SUNY Upstate Is a World Apart from Its Downstate Counterpart – “But We Could Do Much More”

There may only be 250 miles of geographic distance between New York’s SUNY Upstate and SUNY Downstate campuses, but the difference on the woke-o-meter is astounding.

Earlier this year, we reported the “perfect” score that SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University College of Medicine scored on its Diversity, Inclusion, Culture, and Equity (DICE) Inventory that it submitted to the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). This indicates that SUNY Downstate has implemented 100% of the DEI-related policies prescribed by the AAMC.

That’s not the case at SUNY Upstate Medical University. Through a freedom of information request, Do No Harm just received the DICE Inventory results from the Norton College of Medicine (NCOM), and the differences couldn’t be starker.

NCOM does have a dedicated Office of Diversity and Inclusion and DEI strategic plan, and the school responded affirmatively to the AAMC’s questions regarding admissions policies and curriculum components that support DEI. These initiatives produced a score “in the green” on the DICE Inventory, indicating the school is making “substantial Diversity, Inclusion, Culture, and Equity efforts.”

Figure 1. SUNY Upstate Medical University Strategic Diversity Plan

But that’s where the alignment with SUNY Downstate ends. In three sections of the DICE Inventory, SUNY Upstate is “in the red” with the AAMC’s woke directives.

  • Institutional Planning and Policies: There are no performance incentives or awards from senior leadership for departments with “successful” DEI initiatives, and the last salary equity assessment at the medical school was more than 5 years ago. NCOM scored less than 50% in this section.
  • Communications and Engagement: NCOM says its “institutional leaders are active within local, regional, and national forums” to promote DEI, “but we could do much more.” According to the AAMC DICE Inventory criteria, SUNY Upstate needs to act “to rectify historically exclusionary practices” and incorporate “visual displays on campus” that highlight its DEI work to get the score up in this section.
  • Faculty and Staff: Because NCOM does not currently require a “diversity statement,” enforce a mandate to complete DEI training, or uphold practices to consider DEI activities in promotion and tenure, this section’s score also fell below the 50% threshold. However, the comments indicate that it plans to add diversity statements to its curriculum vitae (CV) template.
Figure 2. SUNY Upstate NCOM DICE Inventory scoring report.

Overall, SUNY Upstate Norton College of Medicine has instituted only 55.2% of the divisive and discriminatory woke policies listed by the AAMC. So, you can bet it is feeling pressure from activists and outside groups to go further down the radical rabbit hole of DEI.

Figure 3. SUNY Upstate NCOM DICE Inventory overall score.

We urge a different reaction. Rather than rush to infuse divisive and discriminatory ideology throughout the SUNY Update Medical University system, their leadership should pause and realize that they have a strategic opportunity to position themselves as one of the most unique medical schools in America – one that that puts medicine, not ideology, front and center.

We hear every day from a diverse group of concerned students and their parents about applying to a medical school that avoids identity and focuses instead on academic merit. They crave intellectual diversity and a solid focus on healing people, but they feel totally alienated by the current trends in higher education.

Could SUNY Upstate be their destination? Time will tell.

Does a Diverse Medical Team Improve Healthcare Outcomes?

Increasing diversity of the physician workforce is a dominant activity in today’s healthcare system and the goal of the millions of dollars spent by hospitals and medical schools on their diversity bureaucracies. One of the most cited studies to support the rather unlikely notion that merely diversifying a hospital staff will improve patient outcomes is a study published in the Journal of the National Medical Association in 2019 by Gomez and Bernet (J Natl Med Assoc. 2019 Aug; 111(4): 383-392). It has been cited hundreds of times in various medical articles touting the benefits of diversity, likely because of the title, “Diversity improves performance and outcomes.” As it turns out, this article is often the only citation used to assert that diversity improves clinical outcomes. The vast majority of studies of the benefits of diversity claim that physician-patient racial concordance improves short term patient satisfaction and feelings of comfort with their physician. While comfort is pleasant, the goal of the patient-physician interaction is a successful therapeutic outcome.

In 2023 alone, 16 articles with titles like “Addressing kidney health disparities with new national policy: the time is now” call for more diversity of the health care workforce and cite the single study purporting to show improved outcomes. However, if one reads beyond the title, which is apparently rarely done, the story is very different.

