Luke de Castro Assignment 3

When people think of diversity, they often picture a multiethnic group from different countries and areas of the world. People don’t often think about why we need diversity. Sure it looks attractive for PR, but why is diversity truly necessary? At the weekly seminar I attend at the Computer Science Department at the University of Kentucky, I learned that diversity is essential because it exposes us to ideas originating from different backgrounds and viewpoints that we might never see.

At this seminar, people from all over the world, like India, China, Poland, Greece, Italy and more, talk about their research or ideas in the field of computer science. The topics range from better networking systems to revolutionary machine learning. People from different cultures bring new interests and different ways of solving problems. One researcher from India created a method of communication using smartphones after a hurricane wipes out the cell network. He was inspired after his city in India was struck by a hurricane. His experiences with this natural disaster gave him new ideas on how to solve a worldwide problem that I certainly would have never thought of. When people from different backgrounds work together, they combine all their collective life experiences, and this exchange of ideas sparks completely new thoughts.

My times at this seminar showed me that seeking diversity is not just seeking diversity of skin colors and nationalities, but also diversity in experience and ideas. In my future intellectual endeavors, I will seek to work with people of different backgrounds because their new ideas could change the way I think about a topic.