David Moltz, Inside Higher Ed, April 8, 2009
{snip}
Officials from the Northern Wyoming Community College District told a group of attendees how they have managed to make institutional progress on both fronts by deliberately attempting to diversify their campuses. They argue that their efforts, including attracting foreign students to the area, have improved the value of the educational experience they provide to native-born students and stimulated the local economy.
Diverse might seem a peculiar word to describe the student body of the three-county region the district serves. Nearly 97 percent of the students who attend its two colleges are white, and Native Americans from traditionally local tribes make up the largest minority group.
{snip}
Still, Kevin Drumm, the district’s president, said the area is becoming more diverse all the time, as it has plenty of jobs to offer—mostly energy-related work with coal, natural gas and oil. Because of its recent growth in comparison to its relatively small population, he asserted that Wyoming is actually the most rapidly diversifying state in the country.
Using this as a backdrop, Drumm came to the district in 2004 with the ambition of creating a more welcoming atmosphere for different kinds of ideas, cultures and students.
“As a president who moved to Wyoming from a city and college in Massachusetts that was majority minority, it was a bit of a culture shock moving to an institution that was 97 percent Anglo,” said Drumm, who was previously vice president for enrollment at Springfield Technical Community College. “I began to cogitate how we could begin to intentionally diversify this college.”
The institution already attracted a number of minority students because of its National Junior College Athletic Association sports teams. Drumm noted that the women’s basketball team’s leading scorer was a Native American. He, however, said these programs were not enough, and fostered diversity in a narrow way that made him “uncomfortable.”
Instead of simply starting academic and student programs with a global focus at the colleges, Drumm said it was important to attract and foster a diverse campus population first.
Claudia Colnar, director of international programs, said the colleges began making a concerted effort to attract foreign students to Wyoming, of all places. Although it seems a hard sell, the district has sent a number of delegations overseas—particularly to China, where there is great interest in American education—to try to recruit students who wish to study in the United States.
To attract these students, Colnar said the colleges have added on-campus housing, full-service dining halls, more tutors, ESL instructors and international affairs officers to help with any student issues. In addition, she noted that the colleges have partnered with a number of families in the region to host some of these students. The colleges brand themselves as a gateway to the American West and take particular pride in the local beauty of the area, no matter how rural and remote.
{snip}
Drumm said it is challenging to persuade international students to come to a Wyoming community college—particularly when most have ambitions of attending college in larger, coastal cities—but he said the district’s strong transfer history and inexpensive cost are major attractions.
Of benefit to the district, international students do not qualify for any financial aid and must pay full freight. Though Drumm claimed this was not the primary reason he pushed for more international students, he acknowledged the extra dollars would help the institution.
{snip}
In the classroom, Drumm said the institution is still working to further integrate a global awareness component in its curriculum. Though more and more faculty members are beginning to “internationalize” their courses, he acknowledged there has not been buy-in from everyone.
“Some of my faculty will say, ‘Oh, that’s an eastern thing,’ ” Drumm said. “And they’ll mean it as an insult.”
The efforts to diversify have also not been without some resistance in the local area.
“We have a very dark [international] student who has been stopped five times by the local police and has never been cited for anything,” said Drumm, referring to instances of prejudice in his community. “Also, we raise a lot of money privately, and fund raising could become an issue because of what we’re doing. So far, however, that hasn’t happened.”
Original article
(Posted on April 10, 2009)
Comments
If Massachusetts is so great, why did Mr. Drumm move to Wyoming?
a culture shock moving to an institution that was 97 percent Anglo,” AND “I began to cogitate how we could begin to intentionally diversify this college.”
This last of course, would mean turn the shockingly WHITE school to a shootingly BLACK school, and all for the federal dollars.
“Still, Kevin Drumm, the district’s president, said the area is becoming more diverse all the time, as it has plenty of jobs to offer—mostly energy-related work with coal, natural gas and oil. Because of its recent growth in comparison to its relatively small population, he asserted that Wyoming is actually the most rapidly diversifying state in the country.”