The article by Gomez and Bernet is actually a compilation of 16 reviews of the effects of a diverse workplace, but only three of the 16 studies are concerned with diversity in healthcare. The rest were in finance, education, or other workplaces. Of the three reviews of healthcare, the articles only dealt with patients’ satisfaction and willingness to accept recommendations for care, not the results of treatments. The first study provides no evidence that racial concordance benefits patients. Rather, it concludes:

Little evidence of clinical benefit resulting from sex or race/ethnicity concordance was found. Greater matching of patients and providers by sex and race/ethnicity is unlikely to mitigate health disparities.

In a second study, the authors reach the same conclusion:

No significant association between concordance and impressions, such as, whether the patient felt the doctor “knew enough or asked enough questions about your health.”

The third article – which Gomez and Bernet incorrectly classify as a meta-analysis (a technique for compiling the results of various studies) – links to two 20-year-old studies that find positive associations between racial concordance and patient satisfaction. Remarkably, Gomez and Bernet omit mention of a 2009 systematic review of racial concordance studies in medicine that concludes that “there are inconclusive results in minority patients’ preference, satisfaction, and communication domains.” In other words, even the narrow assertion that provider-patient racial concordance is associated with higher patient satisfaction rests on cherrypicked data.

So, many articles that claim that diversity improves patient outcomes cite a paper with an intriguing title that claims a result that does not exist. The “evidence” in favor of such claims proves to be a shell game.

In the same fashion, Dr. Quinn Capers IV wrote an opinion piece in the New England Journal of Medicine extolling the virtues of diversity in the physician workforce and cites only one study to justify the idea that merit and ability of the trainees cannot be determined from performance on standardized tests. A key proposal by the diversity world is to do away with all standards to achieve “equity.” The study he cites shows that based on standardized exam scores of trainees at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and McGaw Hospital, one cannot differentiate the residents chosen for highly desired slots as “chief” residents from the rest of the pool of trainees. Therefore, according to Capers, grades do not matter in assessing quality of candidates for training positions.

This analogy is facially absurd. Northwestern McGaw University Hospital is ranked among the top ten hospitals in the United States, so all members of its resident staff are likely to be among the most qualified graduates of American medical schools. Sure enough, the grades achieved by the chief residents and the other residents reported in the study (251.06 ± 13.80 versus 252.51 ± 14.21) would place all the trainees in the top 10% of all medical school graduates. So, among the very best students in the United States, there is not much difference in test scores. This is hardly an argument for sacrificing merit for diversity.

These examples highlight the intellectual dishonesty of the diversity movement. One doubts that the public is willing to sacrifice the quality of American healthcare to satisfy a political goal of a dissembling corps of racialist medical school and healthcare administrators.

Dr. Stanley Goldfarb is the chairman of Do No Harm and is a former Professor and Associate Dean for Curriculum at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

VCU’s Divisive DEI Training

We’ve already unearthed proof that Virginia Commonwealth University has an extremely woke medical school. Now we know that it wants to build an “inclusive environment” in its Department of Ophthalmology which means paying thousands of dollars for trainings built on a foundation of toxic woke division. And this doesn’t just apply to students; it applies to members of the department who provide clinical care, too.

Figure 1. Implicit bias training session at VCU Department of Ophthalmology.

A source tipped us off to what’s happening at VCU, so we did some digging and submitted some freedom of information requests. We found copies of its various trainings, which all revolve around the idea that “inclusive excellence begins with you.” They are offered by a company called IExcel, and one is a course called VCU Inclusive Leadership. There are five courses total in this course (which offers a certificate upon completion), including:

  • Fundamentals of Diversity and Inclusion. It reviews “recent and compelling developments in the field of diversity and inclusion,” while offering “definitions, strategies, and activities” to advance DEI. Remember that DEI is the practical form of Critical Race Theory, which is centered on racial division and discrimination.
  • Implicit Bias and Microaggression. This course “contributes to diversity and inclusion education by providing participants with foundational knowledge and skills for reducing implicit biases and microaggressions.” Remember that implicit bias testing has been thoroughly disproven, to the point that even its creators have admitted its significant shortcomings.

Each training starts with a focus on participants’ pronouns and the idea of “intersectionality,” which is basically the idea that some people are oppressors and others are victims.

Figure 2. From the “VCU Inclusive Leadership Certificate” course.

