Co-Authored by: Raymond Tam
As we think about our responsibilities as engineers it is important to reflect on questions of diversity and inclusion. The 2018-2020 ITE Strategic Plan recognizes the need for ITE to increase its efforts in this area. This blog challenges each of us to think about how these issues come into play in our own work environments.
In her book, So You Want to Talk About Race, Ijeoma Oluo stated that “Intersectionality consists of the belief that we must consider all the intersections of identity, privilege, and oppression before making decisions.”
But how can we consider intersections when we are lacking representatives from the population we are designing for. According to National Science Foundation, women and some minority groups were represented less in science and engineering occupations than they were in the U.S. general population.
Engineering has made progress in terms of diversity with organizations such as Girls Who Code and Engineer Girl. However diversity should not only be limited to gender and sex, we must also consider race, sexuality, (dis-)ability status, age, and class. With these perspectives in mind, we can begin to focus on engineering as a discipline with which to apply intersectionality. We don’t always feel it because of the privileges we have, but these aspects are interwoven into our life and play a major role in our workplace and its culture.
These aspects do not only apply to ourselves but our work environment as well. For example, what do you see when you view your workplace? Are many of your coworkers from the same background and class as you? Is their background and class different from yours? Considering these questions allows us to begin to understand what viewpoints are lacking within our workplace. If you are a transportation engineer do you have any coworkers with a disability? Unfortunately the answer is no for the most of us, and that’s a very telling sign that we are missing the engagement with large portion of the population. How are we as engineers supposed to build and design infrastructure for the aid of all people, when we are only representing a small, and privileged few? When able-bodied people design infrastructure such as ADA ramps, how will they service the disabled community when they were not involved in the initial design process?
Oluo challenges us to ask “how might race, gender, sexuality, ability, class, or sex impact this subject? You don’t have to have the exact answers to this question but asking it of yourself will give you ideas of other viewpoints to seek out.”.
Intersectionality does slow things down but it is important to consist of the needs of a diverse group of people. As engineers that design systems around the world, we have an obligation to consider the needs of all, and not just the privileged.
ITE is recognizing National Engineers Week 2019. Throughout the week, there will be posts from ITE members reflecting on how they chose to become transportation engineers, the importance of transportation engineers, and the need for diversity in the transportation profession.