Why do we see police every time we arrange an event? Why don’t ASUNM representatives, despite our invitations, attend our meetings? Why do faculty members treat us like criminals, even when we are the victims? Why have things not changed for African-American students on campus over the last three decades?
UNM administration faced these and other tough questions from African-American students during a town hall style meeting arranged by the Black Student Union on Tuesday.
The meeting was arranged to discuss the action recommendations made in the African-American/Black Climate Review Report in 2011, and the implementation of those recommendations by the University administration.
The meeting was attended by top university brass including Provost Chaouki Abdallah, Vice President of Enrollment Management Terry Babbitt, Vice-President for Athletics Paul Krebbs and Associate Provost for Faculty Development Virginia Scharff.
During the meeting African-American students shared grievances and bad experiences that occured on campus with the administrators in attendance.
Amber Lopez, a senior linguistics major, said at the town hall meeting that she once dropped a class because of racism.
“In this semester, I had an incident in my class in which a student decided to invoke his right to use pejorative words. Nothing in the class (or) in the syllabus was related to what he brought up. That being said, I had actually contacted the professor. She had let him go on a 20 minutes talk [using pejorative words],” she said.
Lopez said the teacher never attempted to reconcile the situation.
“In the next class, I tried to tell the student civilly that why he is not allowed to use pejorative terms,” she said.
She said what ensued next was a disaster, as she and the student had a conversation during which she was threatened.
“After that happened, he dropped from the class. But the teacher took it upon herself to start aggressive behavior towards me,” she said, adding that she had the whole affair recorded. “It has to do with the faculty. She allowed that to happen in the classes and when things got heated she started to blame me. Eventually, I had to drop the class. The professor blamed me for the racial tensions in the class,” she said
Abdallah, said that he would investigate her case.
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In 2011, then-University President David Schmidly had commissioned a study of UNM campus climate to assess the issues and concerns of UNM’s African-American community. The study was done by external consultants contracted by the University.
According to the report, African-American students demanded a campus that was more inclusive, supportive, equitable and welcoming.
“Respondents indicated that the University articulates support for diversity, but many African- Americans/Blacks have not witnessed this commitment in demonstrative actions that are effective,” according to the report.
The report had 76 action recommendations under seven categories: commitment, organizational structure/leadership, recruitment, climate, community outreach, curriculum/academic programs and equity.
Abdallah said that University administration was making sure that “black experience” is included in the diversity initiatives.
“We have hired two African-American deans. We are also hiring African-Americans on other positions. The director of assessment is African-American, who came here from Alabama,” he said.
The students asked administrators about academic freedom and what is the process of dealing with faculty who may cross the line of academic freedom.
Abdallah answered their inquiry, saying that academic freedom is well-defined.
“(It) is the freedom of the teacher to able to teach what he/she wants to teach and the ability of the students to learn what they want to learn,” Abdallah said.
He said the definition of academic freedom accepted across the country was very specific and does not provide space for whatever a faculty member wants to say.
He also said that he supported difficult conversations on campus within the boundaries of respect.
“If you as a student believe that a professor crossed a line, you report that to chair. The chair forwards that to the concerned dean and that ultimately reaches the provost office. We have processes in place for students,” he said.
Scharff stressed the need to arrange difficult conversations within the limits of empathy and respect.
“I understand how painful these conversations may be. But we need to do these conversations with the limits of empathy. When a professor creates a hostile learning environment that is the moment where the line of academic freedom is crossed,” she said.
The students in attendance requested the administration to issue an updated African-American/ Black Climate Review Report.
Some of them opined that University administration needs to take more steps to create an inclusive environment for Black students on campus.
Abdallah promised to issue a new report and to attend to the events of African-American students.
“I can meet you (the representatives of the African-American/Black students) every month,” he said.
Abdallah asked the students who shared their negative experiences on campus to contact him so that he could investigate those incidents.
Sayyed Shah is the assistant news editor at the Daily Lobo. He can be contacted at assistant-news@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @mianfawadshah.