In light of these disturbing trainings, VCU needs to answer some questions. What is the ophthalmology department doing that demands racial re-education? Were there actual incidents that demanded a response? It seems highly unlikely, but what is likely is this: VCU, like other institutions, is wholly bought into woke indoctrination.

How much did VCU pay for these blatantly woke products? Our FOIA requests turned up an initial $12,750 worth of invoices to IExcel for personnel in the health sciences. That’s steep, but the highest price of all is the continued corruption of medical education and practice.

VCU School of Medicine DICE Inventory Score: 94.4%

The Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine received a top-tier score on the DICE Inventory it submitted to AAMC.

Here’s the background. In November 2022, the Association of American Medical Colleges released a report showing that the vast majority of medical schools have embraced identity politics, despite their divisive and even discriminatory nature. The report was based on surveys of specific medical schools, which the AAMC didn’t name.

For the sake of transparency and accountability, Do No Harm submitted freedom of information requests to public medical schools nationwide, including the VCU School of Medicine (VCUSOM). We asked for a copy of its survey response, so that Virginia taxpayers and policymakers could learn the truth about this institution.

Here’s what the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine has self-reported:

  • It has adopted racially discriminatory admissions practices under the guise of “affirmative action.”  VCUSOM commented, “Most graduate programs no longer require the GRE exam in part because of cultural biases in exam performance.” This means it’s potentially lowering standards in the name of diversity, thereby threatening patient health.

Figure 1. From the VCUSOM “Future Applicants” website.
  • It has a “dedicated office, staff, or resources” dedicated to DEI, evidenced by VCU’s 17-member Institutional Equity (IE) Council in its Office of Institutional Equity, Effectiveness, and Success. This means there’s a permanent woke bureaucracy pushing ideology on faculty and students. 
Figure 2. From the VCU Office of Institutional Equity, Effectiveness, and Success website.
  • It lobbies for woke policies at the federal, state, and/or local levels via the Office of Government Relations within the Office of the President. This means it’s wading into toxic public debates instead of fully focusing on educating future physicians. 
  • It offers tenure and promotion to faculty who prove their commitment to extreme identity politics and woke priorities. The Office of Institutional Equity, Effectiveness, and Success is involved in promotion and tenure, modifying its guidelines “to include recognition of Community Engagement (archived page) as an accepted criteria for evaluation.” This is a litmus test that requires faculty to toe the party line instead of teaching medicine at the highest level.
Figure 3. From the VCU Office of Institutional Equity, Effectiveness, and Success Community Engagement page.
  • Its administrators are active within local, regional, and national forums to promote equity, diversity, and inclusion. VCUSOM said that DEI “colleagues” on its campuses have “engaged in state-level initiatives regarding required non-discrimination training with the Virginia Governor’s Office.” This means it’s wasting resources that would be better spent on real medical education.
Figure 4. VCU School of Medicine DICE Inventory score.

All told, the VCU School of Medicine has instituted 94.4% of the divisive and discriminatory woke policies listed by the AAMC. And you can bet it is feeling pressure from activists and outside groups to go even further down the radical rabbit hole – doing even more damage to faculty, medical students, and ultimately, the millions of patients they’ll see.

Virginia taxpayers help fund the VCUSOM. They, and the policymakers who represent them, should ask why they’re giving so much money to an institution that’s putting divisive and discriminatory ideology at the heart of medical education. More importantly, they should ensure the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine stops, and soon.

UC Irvine School of Medicine Tells AAMC It Considers Applicants “With GPA Below Benchmark” – If They Meet Certain Criteria

The University of California system continues to show its commitment to the implementation of woke policies at the UC Irvine School of Medicine (UCI SOM), including those related to its admissions criteria. The institution’s own words and actions speak for themselves.

Here’s the background. In November 2022, the Association of American Medical Colleges released a report showing that the vast majority of medical schools have embraced identity politics, despite their divisive and even discriminatory nature. The report was based on surveys of specific medical schools, which the AAMC didn’t name.

For the sake of transparency and accountability, Do No Harm submitted freedom of information requests to public medical schools nationwide, including UCI SOM. We asked for a copy of its survey response, so that California taxpayers and policymakers could learn the truth about this institution.

