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Value-added animal agriculture: Inclusion of race and gender in the professional formula¹

M. M. Beck^2,* and J. C. Swanson^3,

^* Department of Animal Science, University of Nebraska, Lincoln 68583-0908, and and Department of Animal Sciences and Industry, Kansas State University, Manhattan 66505-0201

² Correspondence: A224 Animal Sciences (phone: 402/472-6439; fax:402/472-6362; E-mail: mbeck{at}unl.edu).

The Morrill Act establishing the land grant university system created public higher education institutions and paved the way for women and racial minorities to access them. Today women are ~50% of the undergraduate population in animal science (AS) departments at the original land grant state universities, but racial minorities lag far behind, in part because the schools created under the 1890 legislation provided a diversion away from the state universities. Demographic trends from the U.S. Census and the Bureau of Labor Statistics indicate increasing positive growth in nonwhite workforce participation, with concurrent decreases in non-Hispanic male participation; men and women will be nearly equally represented by early in the 21st Century. In the faculties of AS departments, both women and minorities are seriously underrepresented; causative factors underlying this phenomenon are similar. Although, historically, adherence to role stereotypes and divisions of labor explain some of the under-representation, these assumptions do not hold across all economic classes. Other factors contributing to the scarcity of women and faculty of color in AS include assumptions and mechanisms of scientific research itself; the very neutrality and disinterestedness of researchers, inherent in the scientific method, prevent recognition that values and personal biases affect decisions of hiring selections and mentoring effectiveness. We explore the cultural factors that underlie these values and biases that are common not only to agriculture but also to science more broadly.

Key Words: Animal Husbandry • Diversity • Universities

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