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This week’s five breaking news haikus have been brought to you by Tony Samuel, founder and CEO of Talented Books. He is one of raceAhead ’s earliest friends, and as you will see, he was captivated by the impeachment hearings this week. He also went above and beyond to meet the Friday haiku challenge; you can enjoy the rest of his haikus here.
Nobody wanted
To work with Giuliani
Impeachment TV
Everybody knew
I was following orders
Impeachment TV
It was no secret
The president directed
Extortion TV
Investigations
Into a political
Opponent is wrong
Ninety five thousand
Dollars makes you number one
Must be nice indeed
Have an unimpeachably wonderful weekend with friends and family.
Ellen McGirt
On Point
Stacey Abrams: "[O]ur mission is to make certain that no one is taken off of the [voter] rolls improperly" In a lengthy interview with Politico, the former Georgia gubernatorial candidate turned voter rights activist talked about her efforts to contact 300,000 Georgia voters who are likely to be purged from voter rolls, as well as her persistent vice presidential rumors and diversity in politics. "I am excited because... The diversity of this field has forced a complexity of conversation that we have not previously seen," she says. It’s bigger than the horse race. "And whether or not that diversity is reflected in the eventual nominee, the diversity of the field has changed the conversation, and I think for the better."
Politico
New York City has a new chief algorithms officer The position was created via an executive order from Mayor Bill de Blasio. The new officer’s primary job is to ensure that the digital tools used to collect information and deliver services aren’t hobbled by implicit or explicit bias. "Fairness and equity are central to improving the lives of New Yorkers," says de Blasio. "With every new technology comes added responsibility, and I look forward to welcoming an algorithms management and policy officer to my team to ensure the tools we use to make decisions are fair and transparent."
Government Technology
Walmart, Microsoft, and Cognizant dedicated $3 million to teaching computer science to underrepresented college students The Cognizant U.S. Foundation, Walmart.org, and Microsoft Philanthropies will make the investment in CodePath.org, a nonprofit which works with tech companies to create computer science training that better meets the needs of employers for underrepresented students. The investment will allow them to expand their offerings to more than 75 cities nationwide—with an aim to reach some 7,000 students by 2021. "The computer science coursework offered by most colleges today is disconnected from shifting industry demands," says Michael Ellison, founder and CEO of CodePath.org. The training also helps students prepare for technical interviews.
Campus Technology
On Background
Jamelle Bouie: Sometimes the racism is personal In his latest opinion piece, Bouie names the recent Newsday investigation that found a pattern of discrimination in the Long Island real estate market. This should shock no one, he says. It’s everywhere, and largely underreported. "Large and persistent racial gaps in housing and employment are a fact of American life," he says. "A good deal of this is the long overhang of past discrimination, the legacy of Jim Crow and redlining and urban renewal and the deliberate neglect of communities of color by authorities at all levels of government," he says. But at the heart of the matter is explicit, not implicit bias. "Millions of Americans are still taking deliberate action to deny jobs and homes on the basis of race."
New York Times
Zora Magazine has an exceptional series on Black trans women "Know Their Names: Black Trans Women Deserve More" is a collection of stories that celebrate the lives of Black trans women and illuminate the unique dangers they face. At least 19 Black trans women have been murdered in the U.S. So far this year, but the number is probably far higher. "The approximation speaks to the fundamental impossibility of tracking the lives and deaths of people who are ignored by the power structures that keep tabs," say the editors. To honor and remember them, the editors have compiled a collection of stories from Zora contributors, and have published thorough and loving profiles of each of the women who have been lost.
Zora
Are you an ethical leader? Part of the trouble is recognizing what the right thing to do is in any given situation. Neil Malhotra and Ken Shotts, two political economists at Stanford Graduate School of Business, teach a class called "Values-Based Leadership," designed to prepare future leaders to grapple with some of the big questions of the day: What are values? How do you stay true to your own values while respecting the values of others in the organization? In an excellent Q&A, they take on everything from the pitfalls of gut instinct to the creeping rationalizations that produce the Theranoses of the world. And then there is the leadership bubble. "Powerful people typically don’t perceive that other people are agreeing with them because of their role. They have to learn to recognize that," cautions Malhotra.
Stanford
Tamara El-Waylly helps write and produce raceAhead.
Quote
"There is a housing project standing now where the house in which we grew up once stood, and one of those stunted city trees is snarling where our doorway used to be. This is on the rehabilitated side of the avenue. The other side of the avenue—for progress takes time—has not been rehabilitated yet and it looks exactly as it looked in the days when we sat with our noses pressed against the windowpane, longing to be allowed to go 'across the street.' The grocery store which gave us credit is still there, and there can be no doubt that it is still giving credit. The people in the project certainly need it—far more, indeed, than they ever needed the project."
—James Baldwin, Esquire, 1960
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