Here’s what the UC Irvine School of Medicine has self-reported:

  • It has adopted racially discriminatory admissions practices under the guise of “affirmative action.” This means it’s potentially lowering standards in the name of diversity, thereby threatening patient health. UCI SOM says it revised its secondary application criteria and will consider students “with GPA below benchmark who have completed a post-baccalaureate program.” DICE inventory responses also reflect that the school is giving “special consideration” to students from “disadvantaged backgrounds” and those who “have served the Latino community” as part of its “holistic admissions process.” This commitment is reiterated in the SOM’s Diversity Statement.
Figure 1. UCI SOM Diversity Statement.
  • It has a “dedicated office, staff, or resources” dedicated to DEI. This means there’s a permanent woke bureaucracy pushing ideology on faculty and students In addition to the UCI DEI offices, the med school maintains its own DEI department, featuring “mission-based programs” that identify students according to race/ethnicity. UCI SOM also informed AAMC of the development of a Belonging, Equity, and Empowerment unit and two diversity officer positions.
Figure 2. Leadership Education to Advance Diversity-African, Black & Caribbean and LEAD-Latino Community programs at UC Irvine School of Medicine.
  • It lobbies for woke policies at the federal, state, and/or local levels. This means it’s wading into toxic public debates instead of fully focusing on educating future physicians. The DICE Inventory listed the names of several university staff members who are active at the State Capitol and in government relations.
  • It offers tenure and promotion to faculty who prove their commitment to extreme identity politics and woke priorities. This is a litmus test that requires faculty to toe the party line instead of teaching medicine at the highest level. The form used to review merit, tenure, and promotion applications contains sections to describe “diversity activities” related to teaching, creative activities, and professional/public service. “In addition,” the DICE Inventory reveals, “candidates are able to submit a separate Diversity Statement if they have significant diversity activities to highlight beyond these sections.” Additionally, the responses state that the SOM has participated in ongoing “Black Thriving Initiative cluster hires.”
  • Its administrators are active within local, regional, and national forums to promote equity, diversity, and inclusion. This means it’s wasting resources that would be better spent on real medical education. UCI SOM boasts being “active within the AAMC community” and creation of the Clinical Faculty Equity and Diversity Advisory Committee in 2020.
Figure 3. UC Irvine School of Medicine overall DICE Inventory score.

All told, UCI SOM has instituted 95.2% of the divisive and discriminatory woke policies listed by the AAMC. And you can bet it is feeling pressure from activists and outside groups to go even further down the radical rabbit hole – doing even more damage to faculty, medical students, and ultimately, the millions of patients they’ll see.

California taxpayers help fund the UC Irvine School of Medicine. They, and the policymakers who represent them, should ask why they’re giving so much money to an institution that’s putting divisive and discriminatory ideology at the heart of medical education. More importantly, they should ensure UCI SOM stops, and soon.

UVA Is On A DEI Hiring Spree

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Forget teaching medicine. The University of Virginia’s medical education programs are too busy hiring woke ideologues. A source recently sent us the job posting for the UVA Comprehensive Cancer Center’s new DEI Program Coordinator, and the School of Medicine is hiring a Program Manager and Events Coordinator. These are the sorts of things the UVA Board should investigate, and better yet, stop.

The job descriptions are everything you’d expect from positions grounded in divisive and discriminatory concepts like DEI. The cancer center job, for instance, will develop “DEI related trainings, programs, seminars, and presentations,” ensuring faculty and students receive woke indoctrination. They will also help implement a “5-year strategic plan,” with the goal of making the Cancer Center more woke every year.

The program coordinator will also “engage in the day-to-day advance of the Plan to Enhance Diversity,” which likely involves putting skin color ahead of merit. The same is surely true of the person’s responsibility to “assist with recruitment activities of trainees and faculty.” In the context of DEI, that typically means hiring educators and admitting students based on their race. In other words, racial discrimination.

Naturally, these jobs slot into a rapidly growing DEI bureaucracy, with the cancer center position “reporting to the Associate Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.” As experience shows, DEI departments always grow and exert a bigger influence. With these new jobs, DEI will come to affect more and more of what faculty teach, students learn, and trainees practice – across the entire UVA School of Medicine.