Kevin Drum should be tried and convicted of causing the degeneration of his school with his seditious, mentally disturbed fixation to pander to people who have given us millions of examples of how they are destroying our society and its institutions.
As bad as the non-whites are, they do far less harm to us than the Kevin Drums of the world.
How disgusting.
What are you going to do next year, Mr. Drum, when you won’t have enough funds to pay for student teaching for the ones you have now, due to falling revenues?
And 2011 is going to be even worse. What then? Is your mental disorder at such an advanced stage you will give up your income and your house in order to bring unteachable Somalis to your school?
“We have a very dark [international] student who has been stopped five times by the local police and has never been cited for anything,” said Drumm, referring to instances of prejudice in his community.
Great, he wants to bring in more “dark” students in hopes more “dark” students will mean fewer such incidents in the future?
Is it any wonder why I believe liberalism is a kind of mental illness?
Meet Kevin Drumm, traitor, intentional destroyer of the community in which he now resides. The education industry is filled with Kevin Drumms. Is Drumm the typical careerist educrat who will jump to another institution if the jump enhances his career? Who annointed these people the re-makers of their communities?
Now Wyoming can have more crime on campus, poor academic performance and a bunch of black whiners every time they don’t get their way.
“As a president who moved to Wyoming from a city and college in Massachusetts that was majority minority, it was a bit of a culture shock moving to an institution that was 97 percent Anglo,”
From this quote, I had assumed Drumm must be black. But no: lo and behold, on the college’s web page, he’s a goofy looking middle-aged white guy with receding blond hair. Yet he speaks of other whites as though they were a different race from him.
Reading between the lines, I figure the “culture shock” is from being surrounded by conservative white people. Poor guy probably never met a single one in Massachusetts! And predictably, his response is not to try to “improve his cultural sensitivity” to these culturally diverse Wyoming folk, but to PLOT DEMOGRAPHIC WARFARE AGAINST THEM! A little wannabe Stalin, flooding the conquered SS Republics with his compatriots.
Maybe they could create scholarhips for former Somalian pirates at the Northern Wyoming Community College. That way several goals could be accompished at the same time. First, they could create a much more enriching environment for all those nasty, racist white students. Second, they could raise the level of academic excellence by the mere presence of black people on the campus. Third, it would be easier for white people to deliver free food to all the black people in all of the failed nations of the sub-African continent without the undue impedence of black African Somalian pirates. It’s win-win for everybody!
“As a president who moved to Wyoming from a city and college in Massachusetts that was majority minority, it was a bit of a culture shock moving to an institution that was 97 percent Anglo,” said Drumm, who was previously vice president for enrollment at Springfield Technical Community College. “I began to cogitate how we could begin to intentionally diversify this college.”
I put on my cogitating cap and really began to cogitate hard. I thought, ninety seven percent Anglo, hmmm. There’s just no way I can flaunt my Big City liberal Tolerance superiority in this environment. I’d just be another white guy. That’ll make it difficult to stand out. I won’t be able to leave my mark like that. But I know, we’ll ship the non-whites in from elsewhere. And then when these lowlife rednecks to begin to moan and whine it’ll be time for me to shine as I get to demonstrating the weird and wonderful assortment of diversoids I can tolerate. Oh boy won’t I stand out from the pack then . Now, sure, some of the “problems” the whiners complain about contain a component of what could, at a pinch, be called “reality” — the rapes, the murders, the retarded academic progress; all the sorts of things that amount to what some are dangerously referring to as a loss of “social capital” — but come on, the diversity die has been cast and there’s no way to turn back now. These communities are going to be “destroyed” in time anyway, so it may as well be me who does it. And when I think of the pristine moral glow I’ll be able to enjoy as I go about my task — while those all around me lose their heads, hah — what can possibly compare to that ?
If diverse countries are so much more competitive, why are homogonous contries in Asia poised to take us over economically? Could anyone go to a university in Tokyo, call a 100% Japanese school a “shock” and NOT be thought of as a total moron?
Drumm is just another petty Nazi out to destroy any last vestiges of white society. Why can’t he go to Africa and moan and groan about how it’s 99% - 100% black and THEY lack diversity?
