We recently posted How to Calculate a Diversity Index and suggested this could be used to look at how well mixed schools within a school district were, among other uses. Somewhat on cue, there was a major controversy in New York City’s Upper West Side, as parents debated a plan to allocate middle school seats to lower income students. https://twitter.com/DOEChancellor/status/989728932772499457
Continue reading “Calculate a Diversity Index for NYC District 3”
“If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it” – supposedly Peter Drucker
A unique feature of the United States is its diverse population, tied together by shared values. Generally a commonly-embraced aspiration, diversity is promoted as a healthy feature of groups within society (usually, although the trend might appear otherwise). But can diversity be measured?
What if we could come up with an index that measures how well “mixed” a set of groups is, a so-called Diversity Score? For instance, can we create an index such that a prison and its subset gangs falls on the less diverse/less well-mixed end and a Benetton commercial on the other? Once we have a method, we can apply it to other places like school districts, college fraternities and sororities, social groupings within a company, and many more. That’s the beauty of spreadsheets! Continue reading “How well mixed is your melting pot? Calculate a Diversity Index with a Spreadsheet”
