A letter to my oldest friend

June 19, 2008

1:50 PM

Response to Earl Vaughn's E-Mail



Earl,



I appreciate the music; I have been a big Tom T. Hall fan for a long time. I heard him once say that his middle initial "T" was an abbreviation of his middle name which was also Tom. Thus, his name was Tom Tom Hall, I don't know if it is true or not, but if it's not, it oughta be.

You mentioned that I seem unhappy, or to be more precise, "disgruntled." Disgruntled is probably too mild a term to describe my feelings about the world in general. The adjective I would pick is cynical, followed closely by amused resignation.

With all my heart I believe the Country is on the wane but the bright side is the Country will become what the people that wanted change deserve. Better them than me, and thankfully it will be them.



One of the reasons that I see little hope for us is based somewhat upon my years as a Human Resources Director. One of the first positions I had was in charge of Broward County employee testing; The United States Justice Department required that our entire county workforce be balanced. In other words we had to have the same percentages of minorities and women as the county. To accomplish this requirement we had to adjust written test scores based solely on ethnicity and/or gender. Any written or physical test which were given, had to have the same number of eligible minority or female applicants as the number of white males who passed the test.

We had to establish passing points for all written tests based upon the results for each minority or female group and then scale all of that particular group's scores accordingly. This system is called “test weighting.” IN order to have a sufficent number of minorities I once had to set a passing point at 38 percentile for one group and 86 percentile for another group taking the exact same test. Are you still following this? Hence, a person making an actual score of 39 would pass with an adjusted score of 74. The white males, with far higher grades, may have a person make an actual score of 85 percent but because of a “weighted” score, fail the exact same test. In other words the white guy answered more than twice as many questions correctly as did his minority counterpart. Yet, the white male failed and the minority passed. Neat system? you bet, fair? No way.

After all of the tests were scored, we ranked candidates by their adjusted or “weighted” scores and selected police officer and firefighter candidates based upon those scores. No one taking the tests was ever told the tests were adjusted because it would "appear" that our testing system was "unfair" and worse, it would indicate that some groups scored less well than other groups.

Stay with me a second, lets just suppose that the selection process for athletics were conducted in a similar fashion. For example, if I ran a hundred yard dash in twenty seconds, under test weighting, the timer would tell me I ran it in ten seconds. Then another person, from a different ethnic group, runs the same distance in nine seconds but the timer would tell that person that their time was twenty five seconds. We would all wonder why our team was so slow when our recorded times were so fast.

I think most folks would agree that it would be silly and dishonest to lie to people about their performance, particularly in something as trite as athletic competition. But, if that is true, why does it make any sense to use weighted testing when selecting those involved in life and death professions?

As an aside, all of us were “astounded” when many of the candidates, with artificially inflated scores, later had problems in performing their assigned job tasks. It was even more inexplicable given how well they had performed on their entry level examinations.



The United States Department of Justice mandated this testing practice to enable employers to meet established goals, not quotas. It is a mantra in human resources that thou shall not use the word quotas, it is far too insensitive. The goal was to have a workforce that reflected the racial makeup of our county. Kind of like the "ethnic balance" of the workforce in the National Basketball Association huh? A quota is illegal, a goal is not, unless, alas you fail to meet the goal. In our case, the Federal fine for failing to meet the goal would have been $50,000 per week. A few years later the Justice Department was sued by a white job applicant who claimed discrimination based upon race. Only then did the Justice Department discover that employers routinely used test weighting in employee selection. This was the same Justice Department that had not only designed the system, but also went into federal court and mandated that it be implemented. Now their story became, and I quote, “We are dismayed, weighted testing is blatantly unfair and we demand this outrage be stopped.” With a giant sigh of relief employers complied.

Heck, it is a lot easier to score a test once and not have to re score them using the Justice Department formula to weight the scores. Subsequently President Clinton came into office with his new Attorney General, the ever lovely Janet Reno, the system was reinstated. Luckily they changed the name, it was no longer weighted testing, it became "enhanced testing." Cynical? Why on earth would I be cynical?

I mean pick a football team based on "weighted" forty yard dash times, weights lifted, and disregard previous work experience and go compete against those who use the traditional method of player selection. Oh, and then your team must be fifty percent women, eighty percent white, twenty percent Latino and have disabled people. Think you will win many games? Me either, but that is the current American work place. Wonder why the Chinese and every other civilized country is beating our brains out in world trade and commerce? Could it be? No that is not politically correct, and we can't ever be insensitive, even when it is God's own truth.



But to give the devil his due, the testing process worked splendidly in Miami. They only had 83 police officers indicted for drug trafficking, racketeering and murder. For that particular group, all entry level testing had been suspended. You see Miami also needed to balance the work force. In their case the reason the testing was suspended was simple. The written tests were in English. Couldn't do background checks, too many minorities tended to have criminal records. Fortunately for the citizens of South Florida, the criminal court system had interpreters.

When I was rehired to be an air traffic controller in 1998, I had a chance to see the impact on my profession, air traffic controller. Disastrous is not too strong a term. People controlling traffic who had never flown, could literally not tell a Piper Cherokee from a C141 Star lifter and some had failed radar training three or more times.



Alright, enough of this whining about the world according to Larry. Things I like in no particular order are; college football, San Francisco, New Orleans and leaving Puerto Rico.



Among the things I love are; lyrics by Kris Kristofferson, songs by the Eagles and Credence, my friends, family, cold draft beer, my former job as an air traffic controller and leaving Puerto Rico.



Actually, I am one of the luckiest people in the world. I have survived a lifetime of abusing my body and whatever is left of my mind. I have had a multiple cardiac by-pass operation. I have been blessed by the friendship and love of so many wonderful people. I have seen things I never even knew how to dream about. With my own eyes I have seen my children, grandchildren and hopefully soon, my first great grandchild. I have seen an Alaskan volcano erupt, seen and felt the earth move in a quake. I have seen just how vodka clear water can be over coral reefs in the Virgin Islands. I have seen bullfights in Madrid, skied mountains in Colorado, fished for Salmon in Alaska, and the sunset in Key West. I lived to see my team, the Florida Gators, win a college football championship, back to back National championships in basketball, Muhammad Ali fight and Hank Aaron hit home runs. I have sat in Nashville bars and heard country music like it was meant to be sung and I have stood in the Ryman auditorium, the Mother Church of Country Music and heard Vince Gill sing. I even married the first girl I ever loved, although it did take awhile. And how did that turn out? Moving right along, did I mention, I once saw Puerto Rico fade in the distance



I don't think that I am actually all that angry. Maybe I am a bit like the quotation on Robert Frost's tombstone, "I seem to have had a lover's quarrel with the world."


Your pal,

Larry.