Discrimination and Affirmative Action

Discrimination and Affirmative Action

The city of New Haven should not have rejected the test results based on the lack of minority representation – placing 16th in a pool of approximately 80 candidates would place one in the top 20%, a strong performance indeed. The disparity in the results of the promotion exam could be a result of lingual and cultural background factors, not discrimination. If this is the case, the language and cultural factors may have affected test-taking behavior during the New Haven Fire Department promotion exam. Cultural factors include motivation, attitudes toward test taking, and previous experiences with tests, all of which can affect performance and scores on tests.

The varying culture of test-takers most likely used different strategies in solving problems or organizing information from those required on the promotion exam. Additionally, it is possible that individuals responsible for creating the promotional exam were from varying lingual and cultural backgrounds. Besides, the language of the exam may have purposely been written because the function of the job required it.

Never the less, New Haven should acknowledge the attributes that people with different demographic backgrounds bring to their community and recognize that these attributes have the potential to add value to the New Haven fire department in question. In addition, the community has the opportunity to gain potentially valuable information about their needs and concerns for the fire department, and relationships can be established that facilitate the hiring of diversely qualified employees in the future. Further, if the New Haven Fire Department demonstrates support for seeking a demographic to their employees that matches that of the general population of the community, loyalty may be enhanced among employees who reside in the community the fire department services. However, the aforementioned should not be done at the expense of individuals who have...