<p>I've heard a few minorities(mainly African American and Hispanics) proclaim that they've been subject to stereotypes in Engineering departments. They often get the indication that professors expect them to perform poorly in the class. White students often overlook their black/Hispanic classmates as group members for class projects. As a black student, I have witnessed this myself. Have any of you noticed this?</p>
<p>I’m hispanic and I have never been stereotyped in any of my courses</p>
<p>I can’t speak for your fellow students, but I would think most professors would be thrilled to have blacks or Hispanics (or women) in their classes.</p>
<p>Thinking back on all my classes, I never noticed any professors that expected less of certain students for any reason.</p>
<p>I never noticed any discrimination at my 2-year college. My Physics professor was a black man, and he was very impartial about everyone. My other instructors were all women, and I never noticed anyone treated differently unless they regularly hung out in office hours together. I’m a white guy, and my favorite group mates in Physics were from Ecuador and Jordan. They were very smart, hard working people, and we got along well. I liked talking to them about their countries when we had time to chat. I actually had problems with a couple of white guys in my group because they fell asleep during lectures, didn’t show up for class, and didn’t do their work.</p>
<p>It all depends on who you’re with. Be careful you don’t stereotype against all white people just because a few are jerks.</p>
<p>Also don’t take it for granted that things you’re unhappy about are a result of race. Everyone runs into issues like this, irrespective of race, ethnicity or gender.</p>
<p>I’m a white guy but I’ve never seen or heard of ethnic or racial friction in group projects. And there is a lot of ethnic diversity in engineering and science (I run into people from all over Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East, etc.). But if I had to pinpoint ethnic groups that I rarely see in science or engineering courses it would be black Americans (there are plenty of black immigrants studying engineering on my campus, there are always a few in my CS classes), Hispanics, and American Indians.</p>
<p>It’s hard to talk about seeing issues with Hispanics or American Indians in engineering because they are so darn rare in engineering (and I go to a huge university with a giant engineering college), but I’ve never ran into black engineering students who ever complained about anything like this (but maybe they don’t want to air this in front of a white guy?). I’ve actually heard more black engineering/physics majors say they aren’t accepted <em>by other black people</em> than by white people.</p>
<p>Well, I am a mixed person of Brazilian/Middle Eastern decent, so I don’t really fit into any particular racial group but I do believe that people have prejudices, myself included.</p>
<p>It is wrong to stereotype people but I remember some African American kids who were in some of my classes-they were always late, a lot of them never went to class, etc. </p>
<p>So, unfortunately, this is how prejudices and stereotypes develop- Obviously, a lot of White kids did the same thing but if you see some minority person living up to a stereotype, they just stand out more, as wrong it is.</p>
<p>I know an African American guy who went to Georgia Tech, very successful engineer and I remember being shocked when he told me he was an engineer. Not because he was Black but sadly, I do not see a lot of African Americans in Engineering, especially here in Iowa.</p>
<p>The African kids on the other hand, I see a lot of them, including a guy from South Sudan who could hardly speak English but he would ask some very smart questions in class. I know another buddy who is also from South Sudan, studying Engineering, very smart guy. </p>
<p>Overall, I think African cultures tend to value education more than African American culture, generally speaking.</p>
<p>I think it would be naive to say that there is no prejudice out there- it is wrong, but unfortunately all it takes is a few bad apples to help propagate a stereotype about an entire race.</p>
<p>@Bschool Not particular just African Culture. My pharmacy manager is Eritrea. I think just people from 3rd world country see America as a land of opportunity whereas african-“americans” or white people take it for granted. You see all these Indians, middle eastern, asians, africans owning business, Dr office, hospital worker because most came from nothing.</p>
<p>In one of my engineering courses, the female professor was VERY biased towards female engineers. She even said at the end of the quarter when class was ending that all the females were eligible to do research under her, regardless of grade. For the guys, they had to get a B+ or higher in the class.</p>
<p>Your professor obviously thought that the secret to teaching people to jump higher was to lower the bar.</p>