On whitening the CV

I heard yet another news story* recently about the beneficial effects of whitening the resume for job seekers.

I wasn’t paying close attention so I don’t know the specific context. 

But suffice it to say, minority job applicants have been found (in studies) to get more call-backs for job interviews when the evidence of their non-whiteness on their resume is minimized, concealed or eradicated. 

Should academic trainees and job seekers do the same?

It goes beyond using only your initials if your first name is stereotypically associated with, for example, being African-Anerican. Or using an Americanized nickname to try to communicate that you are highly assimilated Asian-Anerican. 

The CV usually includes awards, listed by foundation or specific award title. “Ford Foundation” or “travel award for minority scholars” or similar can give a pretty good clue. But you cannot omit those! The awards, particularly the all-important “evidence of being competitively funded”, are a key part of a trainee’s CV. 

I don’t know how common it is, but I do have one colleague (I.e., professorial rank at this point) for whom a couple of those training awards were the only clear evidence on the CV of being nonwhite. This person stopped listing these items and/or changed how they were listed to minimize detection. So it happens.

Here’s the rub. 

I come at this from the perspective of one who doesn’t think he is biased against minority trainees and wants to know if prospective postdocs, graduate students or undergrads are of Federally recognized underrepresented status.

Why? 

Because it changes the ability of my lab to afford them. NIH has this supplement program to fund underrepresented trainees. There are other sources of support as well. 

This changes whether I can take someone into my lab. So if I’m full up and I get an unsolicited email+CV I’m more likely to look at it if it is from an individual that qualifies for a novel funding source. 

Naturally, the applicant can’t know in any given situation** if they are facing implicit bias against, or my explicit bias for, their underrepresentedness. 

So I can’t say I have any clear advice on whitening up the academic CV. 

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*probably Kang et al.

**Kang et al caution that institutional pro-diversity statements are not associated with increased call-backs or any minimization of the bias.