So it wasn’t the best weekend to be a University of Maryland student. On Friday, Administrators released the first draft of a forthcoming Diversity Strategic Plan that worried many students, and one of our peers was robbed at gun point. Then, on Saturday, we lost to Duke at football — a sport where the team hasn’t notched a winning season in 15 years.
But fear not loyal Terps, this university wasn’t the only institution that’s recently been handed the short end of the stick.
Take for instance, women. They have been repeatedly discluded and under represented in President Obama’s inner-circle according to several women in the White House interviewed by the New York Times. And according to a story in the Washington Post’s style section, women aren’t given much of a better shot when it comes to lead roles in Hollywood productions.
Maryland criminals have also been short shrifted. According to a report from Slate Magazine, many judges claiming to follow statewide sentencing guidelines accidentally gave criminals more years than recommended. The researcher who first discovered this discrepancy, Emily Owens, received her Ph.D. from this university and estimates that one in ten Maryland prisoners received the wrong sentence.
An illustration depicting the woes of Maryland prisoners - Courtesy Slate Magazine