What’s most concerning are the implications for medical care. When a patient asks a UVA cancer center physician about a lump she discovered, will she get woke extremism instead of medical expertise? When a patient needs lung cancer surgery, will the surgeon’s implicit bias training lead them to provide worse care to white patients? These DEI positions will influence clinical care, contributing nothing but potentially worsening the quality of medical treatment.

Do No Harm has already called attention to the UVA School of Medicine’s discriminatory scholarship, filing a federal civil rights complaint. We have separately spurred the federal government to open a civil rights investigation into the school’s participation in a discriminatory outreach program. Now it’s time for the UVA Board of Visitors to investigate, as well.

Perhaps Bert Ellis, who Gov. Youngkin placed on the board to help fight divisive and discriminatory ideology, would be interested in leading the charge. DEI should be driven from UVA’s medical education, to say nothing of the rest of campus.

The Emergency Nurses Association Advances Anti-Racism “To Be a DEI Leader in Healthcare”

The Emergency Nurses Association (ENA) is doing its part to align with the DEI and anti-racism narrative and is seeking the buy-in of its membership “to be a DEI leader in healthcare.”

Last fall, the ENA engaged Nonprofit HR’s “Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Justice” team to survey its members and staff to determine the current state of DEI at the organization. ENA sought to use that information “to outline a strong roadmap for the future.” What does that roadmap look like at the ENA?

The Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Action page lists three goals of the organization’s DEI initiatives. “Guide the profession to become better providers,” the first goal says, “through greater awareness and understanding of structural and social determinant [sic] of health, including racism and other forms of bias.” Anna Valdez, chair of the ENA DEI Committee, recommends one of her “favorite resources” for nurses: Overdue Reckoning on Racism in Nursing. This group’s Principles of Reckoning “take a bold anti-racist stand for nursing.” These principles include:

  • We commit to challenging, resisting, and ending the voices and actions that sustain white privilege.
  • We seek to nurture authentic anti-racist awareness.
  • We will inspire and nurture action, as we boldly claim an anti-racist identity for nursing.
Figure 1. From “ENA Connection,” Jan/Feb 2023 print edition.

Do these “principles” reflect the values of the ENA? More resources on its website demonstrate similar messaging. More “staff recommendations” include the American Medical Association’s (AMA) publication titled Advancing Health Equity: A Guide to Language, Narrative, and Concepts; the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) version 8 standards of care; and the 1989 essay titled White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack. Multiple webinars on structural racism and DEI-related topics are available, and the Antiracism Resources for Nurses list recommends Ibram Kendi’s book “How to Be an Antiracist.” Kendi advises that “the only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination.” How does that align with the “culture and climate of mutual respect” and “welcoming environment” the ENA’s DEI Vision Statement proclaims?

The DEI and anti-racism resources are plentiful on the ENA website. Glossaries borrowed from Harvard and the University of Missouri provide definitions for terms such as:

Additional DEI resources are available to members, but the ENA wants even more. “Wherever you are in your DEI journey,” ENA wants to know about additional content that nurses want to share.

Figure 2. ENA survey from the “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Action” page.

What would the implementation of DEI look like in the emergency department (ED)? Suppose two patients come in at the same time: one with a broken arm and one with a heart attack. If the first patient has darker skin, will he or she be taken care of sooner, even though the second patient has a more serious condition? How did the ENA conclude that nursing must claim an “anti-racist identity?” Did ED nurses previously push black patients to the end of the line because of “white privilege,” creating disparities in their health outcomes? If there is a wait for an x-ray, will patients belonging to a particular racial group be moved to the head of the line? Who will be the arbitrator of such race-based approaches? A slippery slope indeed.

It’s disappointing to see the ENA taking this path, as it has traditionally been a reliable resource for emergency nurses who seek specialty certification and completion of vital courses in trauma and pediatric patient care. Division and identity politics have no place in this profession, and certainly not in the ED. Front-line nurses are taking care of patients who may be experiencing their worst day, and who may be frightened and vulnerable. They deserve to be addressed as individuals with unique needs instead of being seen as a member of a particular group.

We call on the ENA to continue its mission “to advance excellence in emergency nursing” and abandon the destructive DEI and anti-racism ideologies that have infiltrated other sectors of the healthcare industry.

Is your professional organization pushing woke ideology instead of supporting its clinical or educational mission? Do No Harm wants to hear from you – anonymously and securely.