I know! We can rent Mr. Thumper, I mean ‘Drumm’ a charming cottage in Soweto for his summer vacation. He can use that time to recruit diversity students for his junior college. He’ll be dead within a week. But, hopefully, he will have experienced the richness of South Africa’s diversity….you know….like smoking aids medications and other quaint and noble native practices.
This article really turns my stomach. The only good thing Wyoming has going for it is the fact that it is almost all white. And now this selfish, narcissist is trying to take that one advantage away from the people whose taxes pay his salary.
His statements are a blatant slap in the face to every resident of Wyoming, and to every student at his college. Someone should ask him, loudly and in public, “What’s wrong with US? Why aren’t WE good enough as we are? Who are you to say that we are lacking?” And people should continue to ask him those questions…LOUDLY, and in public.
There’s a four-syllable word in ‘Community College’, that Drumm seems not to comprehend.
I hope this guy never visits a Chinese town to find out that it’s *gasp* 97% Chinese.
These liberals are so desperate to feel ‘cosmopolitan’, because they’re misfits who don’t relate well to the general population.
As a reaction to their solitutude and alienation, they want break up and destroy the society around them.
If Massachusetts is so great, why did Mr. Drumm move to Wyoming?
Maybe the state ran him out!
“Using this as a backdrop, Drumm came to the district in 2004 with the ambition of creating a more welcoming atmosphere for different kinds of ideas, cultures and students.”
Different kinds of ideas, cultures and students, why? The rule of contradiction covers anything different. We have people who keep themselves clean. You want different, we have people who do not keep themselves clean. There are people who obey the laws, and different people who do not obey the laws.
We have the idea that 2+2=4. Different has the idea that 2+2=not4. Mr. Drumm should not force his ideas on others. He is being very intolerant of a culture that is different from his. To satisfy his lust for difference he should go live in different cultures.
Having someone say that is just poisoning another good community. When someone speaks out like that, the men of the town should band together to oust him, by any means necessary.
If Mr. Drumm moved to a rural community in Missippi and found out the school system was 97% black, I’d say the chance that he would cry for ‘diversity’ would be the chance of finding a three-legged ballerina.
Gosh, an almost solid White state like Wyoming and now it’s getting wackos like Drumm.
Until we get control of the government, these things will continue and they will get worse with each passing year.
Mr. Kevin Drum says, “I began to cogitate how we could begin to intentionally diversify this college.”
In the late 60’s, a school board member informed us at an assembly that the high school we went to was “lily white” (in a very condescending tone, as if we should be ashamed of being all white) and we would be integrated the following year.
That was Inglewood High, California, and the nightmare that followed was like something out of a bad movie. Several years after graduating I ran into one of my teachers who thought it was going to be a good thing, and she had completely changed her views of how wonderful diversity was.
Attention Lutheran Refugee Relocation Services: Here’s your clarion call!
“That was Inglewood High, California, and the nightmare that followed was like something out of a bad movie. Several years after graduating I ran into one of my teachers who thought it was going to be a good thing, and she had completely changed her views of how wonderful diversity was.”
That’s the problem. This kind of awakening always happens too late. It’s not good enough for whites to have strong liberal ideas for 5 or 10 or 20 years and then figure out it’s destructive garbage when they’re ready for retirement.
Read the history of whites and Indians in early America. It started out with the English colonists bringing liberal ideas and ended up with complete separation after enough scalpings, kidnappings, raids, For Mims massacres, you name it. Did we learn? Well, yes, for five minutes. Then it was back to Pollyanna liberal attitudes.
““We have a very dark [international] student who has been stopped five times by the local police and has never been cited for anything,””
Well he’s lucky. I’m very pale and the last 5 times I’ve been stopped by the police, I’ve gotten a ticket each and every time.
“As a president who moved to Wyoming from a city and college in Massachusetts that was majority minority, it was a bit of a culture shock moving to an institution that was 97 percent Anglo,” said Drumm, who was previously vice president for enrollment at Springfield Technical Community College. “I began to cogitate how we could begin to intentionally diversify this college.”
