Jan. 8, 2021

When your institution has a less than 1% hiring rate for Black residents

"As soon as I realized we had so few Black residents, I began to ask around to find out if there were reasons why. One person brought up the fact that we happen to be the smaller institution between 3 other larger universities within an hour away and...

"As soon as I realized we had so few Black residents, I began to ask around to find out if there were reasons why. One person brought up the fact that we happen to be the smaller institution between 3 other larger universities within an hour away and even bigger world-class institutions just 6 hours away. So, there is always a chance that Black residents may be choosing to go to more urban and populous cities for more job opportunities and networking. Another attending explained that the county we are in is in the top ten most populous counties in all of the United States, but Black or African Americans make up only 1.7% of the demographics. There are some odds that black applicants may not have family close enough for support and choose to go elsewhere. But despite these potential reasons, even though our county’s demographic makeup is admittedly small, it’s still better than our institution’s hiring rate."

Karen Tran-Harding is a radiologist who blogs at How the Other Side Thinks.

She shares her story and discusses her KevinMD article, "When your institution has a less than 1% hiring rate for Black residents." (https://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2020/12/when-your-institution-has-a-less-than-1-hiring-rate-for-black-residents.html)