The Radiological Society of North America Apologizes to Members for Its History of Racism

The Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) recently contacted its members with a message of apology for the organization’s “contributions to structural racism in the specialty.”

Figure 1. Message distributed to RSNA members (from Radiology Business, March 3, 2023).

“We write this statement to acknowledge our historical contribution to structural racism in radiology,” said the Board of Directors, “and apologize for RSNA’s actions that perpetuated systemic racism, both through omission and commission.”

The source of RSNA’s “sadness and remorse” is an article published in the February 2023 issue of RadioGraphics titled “How We Got Here: The Legacy of Anti-Black Discrimination in Radiology” (Goldberg et al). The commentary goes back to the 19th century to describe “radiology’s history and resultant structural racism,” with the objective of advising readers of what must be done to address it. “Multiple opportunities exist today for antiracism work to improve quality of care,” the abstract notes, “and to apply standards of social justice and health equity to the field of radiology.”

Figure 2. High-Yield Strategies to Address Health Care Disparities in Radiology (RSNA).

Improving access to services is a rational and worthwhile aim for all healthcare disciplines to undertake. However, the RSNA’s approach is to apply “antibias methodology” and “antiracist” workforce policies and training and an “antiracist workplace culture” to achieve it. To ensure readers understand the organization’s perspective on these and other terms, the article posts the RSNA’s definitions related to “healthcare disparities and discrimination.”

Figure 3. Terminology for Understanding Health Care Disparities and Discrimination (RSNA).

Among the apologies in their statement, the Board of Directors said the conclusions of Goldberg et al “likely do not represent a full accounting of RSNA’s harmful actions,” but demonstrate examples of “when our organization failed.” Predictably, the response from the society includes the implementation of two separate committees to address “equity” and to push an agenda based on racial identity politics.

RSNA makes its position known on its website. Its “commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion” states the RNSA acts to “combat inequity” and was the first professional association for radiology to require its leadership to complete unconscious bias training. Members are also encouraged to participate in bias training, as well as education offerings on additional topics such as “gender equity and disparities in imaging” and to demonstrate “allyship in everyday actions.”

Figure 4. From the RSNA member website.

RNSA’s message to its members suggests that they must accept that they are biased against their patients, even if they aren’t aware of it. Even worse, they are paying to belong to a professional organization that supports the tenets of anti-racism: Past discrimination must be met with present discrimination, and present discrimination must be met with future discrimination. Considering that radiologists are interpreting x-rays and images that do no show the patient’s skin color, isn’t it a bit bizarre to conclude that they are racists?

Said one practicing radiologist: “I will soon be cancelling my RSNA affiliation.”

Is your professional organization or medical society pushing anti-racism and implicit bias training? Do No Harm wants to hear from you via our secure online portal.

Dr. Stanley Goldfarb Acknowledges Mississippi State Auditor for Requesting Accounting of DEI Spending at the State’s Public Universities

Dr. Stanley Goldfarb, Do No Harm chairman, praised Mississippi State Auditor Shad White for his leadership in requesting an accounting of spending on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in the state’s public colleges and universities.

“Medical schools have arguably embraced DEI to an even greater extent than other institutions – and the consequences are liable to be much more dangerous, even deadly,” Dr. Goldfarb wrote in a letter to Auditor White. “By its nature, DEI demands a greater focus on people’s skin color instead of their character or individual characteristics. It has already been used to lower standards for admission to medical school, leading to worse quality students who will provide worse quality care as physicians. DEI has even been used to justify policies like preferential medical treatment by race, which is racial discrimination by another name.”

See the full letter below.

Letter to Auditor WhiteDownload

Dr. Marilyn Singleton on The Megyn Kelly Show

Do No Harm Visiting Fellow Dr. Marilyn Singleton discusses the effects of DEI in medicine with host Megyn Kelly.

Dr. Ben Carson Addresses Texas Senate on DEI in Higher Education

The Texas Senate Subcommittee on Higher Education held a hearing on April 6 to hear testimony on Senate Bill 17 and efforts to eliminate DEI initiatives in the state’s institutions of higher learning. Renown pediatric neurosurgeon and former Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Dr. Ben Carson provided testimony in support of the bill, and he had some wise words for the committee members.

