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OIG: NASA Has Made Little Progress To Increase Its Workforce Diversity

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
NASAWatch
April 20, 2023
Filed under , ,
OIG: NASA Has Made Little Progress To Increase Its Workforce Diversity
NASA’s workforce
NASA OIG

Keith’s note: small wonder that NASA fails so miserably in reaching vast portions of America when it still can’t change its own internal culture. Latest OIG report: “Despite support from Agency leaders and multiple initiatives to increase diversity, we found NASA has made little progress in increasing the representation of women and minorities in its civilian workforce or leadership ranks. Specifically, over the past decade NASA’s overall workforce demographics have stayed roughly the same, with small increases (1 or 2 percent) for some groups. Demographics have not varied significantly over the same time period at individual NASA Centers, with only two Centers increasing African American representation and other Centers making small gains in Hispanic, Asian American, and women’s representation. We also found NASA has made few gains in the percentages of women and racial and ethnic minorities in its senior levels (General Schedule 14 and 15 positions and Senior Executive Service) over the decade. At the same time, the proportion of veterans NASA hires has declined over the past 10 years, most significantly from 28 percent in 2015 to 13 percent in 2021. NASA’s lack of progress towards increasing diversity in its workforce is due to the Agency’s siloed approach to advancing DEIA. Specifically, ODEO and OCHCO have focused their efforts on meeting federal workforce reporting requirements while also working to integrate DEIA concepts into Agency culture. Moreover, NASA did not hold its leaders fully accountable for advancing DEIA efforts in their annual performance appraisals until 2021. In addition, the Agency has experienced gaps in professional development and training opportunities including programs designed to prepare employees for senior roles.” (Full report) — Update: I just deleted two bigoted anti-diversity comments. From now on you are instantly banned if you try this. I expected better from readers than this.

/m

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

One response to “OIG: NASA Has Made Little Progress To Increase Its Workforce Diversity”

  1. tutiger87 says:
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    Having been in spaceflight for 27 years, I have seen the initial gains made when I first arrived in this business vanish. While there has been much to be proud of, especially with respect to the gains made by women, I have watched the number of ethnic minorities shrink. This is a multi-faceted problem. Recruiting is a big part of it. We can talk about the dwindling number of minorities majoring in engineering as well. Thankfully, there are efforts such as the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship trying to address this issue.

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