to Larry ( weinstein at odu.edu ), or if you really worry about something, send the emails to me and I will forward them to him. Your support is very important. Thank you. 
Zhihong 

-------- Forwarded Message -------- 
Subject: Re: About the JLab Diversity Policy 
Date: Fri, 24 Jun 2016 09:22:09 -0400 
From: Larry Weinstein <lweinste at odu.edu> 
Reply-To: weinstein at odu.edu 
To: Zhihong Ye <yez at jlab.org> , Larry Weinstein <weinstein at odu.edu> 

Dear Zhihong, 

Thank you very much for sharing your concerns with me. I think that the lab needs to focus on scientific excellence and to carefully consider the qualifications of researchers as individuals, not as members of groups. We need to make sure that we treat each individual fairly. 

If you know other people who share your concern, please let me know. Numbers matter when trying to change policies. J.P. also mentioned to me that he is concerned about it. 

May I forward your email to the other members of the chair-group (Krishna Kumar, Haiyan Gao and Julie Roche)? 

Sincerely, 
Larry 

Zhihong Ye wrote: 

Dear Larry, 

During the user group meeting, Mont emphasized about promoting the diversity policy e.g. "Integrated D&I Management". As one of the minority, I am happy to see that but on the other hand, I am also getting more worried about it after carefully thinking. Based on my observation (or common sentence but just can't speak out loud), Chinese usually do not benefit from the diversity policy but sometimes have the opposite outcomes. I was trying to raise this question during the meeting but didn't have the chance. I hope I can express my concerns to you and hope you could pass them to the JLab managements. 

Before I proceed, I would like to emphasize that my concerns are not against any other communities. I personally believe that in our science communities, we shouldn't distinguish people by different races or genders. We should recognize researchers based on their intelligence, work performance and potentials, but not based on who their parents are and where they are from. 

Just speaking about our JLab communities, I believe you have met and been working with many outstanding Chinese graduate students in the last twenty years of JLab operation. They are always working very hard and provided great contributions to many physics programs. However, we know how many of them are able to stay inside the field, and obviously, the amount is very very small . At JLab, only three Chinese staff scientists in Hall-A, B and C, and they all have been working for more than 20 years, and zero in Hall-D. Among the User community, who are the most junior faculty at JLab with active research programs? Xiaochao Zheng! (yes, Lei Guo is still in FIU but he is not very active at JLab now). And who were hired by universities before Xiaochao, Liping Gan and Haiyan Gao! I may be miss some other people but these people are generally we can see at JLab. I have been at JLab for more than 11 years, and most Chinese students who came in earlier than me have left, and many of them are very brilliant and we should have kept them. The sad thing is that more young people are leaving because they can not get any positions. 

If JLab really wants to emphasize the "Integrated D&I Management", they should do a math: how many Chinese PHD JLab have produced so far, how many Chinese graduate students in different experiments, how many awards Chinese graduate students and postdoc have ever received, and how many of them get their permanent positions in the end. And if comparing with other communities, they will immediately realize that we, Chinese are in a very bad position. We work hard, performed great but are recognized very little. For my own interests, I am in the third years of my postdoc and I have already experienced such kind of "disadvantage" in my last several position applications. After seeing these rigid "diversity weighting" numbers and , I am greatly concerning about my next two applications for JLab positions because as a Chinese and one of the minority, I may be in the bad position of the competitions. 

As I mentioned, I hope in our academic community, people should be recognized by their research abilities, but not races and genders. I personally don't need a diversity policy to help me getting something that I don't deserve, but just want a fair competition and working environment. 

Thank you for your time and I hope my concerns can be listened by JLab managements. 

-- 
Best Regards 
@ _______/|______ 0 
/| \_O. / / / /|\ 
|_| /______|____ __/ O_/|_| 
/ \ | | | | / \ 
| | 
Zhihong Ye, PHD 
Physics Division, Medium Energy Group, Argonne National Lab 
Office: Bldg 203, Room C253, 
Phone: 630-252-2305 
Address: 9700 S. Cass Ave, Physics Division Bldg 203, Lemont, IL 60439 

-- 
Sincerely, 
Larry 

----------------------------------------------------------- 
Lawrence Weinstein 
Eminent Scholar and University Professor 
Physics Department 
Old Dominion University 
Norfolk, VA 23529 
757 683 5803 
757 683 3038 (fax) weinstein at odu.edu http://www.lions.odu.edu/~lweinste/ 

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-- 
Thank you very much, 
Brandye I Rogers 

"Remember where you were when you began. 
It increases your compassion for people just beginning." 
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