Dr. Carson voiced his concerns about medical schools that are engaging in “the rejection of colorblind standardized testing” in the name of equity, failing to set a minimum MCAT score or GPA, and withdrawing from national ranking systems. “Putting aside merit, and instead emphasizing qualities like race, sex, religion, and all the others we hear about endlessly today,” he stated, “can very well cost people their lives when it comes to the medical field.”

Figure 1. Testimony to the Texas Senate Subcommittee on Higher Education in support of SB 17 by Dr. Ben Carson: April 6, 2023.

“This ubiquitous DEI virus,” Dr. Carson said, “has a chilling effect on free speech and open inquiry.” He warned of “the power of even the mere accusation of racism,” and how false allegations can have severe consequences to the person being accused. “Senate Bill 17 is a great step toward rejecting the entire framework of DEI and restoring us to a country our founding fathers envisioned so many years ago,” he concluded.

State Senator Brandon Creighton, SB 17’s sponsor, explained that the bill’s goal was to end mandatory diversity statements and DEI-related training in Texas universities, and he noted how several schools have already started to close their DEI offices and departments.

Figure 2. Opening remarks regarding SB 17 to the Texas Senate Subcommittee on Higher Education, April 6, 2023.

Senator Royce West responded with his concerns for “throwing out” DEI and “dismantling the entire program,” insisting that “it has begun to work” and any problems are isolated incidents that can be dealt with on an individual basis. “There will be us that will stand up and say, ‘It’s wrong.’ It’s totally wrong, what’s getting ready to happen in this legislative process,” he said.

Senator Creighton noted that the committee was “here to vet” the narratives and “root out any inefficiencies” in programs that are receiving millions of taxpayer dollars.

When it came time to pose questions to the panelists, Senator West reiterated his concerns about abandoning DEI and starting over with a different approach.   “We’ve been dealing with the same issues” regarding DEI and universities saying that they are “hamstrung” by Supreme Court or federal court decisions. “Here we are tonight,” he said, “dealing with the same issues again, and we don’t have the results.” He asked Dr. Carson, “What do we do?”

“We need solutions; not names,” Dr. Carson replied. He recounted an experience he had in medical school when he had performed poorly on a set of comprehensive tests and was told by a university counselor that he “wasn’t cut out to be a doctor.” After much thought and contemplation, he discovered that the problem was simply a matter of preferred learning style, and he adjusted his method of study. “It wasn’t a problem with me intellectually,” he said, advising that “a variety of different mechanisms are needed on an individual level. “Those are the kinds of things we need to be looking at, rather than trying to artificially fit people into other people’s molds.”  

Another senator asked Dr. Carson about instances in which some DEI programs are presented as “not required,” but failure to participate can affect an individual’s ability to receive promotions. “DEI is heavy-handed,” Dr. Carson responded. “The reason why I say ‘wipe the slate clean’ is because the atmosphere has been poisoned by what has happened already.” The impact DEI’s role in medical school curriculum and hiring “[has] been disturbing” and “creates an atmosphere” that does not support differences of opinion and constructive discourse on sensitive topics. “The only thing that can really destroy us is division,” Dr. Carson concluded.

Figure 3. Questions to the panelists testifying in support of SB 17.

Senate Bill 17 contains essential measures that Texas medical schools would be required to honor to ensure that faculty, staff, and students are not mandated to subscribe to DEI principles and programs that do not deliver what they promise. Valuing diversity at the expense of merit creates conditions in which “all aspects of society will suffer,” Dr. Carson told the committee. With Senate Bill 17, lawmakers are taking action that will ultimately protect Texans by refocusing medical education programs onto what matters most: Developing doctors with the knowledge and skills to provide safe, individualized patient care.

Important tips for reviewing medical schools and other institutions

Are you looking into medical schools for yourself or a family member? Here are some important things to consider when checking out your top choices:

  • Visit their website and watch for the following keywords:
    • Diversity, equity, and inclusion
    • Social justice
    • Health equity
    • Anti-racism
    • Systemic/structural/institutional racism
    • Implicit/unconscious bias
    • Under-Represented in Medicine (URiM)
    • Holistic review         
  • Review their DICE score: The Diversity, Inclusion, Culture, and Equity (DICE) Inventory grades medical schools’ efforts to embed DEI-related initiatives in many areas of university operations. Higher scores indicate a stronger dedication to woke practices.
  • Visit Critical Race Training in Medical Education to see a summary of DEI-related actions, employee requirements, support for anti-racism, and more. 
  • Check a medical school’s “secondary interview questions” for topics regarding DEI, anti-racism, and social justice issues. Here is a helpful database from ProspectiveDoctor.com.
  • Search for the school’s “white coat ceremony” oath to see what they ask students to pledge.
  • Review a school’s financial aid page to see if they push scholarships that discriminate on the basis of race.
  • Visit Choose College with Confidence from the Heritage Foundation.
  • Check out Activism Instead of Anatomy: The Sorry State of Medical School Curricula by Do No Harm senior fellow Jay Greene, PhD.

