Nas is partnering with the New York educational team General Assembly to help rectify a perpetual lack of diversity in the field of technology. The “Opportunity Fund” will offer scholarships to women, veterans, African-Americans, and Latinos, all groups who have historically and systematically been denied equal access to the sciences.
Joining Nas in the fight is Google, Microsoft and Hirepurpose who have all signed up as the initiative’s first financial backers.
“Each of the donors is taking on a target demographic,” reported the Observer’s BetaBeat. “Google will provide scholarship money for women, Hirepurpose and Microsoft will fund veterans and Nas’s QueensBridge Venture Partners will sponsor African-Americans and Latinos.”
A glaring issue in engineering and its subcultures is the “like-attracts-like” modus operandi. “This is the start of what hopefully will be a contribution to what will be a more diverse and accessible community worldwide,” said General Assembly CEO Jake Schwartz.
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