First of all, why was it “shocking” to him that this school is Wyoaming was majority European-American? Assuming he’s White, this is rather sad that he would be “shocked” to be around his own kind. Also, STCC in Springfield is NOT “majority-minority”. Springfield, Mass. has indeed lost about half its European-American population since 1990, and yes, Springfield has become a disgusting ghetto city of 150,000 people and is the embarrassment of Western Mass., but European-Americans are not the minority in that school. Plus, this joker would never admit it, but he feels a lot safer in his new environment, no doubt. One would not walk the area of Springfield where STCC is located, after dark.
There is really nothing new here. Kevin Drumm is typical of most academic administrators who think that bringing diversity to largely white areas is on the same level as producing competent, well educated graduates. For them social engineering is their raison d’ etre. Multiculturalism really ranks with Marxism as a dogma that allows no dissidents. One should not be amazed that such individuals will leave largely minority areas to go to pristine white areas hoping to bring “change” and “diversity”—its part of their weird pseudo religion.
Who hired this Bozo? The community needs to have a serious talk with the college hiring committee and send this idiot on his way! I have lived among the wonderful diversity of this country for 35 years in the educational arena, and my goal is to move somewhere where it is 97% white. I am tired of the baggy pants, the smells, the tattoos, the piercings, and the snotty attitude. I believe I deserve better from people whose bills I have been paying for the entire adult portion of my life. I this Drumm really thinks he is helping that community, then he needs to spend a little more time in Mass. or maybe New Mexico.
Diversity is not having just the right percentages everywhere you go. Diversity means sometimes being able to experience 97% white, sometimes 97% black. What can’t this guy handle about authentic diversity?
It’s not good enough for whites to have strong liberal ideas for 5 or 10 or 20 years and then figure out it’s destructive garbage when they’re ready for retirement.
Teachers and many other professionals must put forth a mask of diversity if they want to keep their jobs long enough TO retire, after which they are free to voice their real thoughts.
Drum reminds me of some similar-thinking ‘liberals’ I’ve debated with. Like one on a local news blog site. He was forever extolling the virtues of the highly mixed student body at the school where he worked. How he loved his Mestizo neighbors in the neighborhood where he lived. I invited him to move to a heavily Black neighborhood. For some reason or another, this liberal got himself kind of huffy at my suggestion.
Well said, Skip! As a teacher, I have to bend over backwards to embrace diversity. As a young teacher just starting out, I actually did value the idea of diversity. I thought others did, too. After 15 years in the trenches, I have come to realize that the proponents of diversity have anything but this concept in mind. I teach in a community which is 90 percent Hispanic, yet the city buses bear the slogan, “Diversity is our strength.” Whose definition of diversity is that?
Here are some examples to illustrate “diversity” in my school district. First, in all these years teaching, I have yet to work for a principal who can speak or write standard English. Year after year, our Multicultural Fair equates to having a ballet folklorico performance followed by pozole. One year, we did something different and had a Polynesian performance, but the students laughed at the dancers. I was mortified by the lack of respect. Every year, I can expect at least one student to ask me if my “eyes are real.” After all, eyes are supposed to be brown, so I must wear colored contacts, right? Yet, if I were to ask them how they got that wicked tan, I can only imagine the response I would get. The few white students I have taught throughout my career have been christened with disparaging nicknames such as “Casper.” This behavior is not limited to just the students however. A fellow teacher once asked me if my blonde, blue-eyed daughter was working on her “moon tan.” It never would have even crossed my mind to make a comment about his daughter’s appearance.
If this is the kind of diversity that Mr. Drumm would like to have, I invite him to come work in California.
If groupthink says that everyone needs diversity to be a well-educated person, then this is what I would promote. I suppose, too, that if I came to a state I knew nothing about, I could either make the effort to discover what the existing population really needs or just trade on my having jetted in from a state drowning in diversity. It is obviously more work to identify real needs and answer them than to turn a Wyoming campus into a mini-Boston.