Taxonomy – Location

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Page – Events

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Taxonomy – Institution

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Event

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CUNY Med School Is Proud Of Not Having Standards

Should medical schools have standards for who they accept? Every patient in America would obviously say yes, since lower quality physicians inevitably provide worse levels of care. Yet the CUNY School of Medicine apparently disagrees, and it’s openly touting its disregard for standards.

We discovered this fact after watching a recent seminar hosted by the International Association of Medical Science Educators. The seminar was titled, “building pathways and bridges on the bumpy road towards equity in STEM and medicine.”

The moderator asked, “are there any programs to support the next step of MCAT preparation in admissions process for those students that go on?” A representative at CUNY’s medical school response: “I can say for our school at the CUNY School of Medicine, when they get accepted into the BS/MD program, there is no MCAT to gatekeep them from going into medical school.”

This is an astounding statement. Medical schools should want to “gatekeep” in order to accept the most qualified students. And the MCAT in particular is proven to help find the medical students who are most likely to become the best physicians. Yet the MCAT, along with the whole concept of gatekeeping, have come under assault from woke activists who believe that standards prevent schools from achieving their demands for greater diversity.

Figure 1, Admission requirements, CUNY School of Medicine (https://www.ccny.cuny.edu/csom/you-apply)

CUNY is not alone. At least 40 medical schools have abandoned the MCAT for at least some applicants. For instance, the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine waives MCAT requirements for some applicants from Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

This is a dangerous trend – and it’s deeply disturbing that medical schools are patting themselves on the back. The CUNY School of Medicine may be proud of abandoning key standards for applicants, but patients should perhaps be worried the next time they’re treated by one of its graduates.

Tennessee’s New Legislation Is A Huge Victory

The Tennessee legislature just passed one of the best bills in America. The “Tennessee Higher Education Freedom of Expression and Transparency Act,” sponsored by Rep. Ragan and Senator Hensley, starts rolling back divisive Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion requirements at publicly funded colleges and universities, including medical schools. It’s exactly the sort of reform that other states should look to as they push back against Critical Race Theory’s takeover of education.

The bill’s findings clearly state that “public medical institutions of higher education best serve the state when providing meritorious education and training that positions future healthcare professionals to serve all patients adequately and to the best of their ability.” Do No Harm could not agree more.

To ensure that happens, the bill includes several key provisions:

  • No DEI Statements: Applicants for employment and admission cannot be required to submit DEI Statements, which medical schools increasingly use to weed out candidates who don’t toe the woke party line. This helps ensure that students and faculty are chosen by merit, not politics. And getting rid of these statements will create a more intellectually diverse campus environment where students and their teachers are open to exploring new research ideas.
  • No DEI Spending: Medical schools are prohibited from using state funds for fees, dues, subscriptions, or travel relating to an organization that requires an individual to endorse or promote a divisive concept – i.e., that a certain race or sex is inherently superior to another or that the United States is fundamentally racist or sexist. This ban covers essentially every medical association. This puts pressure on groups like the AMA and AAMC to drop their increasingly discriminatory demands. Most taxpayers don’t realize their hard-earned dollars fund woke national organizations that focus on progressive activism over patient outcomes.

There are even more victories in the bill, including welcoming campus speakers with differing views, banning discrimination against student groups based on their ideologies, requiring DEI officers to focus on workforce training and promote intellectual diversity, and notifying students and teachers of their rights, among others.

Once Governor Lee signs the bill, Tennessee will have gone further than any other state in weeding out DEI at medical schools. Hopefully it will be the first of many such measures in Tennessee. And it should be a model for every other state that wants to ensure its medical schools uphold the highest standards of education and excellence in health care.