After Years of Delays, Colleges Are Quickly Acting on Protesters’ Demands

For years, protesters have pleaded with the University of Kentucky to remove a fresco that depicts slaves working in a tobacco field. The colorful artwork, displayed in a prominent university hall, sanitizes the brutal treatment slaves endured and reminds students of their ancestors’ painful past, critics have said.

On Friday the university’s president, Eli Capilouto, said it’s coming down. The reason? All of the committees, plans and conversations about the controversial mural haven’t worked, he wrote. And those failed efforts “have been a roadblock to reconciliation, rather than a path toward healing.”

In announcing the decision, Capilouto invoked the widespread pain over George Floyd’s killing in police custody — the Memorial Day event that sparked renewed outrage and protests against racism and police brutality around the country. As support for the movement grows, pressure from activists has prompted colleges to accelerate action on complaints that might have simmered in committee discussions for months.

Over the past few weeks, some campus leaders have agreed to cut ties with the local police while others have rescinded admissions offers over racist social-media posts. The swift responses stand in stark contrast to the decades of delays and foot-dragging that have dogged previous protests over symbols and actions seen as racist.

In response to complaints that had been building for years, University of Alabama trustees announced on Monday that they’ll move three plaques commemorating students who served in the Confederate army from their locations in and outside of a university library. A group of trustees will also study the names of buildings across system campuses and recommend changes.

Changing Course

Meanwhile over the weekend, pressure from protesters prompted officials at two universities to quickly reverse course — one on a statement of neutrality on growing national protests and another on the selection of a new dean.

At California Northstate University, a group of medical students wrote that they were “appalled, disappointed, and deeply hurt” by the university’s statement last week that it shouldn’t take sides on protests over police violence, according to The Sacramento Bee.

“This statement tacitly condones both police brutality and systemic racism faced by black and brown communities across America,” the students wrote to administrators.

On Saturday, the university’s president, Alvin Cheung, issued a new statement: “Collectively, members of the CNU students, faculty and administration all condemn the killing of George Floyd, racism, brutality, violence and social injustice,” it reads. He acknowledged that the previous day’s memo, which emphasized the importance of letting people draw their own conclusions, missed the mark.

Then on Sunday, Arizona State University rescinded its offer to Sonya F. Duhé to be the new dean of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. Duhé, who was scheduled to take over that position on July 1, had been accused of racism and of mistreating students while serving as director of Loyola University New Orleans’s School of Communication and Design.

Former students told Arizona State’s student newspaper that Duhé had a history of making racist and homophobic comments to students of color and LGBTQ students.

“We believe that the school’s reputation and future are in serious jeopardy should Dr. Duhé assume the position of dean as planned on July 1,” a group of ASU professors wrote in protesting her appointment.

Duhé has denied the allegations. She did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Monday.

‘Deeply Offensive’ Tweets

On other campuses, college employees faced repercussions for social-media posts deemed insensitive, if not racist.

David B. Collum, a Cornell University chemistry professor who had tweeted support for Buffalo police officers who pushed down and seriously hurt a 75-year-old protester, stepped down as his department’s director of undergraduate studies on Saturday.

In a tweet that was widely circulated, Collum said the protester was “feeble” and “needed to give that cop space.” His cracked skull, he wrote “was self inflicted.”

Top Cornell officials, including President Martha E. Pollack, the university’s provost, and its police chief said in a statement on Friday that Collum’s tweets were “not just deeply insensitive, but deeply offensive.”

“While Professor Collum has a right to express his views in his private life, we also have a right and an obligation to call out positions that are at direct odds with Cornell’s ethos,” they wrote.

Collum declined comment on Monday.

In each of the cases where campus officials were acting to quell complaints about racist behavior, they emphasized the steps they’re taking to prevent it.

Cornell’s police department is reviewing its policies and training related to de-escalation techniques and use of force, the university’s statement said, “to ensure that we never have this type of episode here.”

Even Jerry Falwell Jr., president of Liberty University, who typically responds to criticism with biting retorts, issued an apology on Monday for a widely condemned tweet. In it, Falwell said that while he opposed the mask mandate by Gov. Ralph S. Northam of Virginia, he’d consider wearing one that features a racist image pulled from the governor’s medical-school yearbook.

In his apology, Falwell wrote that he understood that the offensive tweet “refreshed the trauma that image had caused and offended some by using the image to make a political point.”