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Home Diversity Being an ally to BIPOC scientists

Being an ally to BIPOC scientists

Created by the ASBMB Maximizing Access Committee (2024)

Statistics

  • Although the STEM workforce has steadily diversified in the past decade, data (Pew Research Center) shows that Black and Hispanic Americans continue to be underrepresented in STEM. 
  • In 2020–2021, Hispanic, Black and American Indian or Alaska Native people collectively accounted for ~37% of the U.S. population (ages 18–34) but earned 26% of science and engineering (S&E) bachelor’s degrees, 24% of S&E master’s degrees and 16% of S&E doctoral degrees (NSF Diversity and STEM Report). 
  • In 2020, Hispanic, Black and American Indian or Alaska Native STEM workers had lower median earnings than white or Asian STEM workers (NSF Diversity and STEM Report). 

Best practices for allies

BIPOC stands for Black, Indigenous, People of Color and centers on Black and Indigenous people because they are more severely impacted by systemic racial injustices.

Racial inequities can results from individual acts of racism and institutional and systemic practices and policies that benefits the majority and/or harm people of color.

An ally is somene who actively seeks to fight injustice and inequity.

  • Recognize your privilege.
    • Self-reflection is important. 
    • Identify factors outside of your immediate control that count as privileges. Your education, gender, age, sexual identity, race, class, ability, religion and language may be considered privileges. 
    • Acknowledge these privileges publicly when appropriate and allow them to frame how you approach situations. 
    • Use your privileges to support your colleagues with less privilege. 
  • Educate yourself about injustice and inequities.
    • Continuously seek more education and learn from content (movies, television, books, articles, podcasts, etc.) made by BIPOC creators to get a better understanding of their lived experiences. 
    • People who face injustices daily may find it stressful to share their experiences; it is never their responsibility to educate you or explain their experiences. 
    • Do research about the various inequities that you observe and the ways that you can contribute to the correction of those inequities. 
    • People will not always have the same experiences, so solutions may not be universal. 
  • Be willing to listen.
    • When people are willing to share their experiences, listen to them carefully and completely; do more listening than talking. 
    • Consider how you might have felt in a similar situation (remembering that your own privileges can make this difficult to conceive). 
    • Consider what you (or others) could have done differently in the situation. 
    • Don’t question their feelings or the validity of the events that they share with you. 
  • Promote diversity whenever possible.
    • Nominate your BIPOC colleagues for awards and prizes. 
    • Write references in support of marginalized persons whenever possible. 
    • Do not continuously ask your BIPOC colleagues to do nonpromotable work without compensation. 
  • Advocacy as an ally.
    • When you observe harmful practices, speak up and support marginalized people. 
    • Consider mentoring students, colleagues and professionals with marginalized identities. 
    • Dismantling systemic injustices and inequities can be a challenging process, but everyone has a role to play.