diversity in the college classroom

EG: Both novels are set in Philadelphia, a diverse city, and your novels never shy away from how ethnic and racial tensions can manifest themselves in the classroom.  Should college instructors be better prepared for teaching in diverse classrooms?

AK: It’s a funny question because, yes, absolutely, and ideally, all college instructors should get paid diversity training, and yet, we aren’t even at the point where every college student in America knows who their teacher will be two weeks before classes start. Also, I should say that although Philadelphia is diverse, I taught at one school where it would not be uncommon to have an almost all white or only white and Asian (often South Asian) class. In the South I had many different sections of up to 34 students that would often include only one black student or two black students and one “HAPA” student or something like that. So some of the college classrooms I’ve been have been incredibly homogeneous—vast majority white to entirely white.

Read more from Part 1 and Part 2 of an extended interview on Auggie's Revenge and the Classroom Edition of Fight for Your Long Day.